Re: text/html for xml extensions of XHTML

On Tue, 1 May 2001, Aaron Swartz wrote:
>
> Ian Hickson <ian@hixie.ch> wrote:
>
> > I don't hear anyone screaming for XSL to be sent as text/html, or CSS to
> > be sent as text/html -- why is XHTML a special case?
>
> Because XHTML is usually (always?) valid HTML.

Nope, XHTML is never valid HTML. One requires an "xmlns" attribute on the
root element, the other forbids it (for just one of the many differences).


> And most XHTML publishers want their documents to be visible in the
> vast number of browsers which do not understand XML. We cannot change
> these older browsers, but it should be relatively easy to change
> browsers that do understand XML.

But you can already do that. That's no problem, and works fine with
sending all text/html through HTML parsers. What people are arguing is
that text/html should be sent through _XML_ parsers on modern UAs, so that
namespaces can be processed... which immediately means that the document
would not work on older browsers, so the argument falls apart.

-- 
Ian Hickson                                            )\     _. - ._.)   fL
Invited Expert, CSS Working Group                     /. `- '  (  `--'
The views expressed in this message are strictly      `- , ) -  > ) \
personal and not those of Netscape or Mozilla. ________ (.' \) (.' -' ______

Received on Wednesday, 2 May 2001 04:45:13 UTC