Re: HTML or XHTML - why do you use it?

Devon Y. wrote:

> Inspired by some of the comments in a recent thread (and several 
> websites debating it once in a while), I'm curious whether You use 
> HTML or XHTML, and why you choose either one over the other. Or do you 
> use some other markup language more often?
>
> As for me, it's a simple no brainer in favor of XHTML. Partly because 
> I feel it's eventually going to replace the older HTML versions. But 
> mostly because I use XSLT often and that makes HTML files "unreliable" 
> or useless to me. I don't lose anything in keeping my doc's as XHTML, 
> but I do gain all the XML support while keeping the HTML one's. I just 
> don't see any real benefits for me in HTML anymore, besides needing it 
> to display in IE.

In HTML, users made errors such as not quoting some attributes that 
needed quoted, etc.  This causes user agents to either screw up or try 
to fix it for the user.  This meant that some browsers worked and some 
didn't.  With XHTML, the rules are explicit.  All attributes are 
quoted.  All elements are closed.  End of story.  There is nothing left 
for the browser to try to fix because the browser is required to not 
show it if it isn't well formed.  This makes sure the XHTML is correct 
before deployment so nothing unexpected happens.

-- 
Brant Langer Gurganus
http://troop545.cjb.net/brant.xhtml