Re: standards

On Fri, 3 Sep 1999, Sarah Wright wrote:

> I've discussed with my colleagues about how the HTML code should be
> written in regards to case. Most people seem to like the HTML written in
> uppercase with attributes in lowercase...

I don't know about "most people" - styles seem to vary chaotically across
people and software packages, and sometimes within a single document! -
but this is my personal preference.  I also uppercase token-type attribute
values (e.g. align="CENTER") - this style emphasizes that the element name
is also the value of a distinguished token-type attribute (the generic
identifier.) 

> however after reading the XHTML 1.0 working draft document it states
> that all code should be written in lowercase. 

Actually, the WD had to choose, because names are case-sensitive in XML;
and when forced to choose, lower-case is advisable.

> What I would like to know is as XHTML is a working draft, how likely is
> it that it will become a standard, and if it doesn't, will the "all code
> must be written in lowercase" become a standard in the future? 

Not exactly "must", but perhaps more than "should":)

Case sensitivity is a hard-nut, and one of the reasons why I personally
think XML-ization of HTML is a bad idea.  That's not to say that XHTML per
se is useless - a form of HTML suitable for XML processors shouldn't be
ruled out - but I don't see the need to define a *standard* for HTML in
XML.


Arjun

Received on Friday, 3 September 1999 19:43:55 UTC