"The web is constantly evolving. New and innovative websites are being created every day, pushing the boundaries of HTML in every direction. HTML 4 has been around for nearly a decade now, and publishers seeking new techniques to provide enhanced functionality are being held back by the constraints of the language and browsers. To give authors more flexibility and interoperability, and enable more interactive and exciting websites and applications, HTML 5 introduces and enhances a wide range of features including form controls, APIs, multimedia, structure, and semantics."
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
Member since:2006-01-05
From the article:
So voice your comments through the venues listed in the article, rather than whine here. The point is, it's a draft, so you can voice your comment on it. Unlike proprietary stuff where some company just decides what's best.
Member since:2007-02-22
Member since:2006-01-10
Member since:2006-10-08
"The Frontpage-ification of the Internet continues."
Of the Web, which is a subset of the Internet's services. :-)
According to your odd bits collection I'd like to comment the following ones:
"-- Using Unicode throughout the document... but then specifying that browsers need only support UTF-8 and Windows-1252... and specifying encodings that 'must not' (?!) be implemented."
When you can use UFT-8 for everything (claimed), so why there's "Windows-1252"? What about the standardized ISO charsets?
"-- Including end tags when none were necessary before."
I think that's a tribute to the XML / XHTML standard style specification where end tags were forced,
a) as a real end tag
<foo>this is a foo style content</foo>
b) as a "all in one" tag
<bar param1="val1" param2="val2) />
"-- Specifying that browsers may not play load events until pictures are loaded (what if the picture never loads) (and the article even explains how that behavior can be used to simplify the hijacking of a user's computer!)."
I think that's strange. What if a browser does not load any pictures because of its setting to load none? What about text mode browsers (essential means for blind users to access the web)?
-- Lazy coding ('div' tags) now going to spread with 'footer', 'header', etc. tags. This is similar to including 'em' and 'code' dags when 'b' and 'tt' already did what the 'new' tags done.
This is the separation of content and form as I mentioned it in my previous post when I compared this kind of text structurin to the LaTeX way. As a web developer, you don't need to specify a certain font style attribute (bold, italics), you just go on a higher level when you define a text to be emphasized and let the browser take care of it, depending on its individual setting how it will display emphasized text. You can concentrate on your actual document structure instead of doing ugly microformatting. I think that's a chance for simplification on the developer's side.
"-- Still hasn't standardized attribute names among disparate tags.
I agree, that's something I'd like to see, especially along with a look to CSS. Or, in other words: same attribute names for similar functionalities in HTML and CSS.
"-- Still lacks a 'macro' or 'define' tag for common code that is repeated throughout a page.
-- Still lacks an 'include' tag."
That's what SSI can be used for. Or abuse cpp -P on your HTML files before uploading them. Write a Makefile . :-)
% make
cpp -P index.html.pp > index.html
% make upload
Don't mind, it's a dirty hack anyway.
"(This and the former are the reason that that symptom of the Frontpage disease, CSS, have spread so quickly.)"
Exacerbatio generalis of Morbus Frontopaginalis with a comorbide attack of Micromollis fenestrae perspectivo editio ultimata? =^_^=
"-- Audio/video tags: Browser-dependent way to show files using an interface you know nothing about."
The interface should be definable by the browser, or, to be more correct, by the user. For example, some users like to have a frame with a pushbutton to launch a fullscreen video player instead of a little instand player within the page, others like an option to download a movie clip instead of playing it.
The web developer should not need to know anything about the client's configuration. Standardized behaviour could be assumed if every browser would adopt to these standards. But as we all know, MICROS~1's browsers won't, as usual.
***
I'm just staring at the screen:
http://www.alistapart.com/d/previewofhtml5/html5.jpg
I'm asking myself: What's that in this box? A smiling pudding? A pile of dust or washing powder? An egg? Can somebody tell? :-)
Edited 2007-12-05 01:01
Member since:2006-06-03
Member since:2006-01-25
A lot of what you mentioned is called a synamtic design of the web. HTML is supposed to describe content, not layout, that is what CSS is for. b and i and tt are deprecated as those are layout tags. strong, em, code are meant to describe whats inside the tags, now how to format them, and may not actually make text bold, etc, depending on the device. Excessively compatible with XHTML/XML? That should be considered a good thing that HTML will comply to other standards... finally.
Member since:
2007-02-22
The Frontpage-ification of the Internet continues.
(Single-quotes used instead of angle brackets for readability.)
Some odd bits from the draft linked to above:
-- Comments in the specification are sometimes empty, and sometimes don't line up with the rest of text.
-- Using Unicode throughout the document... but then specifying that browsers need only support UTF-8 and Windows-1252... and specifying encodings that 'must not' (?!) be implemented.
-- Support for Ogg/Matroska formats in specification.
-- The 'tr' tag is forbidden within 'table' tags (?!).
-- Including end tags when none were necessary before.
-- Specifying that browsers may not play load events until pictures are loaded (what if the picture never loads) (and the article even explains how that behavior can be used to simplify the hijacking of a user's computer!).
-- Lazy coding ('div' tags) now going to spread with 'footer', 'header', etc. tags. This is similar to including 'em' and 'code' dags when 'b' and 'tt' already did what the 'new' tags done.
-- Still hasn't standardized attribute names among disparate tags.
-- Still lacks a 'macro' or 'define' tag for common code that is repeated throughout a page.
-- Still lacks an 'include' tag. (This and the former are the reason that that symptom of the Frontpage disease, CSS, have spread so quickly.)
-- Audio/video tags: Browser-dependent way to show files using an interface you know nothing about.
-- Excessively compatible with XHTML/XML.