[Terry Allen: comments on HTML spec]

"Daniel W. Connolly" <connolly@hal.com>
Message-id: <9406101615.AA07825@ulua.hal.com>
To: html-ig@oclc.org
Subject: [Terry Allen: comments on HTML spec]
Date: Fri, 10 Jun 1994 11:15:19 -0500
From: "Daniel W. Connolly" <connolly@hal.com>
Content-Length: 58701

------- Forwarded Message

Message-Id: <199406091521.IAA15477@rock>
From: Terry Allen <terry@ora.com>
Date: Thu, 9 Jun 1994 08:21:05 PDT
X-Mailer: Mail User's Shell (7.2.0 10/31/90)
To: connolly@hal.com
Subject: comments on HTML spec
Cc: terry@rock.west.ora.com

I inserted comments beginning with >> rather than make changes in
the text (again).  See how this works for you.  I cut off the
text after the last comment.

| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                       Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)
|                    HYPERTEXT MARKUP LANGUAGE (HTML)
|                                    
|        An SGML Application Conforming to International Standard I
|      SO 8879 -- Standard Generalized Markup Language
|      
| About of this Document
| 
|    This document describes the current practice and current proposals
|    for future standardisation of HTML, as a basis for review and
|    enhancement.
|    
|    The document is a draft form of a standard for interchange of
|    information on the network which is proposed to be registered as a
|    MIME (RFC1521) content type.
|    
|    Please send comments to connolly@hal.com or the discussion list
|    www-html@info.cern.ch.
|    
|   VERSION
|   
|    This is version 2.0 of this document, (released $Date: 1994/06/03
|    22:18:28 $) It introduces forms for user input of information. This
|    feature is known as a level 2 feature of HTML. All other specified
|    features are known as level 1 features. Features of higher levels
|    which are under discussion, (such as tables, figures, and
|    mathematical formulae) where mentioned are described as "proposed".
|    
|    The latest version of this document is currently available in
|    hypertext on the World-Wide Web as
|    
| 
| http://www.hal.com/%7Econnolly/html-spec
| 
| Abstract
| 
|    HyperText Markup Language (HTML) 

>>is a structured text format that 

| can be used to represent
|    
|       Hypertext news, mail, online documentation, and collaborative
|       hypermedia;
|       
|       Menus of options;
|       
|       Database query results;
|       
|       Simple structured documents with inlined graphics.
|       
|       Hypertext views of existing bodies of information
|       
|    The World Wide Web (W3) initiative links related information
|    throughout the globe. HTML provides one simple format for providing
|    linked information, and all W3 compatible programs are required to
|    be capable of handling HTML. W3 uses an Internet protocol
|    (Hypertext Transfer Protocol, HTTP), which allows transfer
|    representations to be negotiated between client and server, the
|    result being returned in an extended MIME message. HTML is
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 2
| 
| 
|    therefore just one, but an important one, of the representations
|    used with W3.
|    
|    HTML is proposed as a MIME content type.
|    
|    HTML refers to the URI specification RFCxxxx.
|    
|    Implementations of HTML parsers and generators can be found in the
|    various W3 servers and browsers, in the public domain W3 code, and
|    may also be built using various public domain SGML parsers such as
|    [SGMLS] . HTML documents are SGML documents with fairly generic
|    semantics appropriate for representing information from a wide
|    range of applications.
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                             Vocabulary usied in the HTML specification
|                               VOCABULARY
|                                    
|    This specification uses the words below with the precise meaning
|    given.
|    
|   Representation         The encoding of information for interchange.
|                          For example, HTML is a representation of
|                          hypertext.
|                          
|   Rendering              The form of presentation to information to
|                          the human reader.
|                          
| Imperatives
| 
|   may                    The implementation is not obliged to follow
|                          this in any way.
|                          
|   must                   If this is not followed, the implementation
|                          does not conform to this specification.
|                          
|   shall                  as "must"
|                          
|   should                 If this is not followed, though the
|                          implementation officially conforms to the
|                          standard, undesirable results may occur in

>> conforms to THIS standard

|                          practice.
|                          
|   typical                Typical rendering is described for many
|                          elements. This is not a mandatory part of the
|                          standard but is given as guidance for
|                          designers and to help explain the uses for
|                          which the elements were intended.
|                          
| Notes
| 
|    Sections marked "Note:" are not mandatory parts of the
|    specification but for guidance only.
|    
| Status of features
| 
|   Mandatory              These features must be implemented in the
|                          rendering. Features are mandatory unless
|                          otherwise mentioned.
|                          
|   Optional               Standard HTML features which may safely be

>> what is the force of "Standard" here and s.v. Obsolete?

|                          ignored by parsers. It is legal to ignore
|                          these, treat the contents as though the tags
|                          were not there. (e.g. EM, and processing

>> PIs shouldn't have any content in the sense that elements have
content; what lies between <? and > should be ignored.

|                          instructions) . Authors should be awarethat
|                          these features may be ignored by some
|                          applications.
|                          
|   Proposed               The specification of these features is not
|                          final. They should not be regarded as part
|                          ofthe standard, but indicate possible
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 2
| 
| 
|                          directions for future versions.
|                          
|   Obsolete               Not standard HTML. Parsers should implement
|                          these features as far as possible in order to
|                          preserve back-compatibility with previous
|                          versions of this specification.
|                          
|    
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                          HTML and MIME
|                             HTML AND MIME
|                                    
|    The definition of the HTML content subtype is
|    
|   MIME Type name         text
|                          
|   MIME subtype name:     html
|                          
|   Required parameters:   none
|                          
|   Optional parameters:   level, version, charset
|                          
| Level
| 
|    The level parameter specifies the feature set which is used in the
|    document. The level is an integer number, implying that any
|    features of same or lower level may be present in the document.
|    Levels are defined by this specification.
|    
| Version
| 
|    In order to help avoid future compatibility problems, the version
|    parameter may be used to give the version number of this
|    specification to which the document conforms. The version number
|    appears at the front of this document and within public identifier
|    for the SGML DTD.

>> HTML DTD.

|    
| Character sets
| 
|    The base character set (the SGML BASESET) for HTML is ISO Latin-1.
|    This is the set referred to by any numeric character references .
|    The actual character set used in the representation of an HTML
|    document may be ISO Latin 1, or its 7-bit subset which is ASCII.
|    There is no obligation for an HTML document to contain any
|    characters above decimal 127. It is possible that a transport

>> queerly phrased:  "obligation"  What are you really trying
to say?

|    medium such as electronic mail imposes constraints on the number of
|    bits in a representation of a document, though the HTTP access
|    protocol used by W3 always allows 8 bit transfer.
|    
|    When an HTML document is encoded using 7-bit characters, then the
|    mechanisms of character references and entity references may be
|    used to encode characters in the upper half of the ISO Latin-1 set.
|    In this way, documents may be prepared which are suitable for
|    mailing through 7-bit limited systems.
|    
|   CHARACTER SET OPTION (PROPOSED)
|   
|    The SGML declaration specified ISO Latin 1 as the base character
|    set. The charset parameter is reserved for future use. Its intended


>> say what this parameter is, here.  An attribute somehwere?

|    significance is to override the base character set of the SGML
|    declaration. Support of character sets other than ISO-Latin-1 is
|    not a requirement for conformance with this specification.
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                     Hypertext Markup language and SGML
|                             HTML AND SGML
|                                    
|    This section describes the relationship between HTML and SGML, and
|    guides the newcomer through interpretation of the DTD . (This is
|    not a full tutorial on SGML, and in the event of any apparent
|    conflict, the SGML standard is definitive.)
|    
|    The HyperText Markup Language is an application conforming to
|    International Standard ISO 8879 -- Standard Generalized Markup
|    Language [ SGML ]. SGML is a system for defining structured
|    document types, and markup languages to represent instances of
|    those document types.
|    
|    Every SGML document has three parts:
|    
|       An SGML declaration, which binds SGML processing quantities and
|       syntax token names to specific values. For example, the SGML
|       declaration in the HTML DTD specifies that the string that opens
|       a tag is </ and the maximum length of a name is 34 characters.
|       
|       A prologue including one or more document type declarations,
|       which specifiy the element types, element relationships and
|       attributes, and references that can be represented by markup.
|       The HTML DTD specifies, for example, that the HEAD element
|       contains at most one TITLE element.
|       
|       An instance, which contains the data and markup of the document.
|       
|    We use the term HTML to mean both the document type and the markup
|    language for representing instances of that document type.
|    
|    The SGML declaration for HTML is given in the appendix ``SGML
|    Delcaration for HTML.'' It is implicit among WWW implementations.
|    
|    The prologue for an HTML document should look like:

>> should be, exactly, except for case.

|    
| 
|       <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3O//DTD W3 HTML 2.0//EN">
| 
|   NOTE: MISSING <DOCTYPE DECLARATION
|   
|    Many extant HTML documents do not contain a prologue.
|    Implementations are encouraged to infer the above prologue if the
|    document does not begin with <!.

>> "are encouraged to" but "should".  However, the string <!
is too short; when HTML3.0 happens, the entire doctype line
must be scanned.

| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                Structured Text in HTML
|                            STRUCTURED TEXT
|                                    
|    An HTML instance is like a text file, except that some of the
|    characters are interpreted as markup. The markup gives structure to
|    the document.
|    
|    The instance represents a hierarchy of elements. Each element has a
|    name , some attributes , and some content. Most elements are
|    represented in the document as a start tag, which gives the name
|    and attributes, followed by the content, followed by the end tag.
|    For example:
|    
| 
|         <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3O//DTD W3 HTML 2.0//EN">
|         <HTML>
|           <HEAD>
|             <TITLE>
|               A sample HTML document
|             </TITLE>
|           </HEAD>
| 
|           <BODY>
|             <H1>
|               An Example of Structure
|               <br>
|               In HTML
|             </H1>
|             <P>
|               Here's a typical paragraph.
|             <UL>
|               <LI>
|                 Item one has an
|                 <A NAME="anchor">
|                   anchor
|                 </A>
|               <LI>
|                 Here's item two.
|             </UL>
|           </BODY>
|         </HTML>
| 
|    Some elements (e.g. BR) are empty. They have no content. They show
|    up as just a start tag.
|    
|    For the rest of the elements, the content is a sequence of data
|    characters and nested elements. Some things such as forms and
|    anchors cannot be nested, in which case this is mentioned in the

>> in the text below.

|    text. Anchors and character highlighting may be put inside other
|    constructs.
|    
| Tags

>> repetitious of the above

|    Most elements start and end with tags. Empty elements have no end
|    tag. Start tags are delimited by <and >, and end tags are delimited
|    by </ and >. For example:
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 2
| 
| 
|    
| 
|         <h1> ... </H1>   <!-- uppercase = lowercase  -->
|         <h1 > ... </h1 > <!-- spaces OK before > -->
| 
|    The following are not valid tags:
|    
| 
|         < h1>             <!-- this is not a tag at all -->

>>perfectly valid:  it's a start tag.  Combine this section
with previous or move it to before previous.

|         <H1/> <H=1>       <!-- these are markup errors -->
| 
|   NOTE: SHORTTAG
|   
|    The SGML declaration for HTML specifies SHORTTAG YES , which means
|    that there are some other valid syntaxes for tags, e.g. NET tags:

>> NET = null end tag

|    <em/.../ , empty start tags: <> , empty end tags: </> . Until such
|    time as support for these idioms is widely deployed, their use is
|    strongly discouraged.
|    
|    The start and end tags for the HTML, HEAD, and BODY elements are
|    omissable. The end tags of some other elements (e.g. P, LI, DT, DD)
|    can be ommitted (see the DTD for details). This does not change the
|    document structure -- the following documents are equivalent:
|    
| 
|         <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3O//DTD W3 HTML 2.0//EN">
|           <TITLE>Structural Example</TITLE>
|           <H1>Structural Example</H1>
|           <P>A paragraph...
| 
|         <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3O//DTD W3 HTML 2.0//EN">
|           <HTML><HEAD>
|           <TITLE>Structural Example</TITLE>
|           </HEAD>
|           <BODY>
|           <H1>Structural Example</H1>
|           <P>A paragraph...</P>
|           </BODY>
| 
|   NAMES
|   
|    The element name immediately follows the tag open delimiter. Names
|    consist of a letter followed by up to 33 letters, digits, periods,
|    or hyphens. Names are not case sensitive. For example:
|    
| 
|         A H1 h1 another.name name-with-hyphens
| 
|   ATTRIBUTES
|   
|    In a start tag, whitespace and attributes are allowed between the
|    element name and the closing delimiter. An attribute consists of a
|    name, an equal sign, and a value. Whitespace is allowed around the
|    equal sign.
|    
|    The value is either:
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 3
| 
| 
|    
|       A string literal, delimited by single quotes or double quotes,
|       or
|       
|       A name token; that is, a sequence of letters, digits, periods,
|       or hyphens.
|       
|    For example:
|    
| 
|         <A HREF="http://host/dir/file.html">
|         <A HREF=foo.html >
|         <IMG SRC="mrbill.gif" ALT="Mr. Bill says, &#34;Oh Noooo&#34;">
| 
|    The length of an attribute value (after replacing entity and
|    numeric character referencees) is limited to 1024 characters.
|    
|   NOTE: UNQUOTED ATTRIBUTE VALUE LITERALS
|   
|    Some implementations allowed any character except space or '>' in a
|    name token, for example <A HREF=foo/bar.html> . As a result, there
|    are many documents that contain attribute values that should be
|    quoted but are not. While parser implementators are encouraged to
|    support this idiom, its use in future documents is stictly
|    prohibited.
|    
|   NOTE: > IN ATTRIBUTE VALUE LITERALS
|   
|    Some implementations also consider any occurence of the > character
|    to signal the end of a tag. For compatibility with such
|    implementations, it may be necessary to represent > with an entity
|    or numeric character reference; for example: <IMG SRC="eq1.ps"
|    ALT="a &#62; b">
|    
|    Attributes with a delcared value of NAME (e.g. ISMAP, COMPACT) may
|    be written using a minimized syntax. The markup:
|    
| 
|         <UL COMPACT="COMPACT">
| 
|    can be written as
|    
| 
|         <UL COMPACT>
| 
| Undefined tag and attribute names
| 
|    It is a principle to be conservative in that which one produces,
|    and liberal in that which one accepts. HTML parsers should be
|    liberal except when verifying code. HTML generators should generate
|    strictly conforming HTML.
|    
|    The behaviour of WWW applications reading HTML documents and
|    discovering tag or attribute names which they do not understand
|    should be to behave as though, in the case of a tag, the whole tag
|    had not been there but its content had, or in the case of an
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 4
| 
| 
|    attribute, that the attribute had not been present.
|    
| Character Data
| 
|    The charcters between the tags represent text in the ISO-Latin-1
|    character set, which is a superset of ASCII. Because certain
|    characters will be interpreted as markup, they should be "escaped";
|    that is, represented by markup -- entity or numeric character
|    references. For example:
|    
| 
|                 When a&#60;b, we can show that...
|                 Brought to you by AT&amp;T
| 
|    The HTML DTD includes entities for each of the non-ASCII characters
|    so that one may reference them by name if it is inconvenient to
|    enter them directly:
|    
|            Kurt G&ouml;del was a famous logician and mathematician.

>>Dan, this is the method that should be encouraged, because the source
is then portable among systems that may not used ISO-Latin1 in
their text-entry environment.  ISO-Latin1 may be the native charset
of WWW, but it's not everyone's native charset; yet they can
still use &amp; rather than &#60;

|   NOTE: MARKUP CHARACTERS
|   
|    To ensure that a string of characters has no markup, it is
|    sufficient to represent all occurrences of < , > , and & by
|    character or entity references.
|    
|   NOTE: CDATA, RCDATA
|   
|    There are SGML features ( CDATA , RCDATA ) to allow most < , > ,
|    and & characters to be entered without the use of entity or
|    character references. Because these features tend to be used and
|    implemented inconsistently, and because they require 8-bit
|    characters to represent non-ASCII characters, they are not employed
|    in this version of the HTML DTD. An earlier HTML specification
|    included an XMP element whose syntax is not expressible in SGML.
|    Inside the XMP , no markup was recognized except the </XMP> end
|    tag. While implementations are encouraged to support this idiom,
|    its use is obsolete.

>>I think implementations should not be so encouraged; time to
stamp it out now.  It was never legal.  Perfect backward 
compatibility is impossible with broken instances.

|   COMMENTS
|   
|    To include comments in an HTML document that will be ignored by the
|    parser, surround them with <!-- and -->. After the comment
|    delimiter, all text up to the next occurrence of -- is ignored.
|    Hence comments cannot be nested. Whitespace is allowed between the
|    closing -- and >. (But not between the opening <! and --.)
|    
|    For example:
|    
| <HEAD>
| <TITLE>HTML Guide: Recommended Usage</TITLE>
| <!-- Id: Text.html,v 1.6 1994/04/25 17:33:48 connolly Exp -->
| </HEAD>
| 
|   NOTE: TAGS IN COMMENTS
|   
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 5
| 
| 
|    Some historical implementations incorrectly consider a > sign to
|    terminate a comment.
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                       Elements of HTML
|                             HTML ELEMENTS
|                                    
|    This is a discussion of the elements in the HTML language, and how
|    they interact to represent documents.
|    
| The HTML Document Element
| 
|    An HTML document is organized as a HEAD and a BODY, much like memo
|    or a mail message:
|    
| 
|           HTML
|           |
|           |_head
|           |_body
| 
|    The HEAD element is an small unordered collection of information
|    about the document, whereas the BODY is an ordered sequence of
|    information elements of arbitrary length. This organization allows
|    an implementation to determine certain properties of a document --
|    the title, for example -- without parsing the entire document.
|    
| Information in the HEAD Element
| 
|   TITLE                  The title of the document
|                          
|   ISINDEX                Sent by a server in a searchable document
|                          
|   NEXTID                 A parameter used by editors to generate
|                          unique identifiers
|                          
|   LINK                   Relationship between this document and
|                          another. See also the Anchor element ,
|                          Relationships . A document may have many LINK
|                          elements.
|                          
|   BASE                   A record of the URL of the document when
|                          saved

What does "when saved" mean?

|                          
|   PROPOSED HEAD ELEMENTS
|   
|   EXPIRES                The date after which the document is invalid.
|                          Semantics as in the HTTP specification.
|                          
|   OBSOLETE HEAD ELEMENTS
|   
|   META                   A wrapper for an HTTP element
|                          
| Body Elements (level 1)
| 
|    The order of the contents of the BODY element should be preserved
|    when it is rendered on the output device.
|    
|   HYPERTEXT ANCHORS
|   
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 2
| 
| 
|   Anchors                Sections of text which form the beginning
|                          and/or end of hypertext links are called
|                          "anchors" and defined by the A tag.
|                          
|   BLOCK ELEMENTS
|   
|    These elements typically stack vertically in the rendered flow of


>> These *kinds of elements*, if you don't want to give the element
names directly.

|    text. Whitespace between them is ignored.
|    
|   Headings               Several levels of headings are supported.
|                          
|   Paragraph              The P element represents a paragraph.
|                          
|   Horizontal Rule        A horizontal dividing line
|                          
|   Address style          Used to represent authorship or status of a
|                          document
|                          
|   Blockquote style       A block of text quoted from another source.
|   Lists                  Bulleted lists, glossaries, etc.

>> Glossary *lists*, not Glossaries

|   Preformatted text      Sections in fixed-width font for preformatted
|                          text.
|                          
|   INLINE ELEMENTS
|   
|    These elements fall left to right in the rendered flow of text.

>> better, these elements cause no line breaks

|    Whitespace between them separates words, except in the PRE element,
|    where it has its literal ASCII meaning.

>>what does that mean?  that white space shouldn't be collapsed in
PRE but should be everywhere else?

|   Special Phrases        Emphasis, typographic distinctions, etc.
|                          
|   Line Breaks            Indicates a line break in a flow of text.

>> doesn't belong here; goes above with Block Els?

|   IMG                    The IMG tag allows inline graphics.
|                          
| Body elements (level 2)
| 
|   ELEMENTS FOR FORMS
|   
|    The FORM element and various other elements allowed only within it
|    describe forms which allow user input.
|    
|   FORM elements          FORM, INPUT, SELECT, OPTION, TEXTAREA, etc
|                          
| Obsolete elements
| 
|    The other elements are obsolete but should be recognised by parsers
|    for back-compatibility.
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                       HEAD -- Elements
|                                  HEAD
|                                    
|    The HEAD element contains all information about the document in
|    general. It does not contain any text which is part of the
|    document: this is in the BODY. Within the head element, only
|    certain elements are allowed.

>>without suggesting a change here, I have to remark that I consider
TITLE part of the content of the document, just as the title of a
book is content.

|    
| Jun  3 17:22 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                              The TITLE element in HTML
|                                 TITLE
|                                    
|    The title of a document is specified by the TITLE element. The
|    TITLE element must occur in the HEAD of the document.
|    
|    There may only be one title in any document. It should identify the
|    content of the document in a fairly wide context.
|    
|    It may not contain anchors, paragraph marks, or highlighting. The
|    title may be used to identify the node in a history list, to label
|    the window displaying the node, etc. It is not normally displayed
|    in the text of a document itself. Contrast titles with headings .
|    The title should ideally be less than 64 characters in length. That
|    is, many applications will display document titles in window
|    titles, menus, etc where there is only limited room. Whilst there
|    is no limit on the length of a title (as it may be automatically
|    generated from other data), information providers are warned that
|    it may be truncated if long.
|    
|   EXAMPLES OF USE
|   
|    Appropriate titles might be
|    
|                 <TITLE>Rivest and Neuman. 1989(b)</TITLE>
| 
|    or
|    
|                 <TITLE>A Recipe for Maple Syrup Flap-Jack</TITLE>
| 
|    or
|    
|                 <TITLE>Introduction -- AFS user's Guide</TITLE>
| 
|    Examples of inappropriate titles are those which are only
|    meaningful within context,
|    
|                 <TITLE>Introduction</TITLE>
| 
|    or too long,
|    
|         <TITLE>Remarks on the Quantum-Gravity effects of "Bean
|         Pole" diversification in Mononucleosis patients in Developing
|         Countries under Economic Conditions Prevalent during
|         the Second half of the Twentieth Century, and Related Papers:
|         a Summary</TITLE>
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                ISINDEX element in HTML
|                                ISINDEX
|                                    
|    This element informs the reader that the document is an index
|    document. As well as reading it, the reader may use a keyword
|    search.
|    
|    The node may be queried with a keyword search by suffixing the node
|    address with a question mark, followed by a list of keywords
|    separated by plus signs. See the network address format .
|    
|    Note that this tag is normally generated automatically by a server.
|    If it is added by hand to an HTML document, then the client will
|    assume that the server can handle a search on the document.
|    Obviously the server must have this capability for it to work:
|    simply adding <ISINDEX> in the document is not enough to make
|    searches happen if the server does not have a search engine!
|    
|    Status: standard.
|    
| Example of use:
| 
|                 <ISINDEX>

>> should remark that this should not be implemented a la Mosaic,
as a field in the flow of the text.

| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                       LINK -- Elements
|                                  LINK
|                                    
|    The LINK element occurs within the HEAD element of an HTML
|    document. It is used to indicate a relationship between the
|    document and some other object. A document may have any number of
|    LINK elements.
|    
|    The LINK element is empty, but takes the same attributes as the
|    anchor element .
|    
|    Typical uses are to indicate authorship, related indexes and
|    glossaries, older or more recent versions, etc. Links can indicate
|    a static tree structure in which the document was authored by
|    pointing to a "parent" and "next" and "previous" document, for
|    example.
|    
|    Servers may also allow links to be added by those who do not have
|    the right to alter the body of a document.
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                               The BASE element in HTML
|                                  BASE
|                                    
|    This element allows the URL of the document itself to be recorded
|    in situations in which the document may be read out of context.
|    URLs within the document may be in a "partial" form relative to
|    this base address.
|    
|    Where the base address is not specified, the reader will use the
|    URL it used to access the document to resolve any relative URLs.
|    
|    The one attribute is:
|    
|   HREF                   the URL
|                          
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                      Tags used in HTML
|                                NEXT ID
|                                    
|    This tag takes a single attribute which is the number of the next
|    document-wide numeric identifier to be allocated of the form z123.
|    
|    When modifying a document, old anchor ids should not be reused, as

>>don't say this; one might want to reuse old anchors.  Say that if you
do reuse old anchors, then:

|    there may be references stored elsewhere which point to them. This
|    is read and generated by hypertext editors. Human writers of HTML
|    usually use mnemonic alphabetical identifiers. Browser software may
|    ignore this tag.
|    
| Example of use:
| 
|                 <NEXTID N=z27>
| 
| 
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                               The BODY element in HTML
|                                  BODY
|                                    
|    The BODY element contains all the information which is part of the
|    document, as opposed information about the document which is in the
|    HEAD .
|    
|    The elements within the BODY element are in the order in which they
|    should be presented to the reader.
|    
|    See the list of things which are allowed within a BODY element .
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                             The Anchor element in HTML
|                                ANCHORS
|                                    
|    An anchor is a piece of text which marks the beginning and/or the
|    end of a hypertext link.
|    
|    The text between the opening tag and the closing tag is either the
|    start or destination (or both) of a link. Attributes of the anchor
|    tag are as follows.
|    
|   HREF                   OPTIONAL. If the HREF attribute is present,
|                          the anchor is sensitive text: the start of a
|                          link. If the reader selects this text, (s)he
|                          should be presented with another document
|                          whose network address is defined by the value
|                          of the HREF attribute . The format of the
|                          network address is specified elsewhere . This
|                          allows for the form HREF="#identifier" to
|                          refer to another anchor in the same document.
|                          If the anchor is in another document, the
|                          attribute is a relative name , relative to
|                          the documents address (or specified base
|                          address if any).
|                          
|   NAME                   OPTIONAL. If present, the attribute NAME
|                          allows the anchor to be the destination of a
|                          link. The value of the attribute is an
|                          identifier for the anchor. Identifiers are
|                          arbitrary strings but must be unique within
|                          the HTML document. Another document can then
|                          make a reference explicitly to this anchor by
|                          putting the identifier after the address,
|                          separated by a hash sign .
|                          
|   REL                    OPTIONAL. An attribute REL may give the
|                          relationship (s) described by the hypertext
|                          link. The value is a comma-separated list of
|                          relationship values. Values and their
|                          semantics will be registered by the HTML
|                          registration authority . The default

>> who is that?
this gives false hopes of interoperability, which one can never get
with an open set of attribute values

|                          relationship if none other is given is void.
|                          REL should not be present unless HREF is
|                          present. See Relationship values , REV .
|                          
|   REV                    OPTIONAL. The same as REL , but the semantics
|                          of the link type are in the reverse
|                          direction. A link from A to B with REL="X"
|                          expresses the same relationship as a link
|                          from B to A with REV="X". An anchor may have
|                          both REL and REV attributes.
|                          
|   URN                    OPTIONAL. If present, this specifies a
|                          uniform resource number for the document. See

>> for the document that contains it?

|                          note .
|                          
|   TITLE                  OPTIONAL. This is informational only. If
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 2
| 
| 
|                          present the value of this field should equal
|                          the value of the TITLE of the document whose
|                          address is given by the HREF attribute. See
|                          note .

>> ick; never knew about that.

|   METHODS                OPTIONAL. The value of this field is a string
|                          which if present must be a comma separated

>>should be, not must.  Other values will parse.
|                          list of HTTP METHODS supported by the object
|                          for public use. See note .
|                          
|    All attributes are optional, although one of NAME and HREF is
|    necessary for the anchor to be useful. See also: LINK .
|    
| Example of use:
| 
|         See <A HREF="http://info.cern.ch/">CERN</A>'s information for
|         more details.
| 
|         A <A NAME=serious>serious</A> crime is one which is associated
|         with imprisonment.
|
|         The Organization may refuse employment to anyone convicted
|         of a <a href="#serious">serious</A> crime.
| 
| 
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                          URN -- MarkUp
|                   NOTE : UNIVERSAL RESOURCE NUMBERS
|                                    
|    URNs are provided to allow a document to be recognized if duplicate
|    copies are found. This should save a client implementation from
|    picking up a copy of something it already has.
|    
|    The format of URNs is under discussion (1993) by various working
|    groups of the Internet Engineering Task Force.
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                     Note: On TITLE attributes of links
|                     NOTE: TITLE ATTRIBUTE OF LINKS
|                                    
|    The link may carry a TITLE attribute which should if present give
|    the title of the document whose address is given by the HREF
|    attribute.
|    
|    This is useful for at least two reasons
|    
|       The browser software may chose to display the title of the
|       document as a preliminary to retrieving it, for example as a
|       margin note or on a small box while the mouse is over the
|       anchor, or during document fetch.

>>Except that this isn't really the title of the doc, which may have
changed, or the TITLE att may have been given the wrong value.
	
|       Some documents -- mainly those which are not marked up text,
|       such as graphics, plain text and also Gopher menus, do not come
|       with a title themselves, and so putting a title in the link is
|       the only way to give them a title. This is how Gopher works.

>>this doesn't give the docs titles at all; the whole mechanism 
duplicates the effect of providing the string as the content of the A.
You might say it attributes titles to docs.

|       Obviously it leads to duplication of data, and so it is
|       dangerous to assume that the title attribute of the link is a
|       valid and unique title for the destination document.
|       
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                LinkMethods -- Elements
|                    NOTE: METHODS ATTRIBUTE OF LINKS
|                                    
|    The METHODS attributes of anchors and links are used to provide
|    information about the functions which the user may perform on an
|    object. These are more accurately given by the HTTP protocol when
|    it is used, but it may, for similar reasons as for the TITLE
|    attribute, be useful to include the information in advance in the
|    link.
|    
|    For example, The browser may chose a different rendering as a
|    function of the methods allowed (for example something which is
|    searchable may get a different icon)
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                               Heading elements in HTML
|                                HEADINGS
|                                    
|    Six levels of heading are supported. (Note that a hypertext node
|    within a hypertext work tends to need fewer levels of heading than
|    a work whose only structure is given by the nesting of headings.)

>>just your opinion.  please delete 

|    A heading element implies all the font changes, paragraph breaks
|    before and after, and white space (for example) necessary to render
|    the heading. Further character emphasis or paragraph marks are not
|    required in HTML.
     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>may be required by content:  delete that too.

|    H1 is the highest level of heading, and is recommended for the
|    start of a hypertext node. It is suggested that the the text of the
|    first heading be suitable for a reader who is already browsing in
|    related information, in contrast to the title tag which should
|    identify the node in a wider context.
|    
|    The heading elements are
|    
|                 <H1>, <H2>, <H3>, <H4>, <H5>, <H6>
| 
|    It is not normal practice to jump from one header to a header level
|    more than one below, for example for follow an H1 with an H3.

>>people do it all the time, and you've done it yourself.  It doesn't
help to talk about "normal practice."

|    Although this is legal, it is discouraged, as it may produce
|    strange results for example when generating other representations
|    from the HTML.
|    
| Example:

example of what re previous note?

| 
|                 <H1>This is a heading</H1>
|                 Here is some text
|                 <H2>Second level heading</H2>
|                 Here is some more text.
| 
| Parser Note:
| 
|    Parsers should not require any specific order to heading elements,
|    even if the heading level increases by more than one between
|    successive headings.
|    
| Typical Rendering
| 
|   H1                     Bold very large font, centered. One or two
|                          lines clear space between this and anything
|                          following. If printed on paper, start new
|                          page.
|                          
|   H2                     Bold, large font,, flush left against left
|                          margin, no indent. One or two clear lines
|                          above and below.
|                          
|   H3                     Italic, large font, slightly indented from
|                          the left margin. One or two clear lines above
|                          and below.
|                          
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 2
| 
| 
|   H4                     Bold, normal font, indented more than H3. One
|                          clear line above and below.
|                          
|   H5                     Italic, normal font, indented as H4. One
|                          clear line above.
|                          
|   H6                     Bold, indented same as normal text, more than
|                          H5. One clear line above.
|                          
|    These typical values are just an indication, and it is up to the
|    designer of the presentation software to define the styles. The
|    reader may have options to customize these. When writing documents,
|    you should assume that whatever is done it is designed to have the
|    same sort of effect as the styles above.
|    
|    The rendering software is responsible for generating suitable
|    vertical white space between elements, so it is NOT normal or
|    required to follow a heading element with a paragraph mark.

>>it certainly is if a para follows a heading.  Say instead that
it is not necessary to obtain white space to use a P HERE.

| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                     Paragraphs in HTML
|                              P: PARAGRAPH
|                                    
|    The empty P element represents a paragraph. The exact rendering of
|    this (indentation, leading, etc) is not defined here, and may be a
|    function of other tags, style sheets etc.
|    
|    You do NOT need to use <P> to put white space around heading, list,
|    address or blockquote elements. It is the responsibility of the
|    rendering software to generate that white space. An empty paragraph
|    has undefined effect and should be avoided.
|    
| Typical rendering
| 
|    Typically, paragraphs are surrounded by a small vertical space (of
|    a line or half a line). This is not the case (typically) within
|    ADDRESS or (ever) within PRE elements. With some implementations,
|    normal paragraphs may have a small extra left indent on the first
|    line.
|    
| Examples of use
| 
|         <h1>What to do</h1>
|         <p>This is a one paragraph.<P>This is a second.
|         <P>
|         This is a third.
| 
| Bad example
| 
|         <h1><P>What not to do</h1>
|         <address><p>I found that on my XYZ browser it looked prettier
| to
|         me if I put some paragraph tags</address>
|         <p>
|         <ul><p><li>Around lists, and
|         <li>Inside headings.
|         </ul>
|         <p>
|         <h2>None of the paragraph tags in this example should
|         be there.</h2>
| 
| See also
| 
|    Line Break
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                    Line Breaks in HTML
|                               LINE BREAK
|                                    
|    The line break element marks that a new line must be started at the
|    given point.
|    
| Typical rendering
| 
|    A new line with indent the same as that of line-wrapped text.
|    
| Examples
| 
|                 <ADDRESS>Tim Berners-Lee<BR>
|                 World Wide Web project<BR>
|                 CERN<BR>1211 Geneva 23<BR>Switzerland
|                 </ADDRESS>
| 
|                 I think that I shall never see<BR>
|                 A hoarding lovely as a tree<BR>
|                 In fact, unless the hoardings fall<BR>
|                 I'll never see a tree at all.<P>
| 
| 
| 
| See also:
| 
|    the P (paragraph) element
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                   Highlighting in HTML
|                         CHARACTER HIGHLIGHTING
|                                    
|    Status: Extra
|    
|    These elements allow sections of text to be formatted in a
|    particular way, to provide emphasis, etc. The tags do NOT cause a
|    paragraph break, and may be used on sections of text within
|    paragraphs.
|    
|    Where not supported by implementations, like all tags, these tags
|    should be ignored but the content rendered.
|    
|    All these tags have related closing tags, as in
|    
|                 This is <EM>emphasized</EM> text.
| 
|    Some of these styles are more explicit than others about how they
|    should be physically represented. The logical styles should be used

>>too prescriptive; say "may produce better results"

|    wherever possible, unless for example it is necessary to refer to
|    the formatting in the text. (Eg, "The italic parts are mandatory".)
|    
|   NOTE:
|   
|    Browsers unable to display a specified style may render it in some
|    alternative, or the default, style, with some loss of quality for
|    the reader. Some implementations may ignore these tags altogether,
|    so information providers should attempt not to rely on them as
|    essential to the information content.
|    
|    These element names are derived from TeXInfo macro names.
|    
| Physical styles
| 
|   TT                     Fixed-width typewriter font.
|                          
|   B                      Boldface, where available, otherwise
|                          alternative mapping allowed.
|                          
|   I                      Italic font (or slanted if italic
|                          unavailable).

>>do you want to say what I get if I <b><i>do this?</></>

|   U                      Underline.
|                          
| Logical styles
| 
|   EM                     Emphasis, typically italic.
|                          
|   STRONG                 Stronger emphasis, typically bold.
|                          
|   CODE                   Example of code. typically monospaced font.
|                          (Do not confuse with PRE )
|                          
|   SAMP                   A sequence of literal characters.
|                          
|   KBD                    in an instruction manual, Text typed by a
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 2
| 
| 
|                          user.
|                          
|   VAR                    A variable name.
|                          
|   DFN                    The defining instance of a term. Typically
|                          bold or bold italic.
|                          
|   CITE                   A citation. Typically italic.
|                          
|   STRIKE                 "strike out" text, as in a legal document.
|                          
| Examples of use
| 
|         This text contains an <em>emphasized</em> word.
|         <strong>Don't assume</strong> that it will be italic!
|         It was made using the <CODE>EM</CODE> element. A citation is
|         typically italic and has no formal necessary structure:
|         <cite>Moby Dick</cite> is a book title.
| 
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                The IMG Element in HTML
|                          IMG: EMBEDDED IMAGES
|                                    
|    Status: Extra
|    
|    The IMG element allows another document to be inserted inline. The
|    document is normally an icon or small graphic, etc. This element is
|    NOT intended for embedding other HTML text.
|    
|    Browsers which are not able to display inline images ignore IMG
|    elements. Authors should note that some browsers will be able to
|    display (or print) linked graphics but not inline graphics. If the
|    graphic is essential, it may be wiser to make a link to it rather
|    than to put it inline. If the graphic is essentially decorative,
|    then IMG is appropriate.
|    
|    The IMG element is empty: it has no closing tag. It has two
|    attributes:
|    
|   SRC                    The value of this attribute is the URL of the
|                          document to be embedded. Its syntax is the
|                          same as that of the HREF attribute of the A
|                          tag. SRC is mandatory.
|                          
|   ALIGN                  Take values TOP or MIDDLE or BOTTOM, defining
|                          whether the tops or middles of bottoms of the
|                          graphics and text should be aligned
|                          vertically.
|                          
|   ALT                    Optional alternative text as an alternative
|                          to the graphics for display in text-only
|                          environments.
|                          
|    Note that IMG elements are allowed within anchors.
|    
| Example
| 
|         Warning: < IMG SRC ="triangle.gif" ALT="Warning:"> This must b
| e done by a
|         qualified technician.
| 
|         < A HREF="Go.html">< IMG SRC ="Button.ps" ALT="GO"></A>
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                               Horizontal Rules in HTML
|                            HORIZONTAL RULE
|                                    
| Typical Rendering
| 
|    Some sort of divider between sections of text such as a full width
|    horizontal rule or equivalent graphic.
|    
| Example
| 
|    The horizontal rule is typically used for separating heading
|    information (when more than just a heading) from content, etc.
|    
|                 <H1>The Albatross</H1>
|                 <Address>The Bumstead Monthly, 1948</Address>
|                 The following information is culled from
|                 this and suvccessive issues of the magazine.
|                 Thanks are due to the editor-in-chief,
|                 A.R. Bunstead, for her help and advice.
|                 <H2>Copyright IQR Inc.</h2>
|                 This recording may not be sold, resold,
|                 hired out, used, or talked about in too great
|                 a depth without the publisher's written or
|                 videotaped consent.
|                 <HR>
|                 The Albatross, most fabled and infamous of ..
| 
| 
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                      Tags used in HTML
|                                ADDRESS
|                                    
|    This element is for address information, signatures, authorship,
|    etc, often at the top or bottom of a document.
|    
| Typical rendering
| 
|    Typically, an address element is italic and/or right justified or
|    indented. The address element implies a paragraph break. Paragraph
|    marks within the address element do not cause extra white space to
|    be inserted.
|    
| Examples of use:
| 
|                 <ADDRESS><A HREF="Author.html">A.N.Other</A></ADDRESS>
| 
| 
|                 <ADDRESS>
|                 Newsletter editor<p>
|                 J.R. Brown<p>
|                 JimquickPost News, Jumquick, CT 01234<p>
|                 Tel (123) 456 7890
|                 </ADDRESS>
| 
| 
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                                     BlockQuote in HTML
|                               BLOCKQUOTE
|                                    
|    The BLOCKQUOTE element allows text quoted from another source to be
|    rendered specially.
|    
| Typical rendering
| 
|    A typical rendering might be a slight extra left and right indent,
|    and/or italic font. BLOCKQUOTE causes a paragraph break, and
|    typically a line or so of white space will be allowed between it
|    and any text before or after it.
|    
|    Single-font rendition may for example put a vertical line of ">"
|    characters down the left margin to indicate quotation in the
|    Internet mail style.
|    
| Example
| 
| I think it ends
| <BLOCKQUOTE>Soft you now, the fair Ophelia. Nymph, in thy orisons,
| be all my sins remembered.
| </BLOCKQUOTE>
| but I am not sure.
| 
|    
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 1
| 
| 
|                                           Lists and glossaries in HTML
|                         FORMS OF LIST IN HTML
|                                    
|    These lists may be nested

>>A glossary is a book part, like a chapter.  These are glossary *LISTS*

| Glossaries
| 
|    A glossary (or definition list) is a list of paragraphs each of
|    which has a short title alongside it. Apart from glossaries, this
|    element is useful for presenting a set of named elements to the
|    reader. The elements within a glossary follow are introduced by
|    these elements:
|    
|   DT                     The "term", typically placed in a wide left
|                          indent
|                          
|   DD                     The "definition", which may wrap onto many
|                          lines
|                          
|    These elements must appear in pairs. Single occurrences of DT
|    without a following DD are allowed, and have the same significance
|    as if the DD had been present with no text.. The one attribute
|    which DL can take is
|    
|   COMPACT                suggests that a compact rendering be used,
|                          because the enclosed elements are
|                          individually small, or the whole glossary is
|                          rather large, or both.
|                          
|   TYPICAL RENDERING
|   
|    The definition list DT, DD pairs are arranged vertically. For each
|    pair, the DT element is on the left, in a column of about a third
|    of the display area, and the DD element is in the right hand two
|    thirds of the display area. The DT term is normally small enough to
|    fit on one line within the left-hand column. If it is longer, it
|    will either extend across the page, in which case the DD section is
|    moved down to separate them, or it is wrapped onto successive lines
|    of the left hand column.
|    
|    This is sometimes implemented with the use of a large negative
|    first line indent.
|    
|    White space is typically left between successive DT,DD pairs unless
|    the COMPACT attribute is given. The COMPACT attribute is
|    appropriate for lists which are long and/or have DT,DD pairs which
|    each take only a line or two. It is of course possible for the
|    rendering software to discover these cases itself and make its own
|    decisions, and this is to be encouraged.
|    
|    The COMPACT attribute may also reduce the width of the left-hand
|    (DT) column.
|    
|   EXAMPLES OF USE
|   
|         <DL>
| Jun  3 17:23 1994  HTML Specification    Connolly and Berners-Lee Page 2
| 
| 
|         <DT>Term the first<DD>definition paragraph is reasonably
|         long but is still displayed clearly
|         <DT>Term2 follows<DD>Definition of term2
|         </DL>
| 
|         <DL COMPACT>
|         <DT>Term<DD>definition paragraph
|         <DT>Term2<DD>Definition of term2
|         </DL>
| 
| 
| 
| 
| Lists
| 
|    A list is a sequence of paragraphs, each of which may be preceded
|    by a special mark or sequence number. The syntax is:

>>no, it's a sequence of list items, each of which may have multiple
paras. You should give one example of multiple paras here.

>>end of Terry's comments

- -- 
Terry Allen  (terry@ora.com)
Editor, Digital Media Group
O'Reilly & Associates, Inc.
Sebastopol, Calif., 95472

------- End of Forwarded Message