- From: Lachlan Hunt <lachlan.hunt@lachy.id.au>
- Date: Thu, 09 Jul 2009 11:26:25 +0200
- To: Shelley Powers <shelleyp@burningbird.net>
- Cc: Sam Ruby <rubys@intertwingly.net>, www-archive@w3.org, "Michael(tm) Smith" <mike@w3.org>, Dan Connolly <connolly@w3.org>, Chris Wilson <Chris.Wilson@microsoft.com>
Shelley Powers wrote: > Right now, we have no commitment one way or another from Microsoft on > most aspects of HTML 5. According to Ian, Microsoft has the strongest > veto of all. If it were to come in and just make a statement -- no we're > not supporting Canvas, or MathML, or SVG, or any number of other > elements--, just a statement of fact, then supposedly, *poof*, they're > gone. I think this is a mischaracterisation and over exaggeration of the issue. It's not quite as simple as you make it out to be, and I think this is unnecessarily increasing the tension of the situation. When a vendor objects to implementing something, that doesn't result in the instant removal of the feature. Rather, we need to seek ways to resolve the situation and find some alternative that they will implement. When the requirement for Vorbis and Theora was first added to the spec, and Apple objected, we looked at the situation and searched long and hard for an alternative that would address their concerns. It's also worth nothing that the patent concerns expressed by Apple are also shared by Microsoft [1]. So if we were to include a requirement for Theora and Vorbis in the spec, when we attempt to move to Last Call, the likely result would be that we would get formal objections from both Apple and Microsoft, at which point would have to go through this whole debate again and probably end up right back where we are now. Interestingly, this issue is also occurring in relation to Web Fonts. From what I've been told, Microsoft have objected to supporting TTF/OTF in support of their own EOT format, and commercial font foundries are pushing for some form of DRM. This is why they're now debating the issue intensly on the www-font mailing list. So this situation certainly isn't unique to the HTMLWG. As for your concerns regarding the potential for features like canvas, MathML or SVG being removed, I think you're blowing this way out of proportion. In fact, Microsoft already expressed their opinion that having an immediate mode graphics API was a good thing [2]. However, their concerns were related to the feature being out of scope of the charter and whether the HTMLWG was the best place to develop it. Also, since the we've had a WG decision to include it, we've heard no further objections from them on the issue. I'm also not aware of them expressing any concern over the inclusion of MathML and SVG, and even though I'm not aware of them explicitly saying they will support it, we have no reason to assume they won't. In fact, I'm not particularly surprised that they haven't said they will support it, as they, like many companies, tend to keep information about future products confidential. Regading your concerns about XHTML, I've heard Chris Wilson on numerous occasions say that they are in favour of eventually supporting XHTML [3]. Although I have no information about when that will happen, I don't think we should be too concerned about them turning around and refusing to support it. [1] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2007Apr/0255.html [2] http://www.w3.org/2002/09/wbs/40318/req-gapi-canvas/results [3] http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2005/09/15/467901.aspx -- Lachlan Hunt - Opera Software http://lachy.id.au/ http://www.opera.com/
Received on Thursday, 9 July 2009 09:41:09 UTC