Re: Who started "INvalidated HTML!"?

On Fri, 13 Mar 1998, Dan Connolly wrote:
> It would seem a more simple and effective to just
> follow the instructions on the draft and send their
> comments to www-html and/or www-html-editor. As
> far as I know, we never heard from them.

Well some of the IETF Internet Drafts make it explicit at the top that
they are drafts and that you shouldn't implement them and if you do
(because you're keen on running code and rough consensus and want to feed
implementation experience back into the design like a good IETFer)  then
you shouldn't complain when things change.  That's the down side of being
an early adopter.  I've been implementing the CIP v3 drafts and I'm more
than prepared to change my code to take account of changes in the drafts
(indeed I _expect_ to change the code as one of the reasons for doing it
was to see where the gotchas are in the drafts/design).  I notice that the
W3C bioler plate (from <URL:http://www.pantos.org/invalid/wilbur-d.dtd>)
says:

    This is subject to change, pending final approval by the W3C
    member companies. Changes are limited to bug fixes at this time.

so all you've got to do is show them that the changes were bug fixes.
Maybe the lesson to the W3C should be that the boiler plate should say
"here be dragons" right up until it becomes a recommendation?

If the folks with the "INvalidated HTML!" sites were really worried about
using stable HTML DTDs they should have stuck to HTML 2.0 until 3.2 was
changed to a recommendation.  No tears for them here; IMHO they've just
entered themselves for a "Bozo of the Week" award... :-)

However, if you really want to contact the Pantos chaps, why not just
use the webmaster feedback form for the whole Pantos site at
<URL:http://www.pantos.org/feedback.html>?  The webmaster may be the same
person that created the site or should at least be able to point you at
them.

Tatty bye,

Jim'll

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Jon "Jim'll" Knight, Researcher, Sysop and General Dogsbody, Dept. Computer
Studies, Loughborough University of Technology, Leics., ENGLAND.  LE11 3TU.
* I've found I now dream in Perl.  More worryingly, I enjoy those dreams. *

Received on Friday, 13 March 1998 11:59:37 UTC