Re: Feature request: validation by snippet

Hi Olivier,

olivier Thereaux wrote:
> I agree that there would be indeed a "social" benefit in making the  
> fragment (or snippet) feature eventually happen:  it would make it  
> easier for developers to check chunks of code. I don't know if it  would 
> be useful for people who create web pages, but it would for  developers 
> of libraries, frameworks, CMS, dynamic sites etc - and I  reckon this is 
> the way most of the "profesional" web is being  authored today.

Thank you for the history and context of the feature.

And yes, while I'm a standards advocate in my spare time, I do work in 
the commercial industry and it's very rare that we make flat/static 
XHTML files that stay static. If we do, it is so they can get shipped to 
a third party that will chop it up to be integrated in a CMS or 
templating system, and generally, it does not guarantee a nice valid 
document at the end regardless of what effort we made to create valid 
templates.

>  side benefit: even someone with no understanding  whatsoever 
> of doctypes could just copy-paste the resulting markup,  and have a 
> perfectly valid document.

This is very useful for developers without a full understanding of good 
markup habits, and were simply told "to do it".


> David's worry that [[
> 
>> I also suspect that this will lead to questions such as "these two  
>> snippets validate fine, but when I put them together it doesn't  
>> validate anymore. Is the validator broken??!?1".
> 
> ]] is a valid one, but that just means that the output will have to  
> make it clear that the snippet is not a valid document.

I think this is very fair and a good disclaimer :)


>> Just one more small comment on the dev version: just by sight, the  
>> blue link text on blue background and the white/blue combination of  
>> the selected "tab" for each validation type may not pass contrast  
>> tests for accessibility - but I'm sure you are already aware of this.
> 
> 
> Yes, it was reported a couple of times already. I've made another  
> attempt at making the UI more contrasty yesterday:
> * made the text of the active tab dark gray (same text color as  hovered 
> tab)
>   not really my taste, but easier to read
> * tried using bold white text for links on the blue background
>   is it better?

The "tabs" are, but the "options link" which will go away(?) is not at 
the moment.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, I have very good eyesight for colours, so 
  I'm not always able to spot the contrast problems myself.

A very useful tool is a Firefox extension from JuicyStudio:
http://juicystudio.com/article/colour-contrast-analyser-firefox-extension.php


> I think the feature request is a good one, and I will record it in  
> bugzilla, with a pointer to this thread. Its development, however, is  a 
> trickier question: the current dev version of the validator goes  into 
> feature freeze within a few days, with a few bugs left to fix  before a 
> beta testing.
> so if someone wants to take this on now, or if all my bug fixes are  
> done and I have a chance to have a go at it early next week, then it  
> will go in 0.8.0, otherwise it will remain as an RFE up for the  taking 
> for the time being.

I sincerely hope this makes the release.

Thank you all for the discussion and your time. Your work is very much 
appreciated.


regards,
-steph

Received on Friday, 23 March 2007 03:27:03 UTC