1. The features of this extension are too idionsyncratic and
limited. We will soon outgrow them -- in fact they are already
inadequate for my needs.
By contrast, as enabling technology, the HTML 3.0 SCRIBBLE widget is
a simpler yet more general, providing complete pen-input event
records to the server. I think we should rally behind SCRIBBLE and
see that it gets on the same kind of fast track as TABLE.
2. The design seems rather awkward (not to mention ill-specified).
First, the mixture of <IMG ISMAP> and <FORM> (what are the intended
roles of the two different scripts?). Second, what appears to be ad
hoc client-side coordination between FORM fields and the ISMAP based
on the field NAME (we don't want to screw things up for a clean
client-side scripting solution).
By all means, let's talk about how to give WWW true interactive
capabilities (before it's too late and we are stuck with proprietary
solutions). But we have to think a bit less incrementally. The WWW
is already so big and diverse that _every_ new feature, no matter how
slight, requires an enormous investment of political energy to
implement. Calling this proposal "a minor tweak to the software" is
as unrealistic as the "Simple Plans to Eradicate GIF in 5 Days" we
saw a while back.
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Paul Burchard <burchard@math.utah.edu>
``I'm still learning how to count backwards from infinity...''
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