Re: DIV/CLASS: Mike Wexler: Re: HTML 3.2

> > How about:
> > 
> >    DIV document divisions
> >       Groups related elements together. Can be used with the CLASS
> >       attribute to create meaningful document divisions such as
> >       Chapter, Section, and Sub-section. 
> >       Can be used with ALIGN attribute to set the text alignment of the
> >       block of elements it conains. ALIGN can be one of LEFT, CENTER, or
> >       RIGHT. Requires start and end tags.
> > 
> > > I think the issue of the CLASS attribute could be opened up.
> 
> This is fine for the forthcoming version of HTML which supports
> style sheets. HTML 3.2 on the other hand captures the state of
> HTML as deployed in early `96.  ID and CLASS are therefore not
> part of HTML 3.2.
> 
> Check out the W3C drafts:  WD-object and WD-css1 for a glimpse
> of where things are going.

I have read both of these. There has been considerable discussion on
this list of adding some small, agreed upon things to HTML 3.2.
I know of no browsers that will fail because a CLASS attribute is
specified.

As far as the wording of DIV, even if the class attribute is not added
to HTML 3.2, saying that the sole purpose of DIV is to center things, is
very misleading. How about the following:

    DIV document divisions
       Groups related elements together. 
       Can be used with ALIGN attribute to set the text alignment of the
       block of elements it conains. ALIGN can be one of LEFT, CENTER, or
       RIGHT. Requires start and end tags.

While browsers are important users of HTML, content creation tools,
indexing engines, etc are also important. Just because there is no
visible effect of a tag in some particular browser, doesn't mean
it shouldn't be described.

Received on Tuesday, 14 May 1996 19:18:47 UTC