Re: [cssom-view] small update

Anne van Kesteren wrote:

> On Mon, 21 Apr 2008 15:26:33 +0200, Alan Gresley <alan@css-class.com> 
> wrote:
>> Where does it mention particular user agents that went with there own 
>> standard for far to many years, thus break interoperability.
> 
> We're not here to judge what browsers did, we try to make the best of 
> the situation. (Though if three out of four relevant browsers do the 
> same thing it's an easy choice.)


I'm not be judgmental of any user-agent. I talking about what's 
happening in the the 'real' world. The large world of authors out number 
implementers and specs writers many fold.

The W3C should be open to the feedback from authors but for one author 
(myself) speaking about many authors there is so much mis-understanding 
of the specs (that's even if such a spec is known about). The vast 
majority of web pages on the internet was only tested in one browser in 
quirk mode with a lot of prosperity code. That is a reality. Some 
authors take over these pages and attempt to code by the standards and 
they encounter this very steep learning curve.


>> We are in the present now but do we have to have this not breaking 
>> existing content haunting us for eternity. Some things must break 
>> (past errors) to move forward. This principle doesn't just lay with 
>> CSS or scripting (or other web languages) but in all area of life and 
>> society.
>>
>> The design principles (2.1. Support Existing Content) have a past and 
>> a present. I would rather this be more on the side of the present and 
>> the future.
> 
> This seems more relevant for author tutorials than a specification. A 
> specification defines how something should be implemented, it is not 
> documentation on how something is implemented in various implementations.


This is why I suggested it should be presented in a --'non-normative'-- 
manner. The specs are not just for implementers but for authors too. An 
author shouldn't have to hunt this down via googling.


I can support my argument with much evidence since I am on quite a few 
mailing list ranging from a typical Grandma coder to a Guru coder.


Alan

Received on Monday, 21 April 2008 14:08:16 UTC