RE: XHTML validation

On Monday, June 12, 2000 at 20:22, csgallagher@worldnet.att.net (ClintonGallagher) wrote:

> Probably the same reason you can put a napkin on your lap when
> you eat and still find food dripped all over yourself.

That was not productive. 

Bertilo was just expressing a common aggravation which many people wanting
to use the W3C validator are running into. Currently the W3C validator can
not handle XHTML. This is fairly obvious given the output from just about
any input. All it currently provides is a well-formedness check which is
(in all honesty) just about completely useless. 

Part of the problem is that the output page is ambiguous about what is
being reported. First it says the file is well-formed 

> Below are the results of checking this document for XML well-formedness. 

Then it makes a claim regarding validation:

> Congratulations, this document validates as XHTML 1.0 Strict! 

But if you read on to the end of the page you will encounter this caveat:

> This validator is based on SP, which has some limitations in its support
> for XML. 

and a link to <http://www.jclark.com/sp/xml.htm>

Work needs to be done on the W3C validator if it is ever going to be able
to validate XHTML. Read this message from Gerald Oskoboiny that addresses
this issue to some extent:

<http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-validator/2000JanMar/0166.html>

However, I believe that the W3C validator's current limitation go beyond
what is covered in the SP limitations page mentioned above as the HTMLHelp
validator is also based on SP and is able to provide a much more complete
analysis of XHTML documents. I think that the output from the W3C
validator when checking XHTML files could be more explicit than what is
currently provided.

That all said, if you want to validate your XHTML files right now, try the
HTMLHelp validator at

<http://www.htmlhelp.com/tools/validator/>

-- 
Cybernetic Humanoid Responsible for Infiltration and Sabotage

Received on Tuesday, 20 June 2000 13:17:23 UTC