HTML+ and HyTime
Terry Allen <terry@ora.com>
Message-id: <199311012311.AA14039@rock.west.ora.com>
From: Terry Allen <terry@ora.com>
Date: Mon, 1 Nov 1993 15:11:46 PST
X-Mailer: Mail User's Shell (7.2.0 10/31/90)
To: www-talk@nxoc01.cern.ch
Subject: HTML+ and HyTime
Bert Bos proposes making HTML+ HyTime-compliant by complicating
the syntax of the A element. There is absolutely no need to
do this, as it has no practical effect whatsoever; it will only
turn off users, many of them naive about SGML.
When HyTime tools are available it will be soon enough to thing
about changing this well designed presentation DTD to work with
them. Until then, as people are struggling to get into HTML,
let along HTML+, let's leave the A element as it is.
Further on Mr Bos's comments:
Text flow. This is indeed difficult to implement, and may
require more info than HTML+ demands, but it part of what
people expect from a good renderer.
Conditional text. Marked sections are Bad, because they leave
no seam in the ESIS. One might well want to output a marked
section but indicate that it's been marked; or to output two
alternate versions of something. Better to use a version
attribute in an element than this poorly designed function of
SGML.
Plain lists. Are only unmarked bulletted lists. There is no
reason in the world to make another element for them.
Tab. Em is indeed a better choice than capital M, and is
traditional. The font doesn't have to define an em, though---
it ought to be equal to the width of lowercase m, or be
entirely fixed.
But I'm sure we all welcome Mr Bos's comments; don't let me
dissuade you from making more of them, Bert!
Regards,
--
Terry Allen (terry@ora.com)
Editor, Digital Media Group
O'Reilly & Associates, Inc.
Sebastopol, Calif., 95472