HTML Markup Validation: Your thoughts.

[jamesmc]

"For our Web developers, the No. 1 issue we see in our research is cross-browser compatibility," said Eric Ott, group product manager for Dreamweaver at Macromedia. "The browsers start off with standards but then build on top of that with their own bells and whistles. So developers pull their hair out trying to make things work in both browsers.

Macromedia, for example, said that 84 percent of its Dreamweaver users test their sites for Netscape's 4.x browsers, followed by 73 percent testing for IE 5.5. Sixty-six percent test for IE 5.0, 47 percent for IE 4.x, and 43 percent for Netscape 6.

But now the authoring tools do the time-consuming work, automatically spitting out code that renders properly on whatever browser a visitor might have. With authoring tools automating that ungrateful work, what's the point of Web standards?

Note that the Java SOAPElement is actually a subclass of Element )

SVG is a vector graphics format for the Web, developed by the W3C and has largely failed to be implemented.

The W3C's Xquery 1.0 moved to Proposed Recommendation status in November, bringing the prospect of a SQL-like approach to XML data querying one step closer.

[remi]

Excuse me James, but the quotiation you found is from 2001 and we live in the year 2007. Furthermore the quotation is incomplete and shows a wrong picture. The whole quotation goes:
"For our Web developers, the No. 1 issue we see in our research is cross-browser compatibility," said Eric Ott, group product manager for Dreamweaver at Macromedia. "The browsers start off with standards but then build on top of that with their own bells and whistles. So developers pull their hair out trying to make things work in both browsers. It's really hard to get things to work across all the browsers in every environment, so moving towards standards is going to make things a lot easier for us."
(source: http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-269804.html from July 11, 2001).

The first part of what Eric Ott said was a convenient excuse, why the old tools at Macromedia (since 2005 Adobe) didn't wrote standard HTML code in some cases. But the last sentence shows the insight, that the Browser producers understand, what all the Webdevelopers has demanded since them: moving towards HTML standards.

But as I said, this discussion is from 2001. In the year 2007 nobody uses Netscape 4.0 anymore (if you know one, you should tell him/her something about the security holes in this old browser).

Beside the discussions in the past, the fact remains that we have never had more Webdesigner who understand the modern concepts with HTML/CSS and the necessary to produce valid HTML pages.

SVG is a vector graphics format for the Web, developed by the W3C and has largely failed to be implemented.

The W3C's Xquery 1.0 moved to Proposed Recommendation status in November, bringing the prospect of a SQL-like approach to XML data querying one step closer.

I don't understand the relation to our discussion. I thought, this discussion is about HTML Markup Validation?

Remi

[jamesmc]

That's right, you don't understand.

There is more to Web Authoring than being W3C compliant.

There is more to Web Authoring than HTML Markup.

With auto-generating tool, the last thing a productive person needs to meet deadlines is to futz around W3C compliance. It's pretty much an unsaddled horse no one wants to ride.

[remi]

There is more to Web Authoring than being W3C compliant.
There is more to Web Authoring than HTML Markup.

Sure, but this discussion was about HTML Markup Validation.

With auto-generating tool, the last thing a productive person needs to meet deadlines is to futz around W3C compliance.

I prefer to use auto-generating tools which produce valid HTML code. Another solution is to use a Content Management System and let a Webdesigner develop a valid HTML/CSS template. It's a common division of responsibilites in modern Web projects.

It's pretty much an unsaddled horse no one wants to ride.

I disagree, again.

Remi

PS: We should move this discussion to the "Site design and publishing" forum. It's an important discussion and I'm sure, other Webdesigner are interested in leaving one or more additional comments.

[jamesmc]

Sure, but this discussion was about HTML Markup Validation.Remi

Okay, but if you talk about car paint and exclude factors that affect it, age, weather, storms and etc; you have discussed the purity of car paint but failed to address issues that exist in the reality of the real world.

You would exclude primers that underlay the paint, protective covering and of course design that goes on top of the paint.

When a person sees a Web page or a painted Car, they will probably not be very impressed with the red it is painted as much as the added ingredients that make it shiny or the detailing of the air brush design that make it stand out.

HTML Markup compliances is the equivalent of watching paint dry and then talking about it after it dries.

If you want to make a compliant site for those with special needs, then by all means do it.

However, Bozo the Fanatical who makes Flash Cartoons could care less about W3C compliance and HTML Markup. He'd rather put on a red rubber nose and make people laugh than bore them to death.

[pauland]

I'd broadly agree with what Remi has said. Nobody is particularly interested in the nuts and bolts of writing syntactically correct html, but it's important that we do so and not be sloppy. If we don't do this we are relying on browsers interpreting our invalid markup the way we think they should, rather than the way they actually might.

There's no correlation between producing valid markup and styfling innovation.

Paul

[jamesmc]

I'd broadly agree with what Remi has said. Nobody is particularly interested in the nuts and bolts of writing syntactically correct html, but it's important that we do so and not be sloppy. If we don't do this we are relying on browsers interpreting our invalid markup the way we think they should, rather than the way they actually might.

There's no correlation between producing valid markup and styfling innovation.

Paul

Perhaps the advent of the one-world browser along with the one-world computer then?

Rubber Stamping is compliant with each stamp pressed on paper, but it's utility makes it limited and boring.

[remi]

...make people laugh than bore them to death.

your comments have been noted

btw: Welcome back, James.

Remi

[pauland]

Perhaps the advent of the one-world browser along with the one-world computer then?

Rubber Stamping is compliant with each stamp pressed on paper, but it's utility makes it limited and boring.

I don't mind browsers being innovative and adding new features, but I really wish that if they do support a particular feature that they do it in a way consistent across all browsers.

It's a lack of consistency that makes CSS layouts particularly challenging.

Innovation in page design has nothing to do with compliant html. Boring pages have no relationship to compliant markup, though gambling on browser interpretation certainly does with non-compliant pages.

If you want to keep going on about rubber stamps, there must be thousands of different rubber stamp designs out there, so even in terms of rubber stamps, innovation is rife.

Paul

[jamesmc]

I

If you want to keep going on about rubber stamps, there must be thousands of different rubber stamp designs out there, so even in terms of rubber stamps, innovation is rife.

Paul

But only one with W3C on it.