Re: background-color not validating when it should

Well, I only joined the list for help with an install problem  
recently, but how can I resist the opportunity to take a contrarian  
position...

Warnings for potential accessibility issues seem like something that  
should be optional and off by default.  It's nice to have the choice  
to have the validator act like "Bobby", but that's not the primary  
reason why you would validate the CSS in today's world of XHTML and  
related formats that are not very forgiving of syntax errors.

> By that logic, no warning should ever be issued for anything.

By the opposite logic, warnings should always be issued for  
practically everything:

color: black;
background-color: white;

Warning: someone could override the background-color with a dopey  
user stylesheet to produce black-on-black text.

font-size: 12px;

Warning: someone might have a very big monitor.

div { font-size: 80%; }

Warning: nesting might shrink the font more than you expect.

Specifying margins might cause things to overlap.  Certain colors  
might offend cultural sensibilities.  Certain color combinations  
might not work for the color-blind.

Etc. etc.

I have dealt with accessibility checkers that would throw a warning  
for every instance of <pre> tags -- after all, someone could be  
making phony tables out of monospaced text and dashes.  When spotless  
markup is greeted with pages of warnings, it rapidly becomes  
counterproductive.

John

On Nov 19, 2006, at 10:25 AM, Robert Mullaney wrote:

> A 2-sided argument is pointless. I would not have posted this if I  
> knew only
> 1 person would get involved in the discussion.
>
> Doesn't anybody else have an opinion on this? Obviously we know my  
> point of
> view and David's. I find it impossible to believe nobody else has  
> anything
> to say.
>
> Thanks,
> Robert Mullaney
> Easy Business Services
> Phone: 239-242-6691 x 22
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Dorward,,, [mailto:david@us-lot.org] On Behalf Of David  
> Dorward
> Sent: Sunday, November 19, 2006 10:24 AM
> To: Robert Mullaney
> Cc: www-validator-css@w3.org
> Subject: Re: background-color not validating when it should
>
> On Sun, Nov 19, 2006 at 10:14:28AM -0500, Robert Mullaney wrote:
>> Regardless of value (provided it is valid), the code is correct  
>> per the
> CSS
>> specifications therefore a warning should not be issued.
>
> By that logic, no warning should ever be issued for anything.
>
> Warnings are not errors. The validator can produce errors and still
> produce the "Your code is valid" message.
>
> -- 
> David Dorward                                      http:// 
> dorward.me.uk
>
>
>
>

Received on Sunday, 19 November 2006 22:34:10 UTC