RE: Beta Validator usability suggestion

>  -----Original Message-----
>  From: www-validator-request@w3.org
>  [mailto:www-validator-request@w3.org]On Behalf Of Jeffrey Zeldman
>  Sent: June 13, 2003 1:07 PM
>  To: www-validator@w3.org
>  Cc: asjo@koldfront.dk; Karl Dubost
>  Subject: Beta Validator usability suggestion

>  Wouldn't it be helpful if the validation service itself explained the
>  error clearly, using the language of the FAQ? Or using some of the
>  language of the FAQ and linking to the complete explanation on the
>  FAQ page?

>  Clearer, more user-friendly error messages might help users
>  understand and fix errors instead of scratching their heads and
>  possibly giving up. This in turn might lead to more sites that fully
>  comply with W3C recommendations. It might also help designers and
>  developers feel that the W3C was speaking their language. And the
>  best part is, it's just replacing one stream of ASCII with another. ;)

Hello list,

While we're on the subject, it has come to my attention that many people I
work with who've tried using the validators after I've finally managed to
persuade them had such a bad experience with it they simply decided not to
bother with it and went on with their merry non-compliant lives.

As Jeffrey is saying, user-friendly messages would greatly help those of us
who try to push code validation into their neighboor's working habits. I
truly hope you will take the opportunity we have with this new version to
make this experience a little more pleasant and less frightening fir the
average user. There are a few improvement that have already been made,
particularily with the error message for the missing doctype (fallback), but
there's still much to do to make using these tools a positive, educational
experience for the web authors who want to learn using web standards.

Thank you for listening as well,

Denis Boudreau [ CYBERcodeur ]
CYBERcodeur.net - VDM - W3Qc - OpenWebGroup
Mail : denis@cybercodeur.net
ICQ : 115649885
WEB :  http://www.cybercodeur.net/
	http://w3qc.cybercodeur.net/
            http://www.openweb.eu.org/

Received on Friday, 13 June 2003 14:51:39 UTC