modification of the <dfn> element

• From: Mjumbe Ukweli <mpoe@cs.hmc.edu>
• Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2003 23:46:06 -0800 (PST)
• To: www-html@w3.org
• Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.4.44.0301292345380.23844-100000@turing>

small issue proposal:

I would like to suggest that the definition of the <dfn> element be
modified.  The meaning of the element currently is that whatever's between
the <dfn> and </dfn> tags is the term being defined.  However, this use of
an element when I think about it seems rather useless.  What good is it to
let an agent know that a term is going to be defined without telling the
agent where the definition is?  The only use I can see for <dfn /> is in
case a user wants to style definition terms differently than everything
else.

What might be better is to use the <dfn> element as if everything inside
of the <dfn> and </dfn> tags were the definition of some term.  Then if a
<term> element were introduced, the two elements together would be able to
be used to portray much more than the <dfn> element can alone.

-mjumbe

Received on Thursday, 30 January 2003 02:46:39 UTC