RE: please add Accept header to http request containing application/xhtml+xml

As someone who has been a long lurker here, I feel it might be time to
jump in finally :)

> I think people are reading too much into this, it's just an Accept 
> header, it's not a hack. Other high quality validators have an Accept 
> header [1]. I don't know why the idea sounds so 
> novel/evil/unreasonable 
> etc...

As folks have said, it is completely valid (in fact, mentioned exactly
in the spec) to not send one, right? You simply don't need one unless
you are trying to add request-specific behavior. If you did need one, I
would argue the correct one would be */*. The only reason to do
otherwise is if you're working around a bad browser (which is what I
think people were saying).

+1 for adding all or "*/*" as the accept header ;)

-1 for adding a specific one ;)

If I write a tutorial on XHTML to the spec, I don't see what the problem
is. They should use the correct charset and follow other specifications
too or they might as well not worry about using XHTML to start with.
XHTML is practically tangential to this, as it would affect other
content types too, right?


Martin Smith, Systems Developer
martins@bebr.ufl.edu
Bureau of Economic and Business Research
University of Florida
(352) 392-0171 Ext. 221 

 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: www-validator-request@w3.org 
> [mailto:www-validator-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Dean Edridge
> Sent: Monday, April 21, 2008 1:02 PM
> To: Etienne Miret
> Cc: David Dorward; www-validator@w3.org; Alexandre Alapetite
> Subject: Re: please add Accept header to http request 
> containing application/xhtml+xml
> 
> 
> Etienne Miret wrote:
> > I think that being able to specify a custom header will 
> only be useful 
> > to tech like people anyway (well, you need to know what 
> > content-negotiation is).But being such a person, I would much more 
> > appreciate to do it in the GUI than by editing the request URL.
> 
> Yes, I agree, a GUI Accept feature would be a good idea. But 
> I believe 
> that there should be an Accept header sent by default.
> 
> >
> >
> > So, I agree with the two additions you're asking for, but I want to 
> > stress the fact that people who want to use XHTML and to support IE 
> > will still have to do some dirty hacks.
> 
> Yes of course, I'm not suggesting otherwise, I agree with you 
> here. I'm 
> not trying to suggest that this would be some sort of magic 
> fix-all for 
> using XHTML on the web, I'm just saying that it would be a 
> step in the 
> right direction.
> 
> Put it this way; If I had to write a tutorial on how to use XHTML, I 
> would not want to have to include a line that says: "...but wait, 
> there's more, you'll have to add this extra line of code so 
> people can 
> validate your XHTML pages on the W3C Validator."
>  
> 
> 
> [1] http://validxhtml.org/validators/accept-header/
> 
> 
> 
> Dean Edridge
> 
>

Received on Monday, 21 April 2008 18:20:09 UTC