<PLAINTEXT> clarification [Was: DTD Level 2 nit ]

"Daniel W. Connolly" <connolly@hal.com>
Date: Wed, 5 Oct 94 16:37:03 EDT
Message-id: <9410052016.AA00328@ulua.hal.com>
Reply-To: connolly@hal.com
Originator: html-wg@oclc.org
Sender: html-wg@oclc.org
Precedence: bulk
From: "Daniel W. Connolly" <connolly@hal.com>
To: Multiple recipients of list <html-wg@oclc.org>
Subject: <PLAINTEXT> clarification [Was: DTD Level 2 nit ]
X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas
X-Comment: HTML Working Group (Private)

In message <QQxkiq08646.199410052001@relay3.UU.NET>, CN=Bruce Kahn/O=Iris@IRIS 
writes:
>
>  In particular, in 
>http://www.hal.com/products/sw/olias/Build-html/7L9WSWBuWpF84aK.html the text 
>states (pardon the formatting):

><PRE>
><plaintext>
><BR>0001 This is line one of a ling listing
><BR>0002 file from <any@host.inc.com> which is sent
></PRE>

Well... the formatting is part of the confusion here.  The <BR>'s in
the example are markup in the source of the example. The code that
comprises the example is just:

	<plaintext>
	0001 This is line one of a ling listing
	0002 file from <any@host.inc.com> which is sent

>http://www.hal.com/%7Econnolly/html-spec/L2index.html the Level 2 DTD 
>description states:
>
>PLAINTEXT
>
>Required Parts
>  <PLAINTEXT>characters...
>
>All Parts
>  <PLAINTEXT>characters...
></PLAINTEXT>
>
>Allowed In Content Of...
>  <HTML>
>
>This implys that the PLAINTEXT marker can be used w/in the HTML scope and 
>that it has an optional end marker.  This seems to be inconsistant with the 
>first description.  While this is not from the "prefered" DTD, it is 
>confusing (at least to me).  

This is why <PLAINTEXT> is obsolete. The specified syntax is not
expressible in SGML. It shouldn't really be in the DTD reference.
If you look at the "recommended" or "prescriptive" DTD reference,
you won't see any mention of PLAINTEXT.

>What I would like to know is, just how should the <PLAINTEXT> marker be 
>grok'd?  Should it be treated as a marker that means "Do no more HTML parsing 
>from now on" no matter what

This is how it was originally specified an implemented by TimBL.

> or should it be treated much like the <XMP> 
>marker except that it may or may not have an end marker?

This is how Mosiac implements it.

>?  I would appreciate 
>it if you could clear this up for me.

Well, you seem to understand it just about as well as anybody does.
How do _you_ think it should work?

I'd prefer that it be banned from the planet. Unfortunately, that
conflicts with the HTML Working Group charter a little bit ;-)


Dan