Re: Minutes from 16th November WCAG WG telecon

At 10:36 PM +0000 11/20/00, Sean B. Palmer wrote:
>  > That's not really a "pure fact" -- it's just the holy scripture of
>>  what you happen to believe.  (In any case, the whole sentence from
>>  "if the Semantic Web..." to "...is going to cause problems" is
>  > very opaque even to a technical reader like myself.)
>Therefore, it appears to me that the only reason you believe that it isn't
>pure fact is that it is too "opaque" to you: i.e. you don't understand it.

No.  Don't presume that.

>  > The problem is that you think it matters whether or not HTML
>  > is SGML.
>Well, it clearly is, so that isn't the problem: to clarify, *all* markup is
>SGML. Thanks to the kind person who points out that SGML was invented by
>Charles Goldfarb.

You are arguing dogmatically.  You are arguing via "definition" and
assertion.

>  > Ultimately, it doesn't matter one way or another in the majority of
>>  real world applications; in a practical sense, it's at best an
>  > interesting bit of historical trivia.
>I don't follow. SGML *is* markup: it's the ISO standard for it, and it is a
>direct synonym of what we call markup. Are you saying that all markup is
>historical trivia (apparently you are).

I give up.

>  > A dogmatic insistence on
>You use the word "dogmatic" more than I use the word "implementation"!

Because you seem unable to present any logical arguments other than
"BUT SGML HAS TO BE THIS WAY!"  Has it ever occurred to you that SGML
may not be the object of perfection that you religiously wish it to
be?

>I suggest that anyone
>actually following this debate with any real interest rather than the comic
>value that I see it for should read up about the following subjects:-
>1. The History of the Web (early HTML etc. see www-talk)
>2. The Semantic Web, and it's design principles. Dan's comparison to the
>early Web is very useful (Dan Brickley)
>3. RDF Data Models/Syntax/Schema
>4. The History of MarkUp, SGML etc.
>5. Semantic User Interfaces
>At the end of researching and understanding that, I defy anyone to even use
>the phrase "presentational markup" in a rational discussion.

Yes, yes, the holy books.  I am glad you have found your religion.
I'm going to go back to working on making the web work, though; thanks
for the stimulating discussion!

--Kynn
-- 
Kynn Bartlett <kynn@idyllmtn.com>
http://www.kynn.com/

Received on Monday, 20 November 2000 18:39:57 UTC