Re: SVG crosswordplayer first release!!

On Sunday, December 7, 2003, 10:38:28 AM, Jim wrote:



JL> "Chris Lilley" <chris@w3.org> wrote in message
JL> news:682146176.20031207040800@w3.org...
>> On Saturday, December 6, 2003, 4:25:57 PM, Jim wrote:
>> JL> "Chris Lilley" <chris@w3.org> wrote in message
>> JL> news:193719788.20031205152731@w3.org...
>>
>> >> 6) Encourage SVG implementors to display warnings if they encounter
>> >> the old key events stuff.
>>
>> JL> Everything else I agree with except for this, don't show the users the
>> JL> technology...  They aren't equipped to do anything with the
JL> information.
>>
>> Designers don't like users seeing error messages.

JL> Sure, but requiring that all legacy content need be upgraded so the legacy
JL> content can be accessed on the new viewers is a very bad idea, the new
JL> viewers will be seen to be at fault not the content.

No, the reverse. If there is no message then the viewers that don't
implement old broken stuff are seen to be at fault. If there is a
message then its clear which content is broken.

Remember this isn't 'legacy' as in 'it was previously a standard' but
legacy as in 'nonstandard, proprietary extensions, relying on bugs in
a particular viewer'.

And without an error message, yes, new viewers will be seen to be at
fault. So they will be under pressure to reverse engineer bugs etc and
the format gets defined by reverse engineering and impenetrable
hueristics, not by the spec. See html browsers for where that  ends
up. The whoole mess of reverse engineered bu-alikes so so frasgile
that any forward movement in terms of spec compliance becomes
impossible, hence the sorry state of html browsers today that have not
improved significantly in three or four years.



-- 
 Chris                            mailto:chris@w3.org

Received on Sunday, 7 December 2003 08:27:03 UTC