Fwd: Re: Flagging & in URL in HTML 4.01 transitional type.

Mr. Heins is having problems posting.  Here is his email, which according
to the headers was originally intended for this mailing list.

--helpful Kynn

>Date: Fri, 8 Jun 2001 23:56:15 -0400
>From: Mike Heins <mheins@redhat.com>
>To: Kynn Bartlett <kynn@idyllmtn.com>
>Cc: www-validator@w3.org
>Subject: Re: Flagging & in URL in HTML 4.01 transitional type.
>Reply-To: mike@minivend.com
>
>Quoting Kynn Bartlett (kynn@idyllmtn.com):
>>  At 12:11 PM -0400 2001/6/08, Mike Heins wrote:
>>  >In my opintion that validation is pedantic, and should certainly not
>>  >be flagged in the HTML 4.01 transitional type.\
>>
>>  Well, duh.  All validation -is- pedantic.  That's the point.  If you're
>>  just going to say "I know the spec says this, and I don't care, and even
>>  if you have good reasons for it, it's still stupid" then you're not asking
>>  for real validation.  Not in the technical sense.
>
>Perhaps that is true. Yet why do we have an HTML 4.01 transitional
>spec, and an HTML 4.01 strict spec? And why does a C compiler have
>a -pedantic switch? And why does a program like lint(1) have differing
>levels?
>
>Maybe I am arguing that the HTML 4.01 transitional spec is wrong
>and should be changed. All I wanted to do was find out solid reasons
>why the validation flagged that, and I haven't found that out. No real
>reason for this has been shown other than the case of &copy=, and this
>is defended because the semicolon is optional in an entity, as defined by
>the spec. Why the heck would the semicolon be optional? What good reason
>could there be for that? No one seems to know or care. It is the spec,
>after all, and it must be validated. If that is the totality of the
>mission statement, congratulations to the authors.
>
>I think I just ended up on the wrong list.
>
>>
>>  If you don't care what the specification says or why it says it, why
>>  do you care if your code can be validated against it?  It's all about
>>  the pedantry, man.
>>
>>  Validation does not mean "the browsers will or won't accept it".  If
>>  that is what you think it means, then you need to do some research into
>>  what validation is REALLY about.
>>
>
>If you look at the dictionary definition of pedant, it has a word in
>the definition -- "needlessly".  And pedants are eventually ignored by
>most people, as I feel HTML 4 compliance is being ignored. I think
>have found out why.
>
>This list appears to be silently moderated and without charter, not
>allowing me to post or subscribe after my first post. I find that rude
>in the extreme, particularly so in a quasi-public forum.
>
>Thanks for your response, and please bid the folks there a kind adieu,
>as I cannot.
>
>--
>Red Hat, Inc., 3005 Nichols Rd., Hamilton, OH  45013
>phone +1.513.523.7621      <mheins@redhat.com>
>
>People who want to share their religious views with you
>almost never want you to share yours with them. -- Dave Barry


-- 
Kynn Bartlett <kynn@idyllmtn.com>
http://www.kynn.com/

Received on Saturday, 9 June 2001 12:30:22 UTC