Re: proposal for change of Flow.model

At Sun, Jul 25, 2004 at 06:07:29AM -0400, Sjoerd Visscher wrote:
> Now XHTML 2.0 uses Relax NG, it might be a good idea to use RNGs power
> to change Flow.model to what it really means: a choice between either
> text and inline elements, or block elements:

I agree with this reasoning 100%, and it's certainly one of the things plaguing authoring
tools, as I just completed a job in a company working with said tools.

However... just because the current modules are in RELAX NG doesn't mean the final schema
will be only in RELAX NG.  I have my bets on the RNG modules only being used to construct
the final schema, before converting it to its destination format(s).

> This means that the following would no longer be valid:
> 
>   <section>
>     Some text...
>     <p>Some more text in a paragraph.</p>
>   </section>

On the subject of mixing inline and block, I would argue that even this looks wrong:

  <section>
    Some text...
  </section>

Sure, it's some text in a section, but what the hell is it?  If the text represents a
paragraph, it should be marked up as a paragraph.

I have had the same nark with <div> since the beginning, where people see that it can
be done and immediately invent stuff like this:

  <div class="menu">
    <a href="...">...</a>
    <a href="...">...</a>
    <a href="...">...</a>
  </div>

Where, oh where has the meaning gone?  Why couldn't <div> have been explicitly block
level in the first place?  It would be good for all these authoring tools, _and_ for
humans who are doomed to try and understand other people's XHTML.

TX

-- 
'Every sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic' - Arthur C Clarke
'Every sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology' - Tom Graves

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