Re: standard out of the box (was: IE Blog: Internet Explorer 8 and Acid2: A Milestone)

I would like to see something that could be added to a CSS file that
> would allow me to specify code for IE6-7 that the standards-based
> browsers (including IE8) wouldn't see, or that would allow standards-
> based browsers to see code that IE6-7 wouldn't see.
>

you have it already, it's called "Conditional Comments"
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms537512.aspx

<!--[if IE 6]>
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="IE6.css" />
<![endif]-->


<!--[if IE 7]>
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="IE7.css" />
<![endif]-->



> Perhaps if all other browsers are supporting media queries by the
> time IE8 is released, then we could put all of our standards-based
> CSS inside a media query with a minimum screen width of 1px, and if
> IE8 saw that then it would render everything inside based on standards.
>
> Or perhaps there could be a rule like this:
>
> HTML { standards:true; }
>
> ...which would tell IE8 to switch to standards mode, and not render
> anything in an IE6-7 buggy way. That way corporate intranet
> applications would continue to render the old way without being
> rewritten, but more standards-oriented authors could lose all that
> baggage (and just use existing hacks to accommodate IE6-7 while they
> are still around).
>

So you are advocating to use something non standard to invoke the standard
mode in IE8? That doesn't really make sense. If it has to be done this way
it's way better to put it in some sort of comment that IE8 can parse, i.e.

<!--[IE_STANDARD_MODE]>

  But that would also mean that every single new standard complying page
ever written in the future will have to have it, not really what you want is
it?


> Ideally a standards:true would even work in documents with no doctype
> or with a 3.2 doctype, to get rid of the horrible rendering problems
> of IE quirks mode, since quirks mode is not so bad (even useful) in
> non-IE browsers.
>
>
If you have to put hands on your standard complying page with no DOCTYPE, to
add a tag that tells IE to go in standards mode, you better spend that time
to put there the right DOCTYPE instead.