RE: inline CSS (was: is anyone interested in XHTML?)

Daniel Hiester wrote:

> I just want to be sure we're all clear... "Tagsoup" is pretty much defined
> as what a lot of us (at least me personally) went through when we first
> started playing around with HTML, just kind of playing "monkey see, monkey
> do" with our markup, right? It's like, "Oh, well, if putting this here does
> that in this web browser, then that must be how it works! Neat!" without
> knowing how it really works in the specs. Hehehe... I remember the days when
> I used to use <br> instead of  <p> elements. :)

Pretty much.  Tag Soup looks kind of like markup, yet the purpose of any "Tag"
in it is to function as a formatting instruction.  The only benchmark is "How
does the page *look*?"  Arjun's previously referenced hair-raiser of MS Office
2000 is a perfect example:

	http://www.deja.com/=dnc/getdoc.xp?AN=587187495

That isn't markup.  It doesn't validate as SGML, XML, or anything I know of.  It
was designed so a document written in that nouveau-RTF would *look* the same in
MS Word as it does in Internet Explorer.  That's it.  That's all those poor
folks -- bless their hearts -- thought they needed to win our undying admiration
(and hence, dollars).

To return to this thread, Arjun's objection is that the contents of the style
attribute fall dangerously close to the "formatting instructions" of FONT, etc.
(<P> and <BR> are just formatting instructions for line breaks, doncha know; <P>
even gives you two of 'em :).  I have to agree with him.  It's a matter of
degree; I just don't see that

	<span class="foo">...</span>

is such a vast improvement over

	<span style="...">...</span>

that the latter needs to be sent to the Legacy Gulag.

Who came up with the term "Tag Soup", by the way?  Anybody know?  So
delightfully expressive.


/Jelks
[not affiliated with any CSS Working Group or Microsoft :)]

Received on Wednesday, 23 February 2000 00:00:06 UTC