Re: Some complaints about HTML 4.0

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At 12:31 AM 13/07/97 -0700, David Perrell wrote:
>Liam Quinn wrote:
>> So would you do away with the HTML 4.0 draft's comment concerning
>empty 
>> paragraphs:
>> 
>> | Empty P elements are bad form and should be ignored by the
>renderer.
>> (http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-html40/struct/text.html)
>
>The more I think about it, the more I question why any spec should be
>concerned with 'good form'. Why not consider <P></P> or <P><P> or
><P></some_enclosing_block_element> as an empty <P>element, with margins
>and linespacing still intact?
>
>This won't be specified by accident. Why prohibit it for the sake of
>'good form'?

It's not prohibited, just discouraged.  The spec should make statements 
like above, since otherwise browser vendors will make their own rules for 
interpreting empty paragraphs.  We need more consistency in browser 
vendors' interpretations, e.g., their interpretation of whitespace just 
before </TD> or the next <TD>.

>HTML 4.0 seems to be recognizing stylesheets as the preferred
>presentational markup, and that's wonderful. But I wonder how IMG fits
>into the above reference to Paragraphs. IMG can be either block or
>inline depending on context, can't it?

Structurally, IMG is always inline, AFAIK.  Presentationally, it's treated 
as a block-level element if it has {display: block}, {display: list-item}, 
{float: left}, or {float: right} in its style sheet.

>So how should this be rendered:
>
>  <P>Here's an image <IMG SRC=x>
>  <P>In the previous paragraph we saw an x-rated image.
>
>Should the image follow, inline, the text of the first paragraph, or
>should it be considered a block element? 

If there's no style sheet with any of the above declarations, then it 
should follow the text inline.

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Liam Quinn
===============  http://www.htmlhelp.com/%7Eliam/  ===============
Web Design Group            Enhanced Designs, Web Site Development
http://www.htmlhelp.com/    http://enhanced-designs.com/
======  PGP Key at http://www.htmlhelp.com/%7Eliam/pgp.html  =====

Received on Sunday, 13 July 1997 12:31:48 UTC