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They're legal Unicode.

HTML 4.0 and later uses Unicode as its character set, Unicode being an 16-bit character set in which you can write most human languages. Unicode is a superset of the 8-bit ISO-Latin (which in turn is a superset of 7-bit ASCII), the character set of HTML 3.2 and previous versions. It also has some nice things like typographic characters that aren't in ISO-Latin (m-dashes, curved quotes, and so forth) and some math characters.

The upshot of all this is that if a browser doesn't support Unicode, it'll still work with documents that use it...as long as those documents don't stray outside the first 8 bits. If they do, the resulting character will show up as however the browser handles indeterminate characters. Your browser gets the credit and/or blame for this.

They're legal Unicode.

HTML 4.0 and later uses Unicode as its character set, Unicode being an 16-bit character set in which you can write most human languages. Unicode is a superset of the 8-bit ISO-Latin (which in turn is a superset of 7-bit ASCII), the character set of HTML 3.2 and previous versions. It also has some nice things like typographic characters that aren't in ISO-Latin (m-dashes, curved quotes, and so forth) and some math characters.

The upshot of all this is that if a browser doesn't support Unicode, it'll still work with documents that use it...as long as those documents don't stray outside the first 8 bits. If they do, the resulting character will show up as however the browser handles indeterminate characters. Your browser gets the credit and/or blame for this.

Hmmmm 4.01 is new to me, thanks for pointing out the link to the new draft of HTML 4.01

The article contains a bunch of funky character entities like
#8212, #8220, #8221, and #8217, which fail to render in NetPositive, BeOpera, and BeLynx (a rather eccentric collection of browsers, I admit). As I was preparing to flame him, I violated my principles, and did a little research first, and found this at w3c.org, which appears to list them as valid HTML. What gives?

As the article says, the next version of M$ Visual Studio will rely heavily on XML and will probably forget about Java.

At first, I didn't think much about this. But now I have bad feelings about M$ using XML. Sure, XML is a nice standard and I like many of its applications. But XML is only a markup language; this is not a real programming language. You can use standards such as the Document Object Model DOM (not to be confused with M$'s proprietary COM) to describe in XML (or in an XML derivative) how some actions should be performed on a document, but this is a limited kind of programming.

So if a programmer wants to get something powerful out of XML, the best solution is to define a XML-based markup language that allows you to embed calls to some system-specific components into your documents. And then you can say: "Look at this great set of applications that I just released! They are all based on XML, which is an open standard." That's nice, except that the XML derivative used by these applications is nothing but a glue around some proprietary components that will not work on any other system.

I don't know what M$ is planning when they are focusing on XML and dropping Java. But it could very well be that they use an open standard as a cover for producing more non-portable stuff that will run on nothing else but Windows (because their XML derivative will require Active X, DCOM, and so on). At least with Java, there was some hope to have portable applications, even if M$ tried to lock the developers into Windows-specific Java extensions...

As the article says, the next version of M$ Visual Studio will rely heavily on XML and will probably forget about Java.

At first, I didn't think much about this. But now I have bad feelings about M$ using XML. Sure, XML is a nice standard and I like many of its applications. But XML is only a markup language; this is not a real programming language. You can use standards such as the Document Object Model DOM (not to be confused with M$'s proprietary COM) to describe in XML (or in an XML derivative) how some actions should be performed on a document, but this is a limited kind of programming.

So if a programmer wants to get something powerful out of XML, the best solution is to define a XML-based markup language that allows you to embed calls to some system-specific components into your documents. And then you can say: "Look at this great set of applications that I just released! They are all based on XML, which is an open standard." That's nice, except that the XML derivative used by these applications is nothing but a glue around some proprietary components that will not work on any other system.

I don't know what M$ is planning when they are focusing on XML and dropping Java. But it could very well be that they use an open standard as a cover for producing more non-portable stuff that will run on nothing else but Windows (because their XML derivative will require Active X, DCOM, and so on). At least with Java, there was some hope to have portable applications, even if M$ tried to lock the developers into Windows-specific Java extensions...

Here's some links to resources where you can learn more about HDML (WML), and WAP (Wireless Application Protocol).

A quick definition of HDML from whatis.com
"What is HDML?", at w3.org

Another short definition of WML from whatis.com
The Wireless Application Forum - good resource for wireless info.
WAP, from both a technical and practical perspective.


It should be noted that HDML (Handheld Devices Markup Language) and WML (Wireless Markup Language) are, more or less, the same thing.


.------------ - - -
| big bad mr. frosty
`------------ - - -

Here's some links to resources where you can learn more about HDML (WML), and WAP (Wireless Application Protocol).

A quick definition of HDML from whatis.com
"What is HDML?", at w3.org

Another short definition of WML from whatis.com
The Wireless Application Forum - good resource for wireless info.
WAP, from both a technical and practical perspective.


It should be noted that HDML (Handheld Devices Markup Language) and WML (Wireless Markup Language) are, more or less, the same thing.


.------------ - - -
| big bad mr. frosty
`------------ - - -

Would you please provide some evidence to back your claim that...

W3C has been working [...] unforgeable certificates which users must present to gain access to content, and which incidentally identify them uniquely and provide assorted marketing information."

?

It's completely untrue and unfounded, and shows extremely poor editorial judgement.

--Dan Connolly, W3C

[I tried to register as something other than Anonymous Coward, but I have not received the password mail message.]

Would you please provide some evidence to back your claim that...

W3C has been working [...] unforgeable certificates which users must present to gain access to content, and which incidentally identify them uniquely and provide assorted marketing information."

?

It's completely untrue and unfounded, and shows extremely poor editorial judgement.

--Dan Connolly, W3C

[I tried to register as something other than Anonymous Coward, but I have not received the password mail message.]

Do you mean <like this>?

RTFM.

Looking at the list of new and deprecated elements carried in the w3c's specification for HTML 4, I see:

The following elements are deprecated: APPLET, BASEFONT, CENTER, DIR, FONT, ISINDEX, MENU, STRIKE, and U.

and

The new elements in HTML 4.0 are: ABBR, ACRONYM, BDO, BUTTON, COL, COLGROUP, DEL, FIELDSET, FRAME, FRAMESET, IFRAME , INS, LABEL, LEGEND, NOFRAMES , NOSCRIPT, OBJECT, OPTGROUP, PARAM, S (deprecated), SPAN, TBODY, TFOOT, THEAD, and Q.

It could be that she's gotten confused over the fact that the w3c also identifies "frameset HTML" as a "flavor" of HTML. But the frames-related tags aren't marked as deprecated anywhere in the document posted as "latest" on the w3c's page.

I'm guessing she's trying to use what she thinks is a $10 word (deprecated) to describe a design concept (unneeded and inappropriate).
------------
Michael Hall
mphall@cstone.nospam.net

Looking at the list of new and deprecated elements carried in the w3c's specification for HTML 4, I see:

The following elements are deprecated: APPLET, BASEFONT, CENTER, DIR, FONT, ISINDEX, MENU, STRIKE, and U.

and

The new elements in HTML 4.0 are: ABBR, ACRONYM, BDO, BUTTON, COL, COLGROUP, DEL, FIELDSET, FRAME, FRAMESET, IFRAME , INS, LABEL, LEGEND, NOFRAMES , NOSCRIPT, OBJECT, OPTGROUP, PARAM, S (deprecated), SPAN, TBODY, TFOOT, THEAD, and Q.

It could be that she's gotten confused over the fact that the w3c also identifies "frameset HTML" as a "flavor" of HTML. But the frames-related tags aren't marked as deprecated anywhere in the document posted as "latest" on the w3c's page.

I'm guessing she's trying to use what she thinks is a $10 word (deprecated) to describe a design concept (unneeded and inappropriate).
------------
Michael Hall
mphall@cstone.nospam.net

Whoops! May I plead the "but... the 'greater than' and 'less than' characters rendered correctly in Preview" excuse for my previous post (I used the special character tags).

Read it as:

Is there any way to preserve whitespaces, etc., in HTML?

There's the PRE tag. Look here for the w3 description of the tag.

Basically it preserves whitespace and tab indenting. /. doesn't seem to allow it in comments - it doesn't work in preview and it's not
listed below the comment submit box with the allowed tags.

Whoops! May I plead the "but... the 'greater than' and 'less than' characters rendered correctly in Preview" excuse for my previous post (I used the special character tags).

Read it as:

Is there any way to preserve whitespaces, etc., in HTML?

There's the PRE tag. Look here for the w3 description of the tag.

Basically it preserves whitespace and tab indenting. /. doesn't seem to allow it in comments - it doesn't work in preview and it's not
listed below the comment submit box with the allowed tags.

There's the tag. Look here for the w3c description of the tag.

Basically it preserves whitespace and tab indenting. /. doesn't seem to allow it in comments - it doesn't work in preview and it's not listed below the comment submit box with the allowed tags.

(insert "html shouldn't be used for layout/design" comment here)

I've got a fair amount of tables on my page; I've recently been checking to see how Mozilla renders it.. somewhat akin to the acid test page.

Now, the page itself is pretty much 4.0 compliant, albeit somewhat complex; the W3 validator bitches about ampersands in CGI URIs, so there's nothing I can do about that. In any case...

In MSIE and NS current versions, the page looks pretty much like I'd expect it to. There are minor variations, nothing of great concern.

Now, in M10, The grey box in the middle was shrunken, sorta pushed over to the left a little bit. OK, not exactly what I wanted, but not horrid. In M11, however, the grey box gets shoved waaay over to the right, running into other tables.

Thus, on first glance, it appears that something, in one of the milestones, is wrong. I understand that my page might not be really simple, that's an aside, and I will deal with it later. My concern is that the two milestones rendered the page differently. For the longest time, I've heard that Mozilla is (as in, yes, currently, right now) fully 4.0/CSS1/whatever else compliant. However, such observations have me wondering otherwise....? Could someone clarify?

It's interesting to me that no-one mentioned either Emacs/w3, or Amaya as possible contenders in the browser wars. Either one of which currently runs better than Mozilla, and both of which are Open Source.

Good God man, have you actually used that browser? It's gruesome! Oh and btw you misspelled your URL. As well as forgot to put anchors on it so people can click on the link. Here's the link to this Amaya creature if your stomach is strong enough.

Here I thought we were going to be reminded about W3C's own effort, Amaya. -Robert

First you have to ask yourself - What does Mozilla 5 have working right now, what does IE 5.0 have right now? Let's see:

Mozilla 5 beta
HTML 4.0, CSS1, partial CSS2, XML (disp w/CSS), plugin support, Javascript, full DOM. No shortcut key for 'back' though.
There will be no support for XSL, XQL, SVG, WebDAV VML, or P3P support

Internet Explorer 5
HTML 4.0, partial CSS1, CSS2, XML, XSL, XQL, VML, HTCs - HTML behaviors, WebDAV, SMIL, plugin support, Javascript, full DOM

My opinion on what IE 5.5 release will add, based on what I have heard elsewhere:
Full CSS1/HTML 4 compatibility (always been a sore point with IE browsers, they're finally listening to the Mac people about standards)
SVG support
xHTML 1.0 support
HTML 4.01 support
P3P support
Dynamic shrinking of webpages (ala Opera)

Will they slow down? What are all those paid programmers supposed to do then? There's a lot of money and time invested into the browser, which is becoming the user interface of the next century. There's no way they're slowing down, unless they go broke first.

To those who go 'so what' about all these technologies, so be it. I refuse to be stuck in 1997 w/NS 4.x, or 1993 using Lynx. You can though - be my guest

First you have to ask yourself - What does Mozilla 5 have working right now, what does IE 5.0 have right now? Let's see:

Mozilla 5 beta
HTML 4.0, CSS1, partial CSS2, XML (disp w/CSS), plugin support, Javascript, full DOM. No shortcut key for 'back' though.
There will be no support for XSL, XQL, SVG, WebDAV VML, or P3P support

Internet Explorer 5
HTML 4.0, partial CSS1, CSS2, XML, XSL, XQL, VML, HTCs - HTML behaviors, WebDAV, SMIL, plugin support, Javascript, full DOM

My opinion on what IE 5.5 release will add, based on what I have heard elsewhere:
Full CSS1/HTML 4 compatibility (always been a sore point with IE browsers, they're finally listening to the Mac people about standards)
SVG support
xHTML 1.0 support
HTML 4.01 support
P3P support
Dynamic shrinking of webpages (ala Opera)

Will they slow down? What are all those paid programmers supposed to do then? There's a lot of money and time invested into the browser, which is becoming the user interface of the next century. There's no way they're slowing down, unless they go broke first.

To those who go 'so what' about all these technologies, so be it. I refuse to be stuck in 1997 w/NS 4.x, or 1993 using Lynx. You can though - be my guest

First you have to ask yourself - What does Mozilla 5 have working right now, what does IE 5.0 have right now? Let's see:

Mozilla 5 beta
HTML 4.0, CSS1, partial CSS2, XML (disp w/CSS), plugin support, Javascript, full DOM. No shortcut key for 'back' though.
There will be no support for XSL, XQL, SVG, WebDAV VML, or P3P support

Internet Explorer 5
HTML 4.0, partial CSS1, CSS2, XML, XSL, XQL, VML, HTCs - HTML behaviors, WebDAV, SMIL, plugin support, Javascript, full DOM

My opinion on what IE 5.5 release will add, based on what I have heard elsewhere:
Full CSS1/HTML 4 compatibility (always been a sore point with IE browsers, they're finally listening to the Mac people about standards)
SVG support
xHTML 1.0 support
HTML 4.01 support
P3P support
Dynamic shrinking of webpages (ala Opera)

Will they slow down? What are all those paid programmers supposed to do then? There's a lot of money and time invested into the browser, which is becoming the user interface of the next century. There's no way they're slowing down, unless they go broke first.

To those who go 'so what' about all these technologies, so be it. I refuse to be stuck in 1997 w/NS 4.x, or 1993 using Lynx. You can though - be my guest

First you have to ask yourself - What does Mozilla 5 have working right now, what does IE 5.0 have right now? Let's see:

Mozilla 5 beta
HTML 4.0, CSS1, partial CSS2, XML (disp w/CSS), plugin support, Javascript, full DOM. No shortcut key for 'back' though.
There will be no support for XSL, XQL, SVG, WebDAV VML, or P3P support

Internet Explorer 5
HTML 4.0, partial CSS1, CSS2, XML, XSL, XQL, VML, HTCs - HTML behaviors, WebDAV, SMIL, plugin support, Javascript, full DOM

My opinion on what IE 5.5 release will add, based on what I have heard elsewhere:
Full CSS1/HTML 4 compatibility (always been a sore point with IE browsers, they're finally listening to the Mac people about standards)
SVG support
xHTML 1.0 support
HTML 4.01 support
P3P support
Dynamic shrinking of webpages (ala Opera)

Will they slow down? What are all those paid programmers supposed to do then? There's a lot of money and time invested into the browser, which is becoming the user interface of the next century. There's no way they're slowing down, unless they go broke first.

To those who go 'so what' about all these technologies, so be it. I refuse to be stuck in 1997 w/NS 4.x, or 1993 using Lynx. You can though - be my guest

First you have to ask yourself - What does Mozilla 5 have working right now, what does IE 5.0 have right now? Let's see:

Mozilla 5 beta
HTML 4.0, CSS1, partial CSS2, XML (disp w/CSS), plugin support, Javascript, full DOM. No shortcut key for 'back' though.
There will be no support for XSL, XQL, SVG, WebDAV VML, or P3P support

Internet Explorer 5
HTML 4.0, partial CSS1, CSS2, XML, XSL, XQL, VML, HTCs - HTML behaviors, WebDAV, SMIL, plugin support, Javascript, full DOM

My opinion on what IE 5.5 release will add, based on what I have heard elsewhere:
Full CSS1/HTML 4 compatibility (always been a sore point with IE browsers, they're finally listening to the Mac people about standards)
SVG support
xHTML 1.0 support
HTML 4.01 support
P3P support
Dynamic shrinking of webpages (ala Opera)

Will they slow down? What are all those paid programmers supposed to do then? There's a lot of money and time invested into the browser, which is becoming the user interface of the next century. There's no way they're slowing down, unless they go broke first.

To those who go 'so what' about all these technologies, so be it. I refuse to be stuck in 1997 w/NS 4.x, or 1993 using Lynx. You can though - be my guest

In a standard server/browser situation, you will need to use SSL to provide any useful security.

In a standard server/browser situation, you will need to use SSL to provide any useful security.

There is and informal but generally accepted standard you should take a look at called "A Standard for Robot Exclusion"

Take a look at http://info.webcrawler.c om/mak/projects/robots/robots.html and http://info.webcrawler .com/mak/projects/robots/norobots.html

This does not address copyright issues, which have become even murkier with the recent revisions to the copyright law restricting fair use.

You should also take a look at the XML syndication format (aka RSS [RDF Site Summary]). It's based on RDF and is becoming supported by alot of larger news sites, even /. Here are some links: http://www.edventure.c om/release1/abstracts/syndication.html for background info. http://www.w3.org/RDF/ for the low level info, and http://my.netscape.com/publish/ help/quickstart.html for the RSS implementation.

I've just come away from giving a presentation about web tracking.

It's difficult to weigh up the benefits and disadvantages for the companies and the users - on the one hand companies can really improve their site (layout, usability, quality of information) based on that information. Being able to track people across multiple sites will be enable companies to really cater for those that are coming to their site.

However, users, understandably, don't want every move of theirs tracked - presumably with the worry that they will in the end, be held accountable for that time they typed in www.pr0n4u.com.

Balancing the wants of the company and of the individual is always difficult. In the end, is the individual willing to pay the price of less privacy for a 'better' (i.e. targetted to get the most visits/$$'s from you) browsing experience? Without these measures are unscrupulous people going to join your browsing records with your browsing information?

This area is going to get very complex, legislative-wise, with products such as Novell's DigitalMe campaign to store user profiles 'for your convenience'. This is put forward as a great enabler, but in fact mostly, it is an enabler for companies to get information about you, or aggregate information about you and others, and helps you very little.

With the introduction of the W3C's P3P platform, it will be easier for users to keep track of where their personal details are going, but this kind of collaborative tracking really is a bit difficult. Obviously, DoubleClick will have a privacy policy. When they change it in the case of legislation, will they chuck away your data?

thenerd
The camels are coming.

I have always designed my web pages to work with all browsers. And Netscape has always been my browser of choice, because it was the best. Though it lacks nifty features like IE's rebars, I really like the Netscape Communicator 4.x interface. I find bookmark handling in particular easier to deal with in Netscape than in IE.

Unfortunately, Netscape dropped the ball, and stopped improving their browser engine after Communicator 4.0 was released in June 1997. Though it wasn't standards-compliant then, I fully expected Netscape to remedy that as soon as possible. They never did. In fact, I've never even heard them say that they were working on full HTML 4.0 support.

Instead, Netscape has wasted time with side projects, first trying to push (no pun intended) its ill-fated Netcaster client, then its portal site, and then all kinds of useless junk like AOL Instant Messenger and the Shop button.

Meanwhile, Microsoft wasn't just relying on bundling IE with every conceivable piece of Windows software. IE4 was released with a solid lead over Netscape in HTML and CSS support. While Netscape's ill-named SmartUpdate was and still is broken and difficult to use, IE4 introduced Windows Update, which makes installations, upgrades, and add-ons a snap.

Now IE5 is the undisputed best web browser. Under the hood, it is so far superior to any other browser that there is no contest. To initiate an exodus from IE, Mozilla will have to be fully compliant with HTML, CSS2, XML, and be amazing to boot. And it will need to be released soon.

As for Netscape, I am resigned to its crushing defeat. Over a year ago, it was already clear that it lost the browser war. People have waited patiently since 1997, but there is still no sign that Netscape 5 is forthcoming, let alone any indication that it will be as good as IE5.

Unless there is a dramatic reversal in this situation, I think you can expect to see more and more Netscape holdouts give up and start writing web pages to today's standards, whether Navigator can deal with them or not. I am unhappy about this state of affairs, but that's just the way it is. Netscape stood still while the world kept on turning.

I have always designed my web pages to work with all browsers. And Netscape has always been my browser of choice, because it was the best. Though it lacks nifty features like IE's rebars, I really like the Netscape Communicator 4.x interface. I find bookmark handling in particular easier to deal with in Netscape than in IE.

Unfortunately, Netscape dropped the ball, and stopped improving their browser engine after Communicator 4.0 was released in June 1997. Though it wasn't standards-compliant then, I fully expected Netscape to remedy that as soon as possible. They never did. In fact, I've never even heard them say that they were working on full HTML 4.0 support.

Instead, Netscape has wasted time with side projects, first trying to push (no pun intended) its ill-fated Netcaster client, then its portal site, and then all kinds of useless junk like AOL Instant Messenger and the Shop button.

Meanwhile, Microsoft wasn't just relying on bundling IE with every conceivable piece of Windows software. IE4 was released with a solid lead over Netscape in HTML and CSS support. While Netscape's ill-named SmartUpdate was and still is broken and difficult to use, IE4 introduced Windows Update, which makes installations, upgrades, and add-ons a snap.

Now IE5 is the undisputed best web browser. Under the hood, it is so far superior to any other browser that there is no contest. To initiate an exodus from IE, Mozilla will have to be fully compliant with HTML, CSS2, XML, and be amazing to boot. And it will need to be released soon.

As for Netscape, I am resigned to its crushing defeat. Over a year ago, it was already clear that it lost the browser war. People have waited patiently since 1997, but there is still no sign that Netscape 5 is forthcoming, let alone any indication that it will be as good as IE5.

Unless there is a dramatic reversal in this situation, I think you can expect to see more and more Netscape holdouts give up and start writing web pages to today's standards, whether Navigator can deal with them or not. I am unhappy about this state of affairs, but that's just the way it is. Netscape stood still while the world kept on turning.

I have always designed my web pages to work with all browsers. And Netscape has always been my browser of choice, because it was the best. Though it lacks nifty features like IE's rebars, I really like the Netscape Communicator 4.x interface. I find bookmark handling in particular easier to deal with in Netscape than in IE.

Unfortunately, Netscape dropped the ball, and stopped improving their browser engine after Communicator 4.0 was released in June 1997. Though it wasn't standards-compliant then, I fully expected Netscape to remedy that as soon as possible. They never did. In fact, I've never even heard them say that they were working on full HTML 4.0 support.

Instead, Netscape has wasted time with side projects, first trying to push (no pun intended) its ill-fated Netcaster client, then its portal site, and then all kinds of useless junk like AOL Instant Messenger and the Shop button.

Meanwhile, Microsoft wasn't just relying on bundling IE with every conceivable piece of Windows software. IE4 was released with a solid lead over Netscape in HTML and CSS support. While Netscape's ill-named SmartUpdate was and still is broken and difficult to use, IE4 introduced Windows Update, which makes installations, upgrades, and add-ons a snap.

Now IE5 is the undisputed best web browser. Under the hood, it is so far superior to any other browser that there is no contest. To initiate an exodus from IE, Mozilla will have to be fully compliant with HTML, CSS2, XML, and be amazing to boot. And it will need to be released soon.

As for Netscape, I am resigned to its crushing defeat. Over a year ago, it was already clear that it lost the browser war. People have waited patiently since 1997, but there is still no sign that Netscape 5 is forthcoming, let alone any indication that it will be as good as IE5.

Unless there is a dramatic reversal in this situation, I think you can expect to see more and more Netscape holdouts give up and start writing web pages to today's standards, whether Navigator can deal with them or not. I am unhappy about this state of affairs, but that's just the way it is. Netscape stood still while the world kept on turning.

I have always designed my web pages to work with all browsers. And Netscape has always been my browser of choice, because it was the best. Though it lacks nifty features like IE's rebars, I really like the Netscape Communicator 4.x interface. I find bookmark handling in particular easier to deal with in Netscape than in IE.

Unfortunately, Netscape dropped the ball, and stopped improving their browser engine after Communicator 4.0 was released in June 1997. Though it wasn't standards-compliant then, I fully expected Netscape to remedy that as soon as possible. They never did. In fact, I've never even heard them say that they were working on full HTML 4.0 support.

Instead, Netscape has wasted time with side projects, first trying to push (no pun intended) its ill-fated Netcaster client, then its portal site, and then all kinds of useless junk like AOL Instant Messenger and the Shop button.

Meanwhile, Microsoft wasn't just relying on bundling IE with every conceivable piece of Windows software. IE4 was released with a solid lead over Netscape in HTML and CSS support. While Netscape's ill-named SmartUpdate was and still is broken and difficult to use, IE4 introduced Windows Update, which makes installations, upgrades, and add-ons a snap.

Now IE5 is the undisputed best web browser. Under the hood, it is so far superior to any other browser that there is no contest. To initiate an exodus from IE, Mozilla will have to be fully compliant with HTML, CSS2, XML, and be amazing to boot. And it will need to be released soon.

As for Netscape, I am resigned to its crushing defeat. Over a year ago, it was already clear that it lost the browser war. People have waited patiently since 1997, but there is still no sign that Netscape 5 is forthcoming, let alone any indication that it will be as good as IE5.

Unless there is a dramatic reversal in this situation, I think you can expect to see more and more Netscape holdouts give up and start writing web pages to today's standards, whether Navigator can deal with them or not. I am unhappy about this state of affairs, but that's just the way it is. Netscape stood still while the world kept on turning.

"You souldn't assume that there are only 2 browsers."

Good point -- but more precisely, we shouldn't have to make assumptions at all on how many browsers there are. That is, we should be able to write standards-compliant pages once, and have them formatted appropriately in each browser. Of the two largest browsers, Netscape is far the less compliant; it also lags behind Opera, and even Lynx. "Where is the standard definition of Java Script?"

http://www.ecma.ch/stand/ecma-262.htm -- ECMA is a European standards board; this is their standardized version of the core language, including the input of Netscape and Microsoft (IIRC) employees. Note that it standardizes the language, and not the object model the language manipulates.

The HTTP Document Object Model -- http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-DOM-Level-1/ -- is the W3 standard for the object model, complete with recommendations for Javascript language bindings.

IE purports total adherence to the HTML DOM, I believe, though I haven't used the interface, as such, to know one way or another. I do know it is more complete than Netscape's. Both browsers' javascript is, I believe, ECMA-262-compliant.

phil

HTML 4.0 and CSS compliant and extensible. And it runs on Linux. Has anyone tried this out yet?

It seems to be a browser and authoring tool both on the client side.

http://www.w3.org/Amaya/

HTML 4.0 and CSS compliant and extensible. And it runs of Linux. Has anyone tried this out yet?

It seems to be a browser and authoring tool both on the client side.

http://www.w3.org/Amaya/

Why Not Get Microsoft Where It Will Really Hurt

Convince the IETF http://www.ietf.org/ to require anyone who implements the latest HTML specs to Open-Source their browser software.

The HTML 4.0 specs exist as an open standard. Why not make any company that wishes to implement it have to open-source their software?

I'm not sure how to do this. Any ideas if it's feasible?

Plus (I'm on a Mac), does anyone know what Amaya (http://www.w3.org/Amaya/) is capable of doing? It runs on Linux-PC. Sounds like it is an HTML 4.0 compliant browser environment. Is it?

The team who developed Mosaic gave allowed others to embrace and extended to do the obvious things that were missing, instead of putting the software under the GPL. Both Netscape and Explorer have roots in Mosaic. The base code for Explorer came from Spyglass whom Microsoft cannibalized. Spyglass' wares were derived from Mosaic, IIRC. So you can thank the bungled handling of the Mosaic codebase for the current situation, at least partially.

The W3C guys haven't learned any lessons from all this. They still offer source code that can be embraced, extended and locked away into proprietary machine code. Here is a link to the license for libwww and other w3c freeware like the Amaya browser. Their FAQ says this: Yes, we want people to experiment with and improve our software. It can even be used in commercial software. If you make changes for the better, we encourage you to contact its authors. You may not make changes and continue to call it by a trademarked term or misrepresent the origin, capabilities, or liabilities associated with its use. You may make valid assertions, such that it is based on Amaya code, or that it is compliant with a Recommended Specification of the W3C.

They want everyone to follow the standard, yet they purvey reference implementations that can be molded into whatever proprietary shape that the Microsofts or Netscapes of this world care to dream up. It comes to reason that a reference implementation of a standard should have a license that promotes compliance and prevents it from being used as a basis for proprietary extensions.

It never occured to me that the "proprietizing" of the Web was a direct threat to Linux. Is there anyone out there who can mount an effective response to the problem?

Tim and the W3C seem like voices in the wilderness -- why doesn't anyone listen to the guy who "invented" the Web?

Sigh...

Nick Vargish

The w3c is working on their own accessibilty guidelines, it contains a long checklist htat covers everything from alt text to coloration of links compared to background.

it's here: http://www.w3.org/WAI/

--Kynn

As a way of bringing yourself up to speed on this topic -- since it seems that apart from disliking Jakob, you don't seem to know a whole lot about the subject -- you may want to read up on the W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, which are certainly the web industry standard (de facto or otherwise) for accessibility.

Reading those over would help you know a little what you're ranting against. You can find the WCAG linked from the Web Accessibility Initiative homepage.

--Kynn

This allows for a lot of flexibility and optimization to meet everyone's needs, including users with disabilities, plus PDAs, phones, and more. Neat stuff!

--Kynn

The W3C's Web Accessibility Consortium creates technical specifications that are guidelines for web page authors, browser programmers, and authoring tool creators. (Warning: Dry and technical in that charming W3C manner.)

The HTML Writers Guild's AWARE Center is all about educating web designers on creating accessible pages. You may want to read the Common Myths about Web Accessibility article or the Selfish Reasons for Accessible Web Design. (Full disclosure: I maintain the AWARE center site and wrote both of the articles cited above.)

--Kynn

Actually, accessible sites are possible today, on all major browsers. You don't even need HTML 4.0 or CSS, though those technologies fit in nicely.

You do have to give up the notion that HTML is a typographic markup language, and you also have to accept that the User, not the Author, is in control of the presentation.

The Web Accessibility Initiative is a great resource on designing accessible content.

For starters, there's Lynx. That browser have been with us for a looooooong time. It also gives a good representation of what a web site looks to a person with a braille-enabled browser, or a browser that uses speech synthesis. You also get a quick indication of how your site will "look" when a search engine's robot comes by. If site authors used Lynx more they'd probably figure out what all this fuzz is about.

There's also several resources available regarding accessibility on the web. The HTML 4.0 spec has quite a lot of information regarding how to make your site accessible for everyone, not only those with a graphical browser. With CSS level 2 you have "aural style sheets" which enables you to suggest presentational information for users with speech-synthesis. Add to that the Web Accessibility Intiative and Jacob Nielsen's Accessible Design for users with disabilities.

Usability for other people than those with graphical browsers has been around for years (that Nielsen-article is old). But when you look at people's attitude there's no wonder why sites look like they do. Nobody gives a damn anyway... I think that's scary.

But, even though this has been a case for quite a while it doesn't mean I believe that the blind can sue AOL. As others have mentioned, if AOL hasn't gone out saying it's accessible to the blind they, in my opinion, don't have a case. They can ask AOL to create a site they can use, but they shouldn't be able to force AOL to do so. With the amount of publicity this gets AOL might feel it's good PR to create a site usable for the blind, maybe simply because they don't want to lose the case. In my opinion it's only the government and other official sites that should be required to be accessible to everyone.

The 'net is in my opinion well suited for being accessible for the blind. Provided they have the right aids mail, news, and to a certain extent, the web, is quite easy to use (since most of it is text). We shouldn't simply lock them out saying "this is a graphical medium, it wasn't ment for you" or anything like that.

For starters, there's Lynx. That browser have been with us for a looooooong time. It also gives a good representation of what a web site looks to a person with a braille-enabled browser, or a browser that uses speech synthesis. You also get a quick indication of how your site will "look" when a search engine's robot comes by. If site authors used Lynx more they'd probably figure out what all this fuzz is about.

There's also several resources available regarding accessibility on the web. The HTML 4.0 spec has quite a lot of information regarding how to make your site accessible for everyone, not only those with a graphical browser. With CSS level 2 you have "aural style sheets" which enables you to suggest presentational information for users with speech-synthesis. Add to that the Web Accessibility Intiative and Jacob Nielsen's Accessible Design for users with disabilities.

Usability for other people than those with graphical browsers has been around for years (that Nielsen-article is old). But when you look at people's attitude there's no wonder why sites look like they do. Nobody gives a damn anyway... I think that's scary.

But, even though this has been a case for quite a while it doesn't mean I believe that the blind can sue AOL. As others have mentioned, if AOL hasn't gone out saying it's accessible to the blind they, in my opinion, don't have a case. They can ask AOL to create a site they can use, but they shouldn't be able to force AOL to do so. With the amount of publicity this gets AOL might feel it's good PR to create a site usable for the blind, maybe simply because they don't want to lose the case. In my opinion it's only the government and other official sites that should be required to be accessible to everyone.

The 'net is in my opinion well suited for being accessible for the blind. Provided they have the right aids mail, news, and to a certain extent, the web, is quite easy to use (since most of it is text). We shouldn't simply lock them out saying "this is a graphical medium, it wasn't ment for you" or anything like that.

For starters, there's Lynx. That browser have been with us for a looooooong time. It also gives a good representation of what a web site looks to a person with a braille-enabled browser, or a browser that uses speech synthesis. You also get a quick indication of how your site will "look" when a search engine's robot comes by. If site authors used Lynx more they'd probably figure out what all this fuzz is about.

There's also several resources available regarding accessibility on the web. The HTML 4.0 spec has quite a lot of information regarding how to make your site accessible for everyone, not only those with a graphical browser. With CSS level 2 you have "aural style sheets" which enables you to suggest presentational information for users with speech-synthesis. Add to that the Web Accessibility Intiative and Jacob Nielsen's Accessible Design for users with disabilities.

Usability for other people than those with graphical browsers has been around for years (that Nielsen-article is old). But when you look at people's attitude there's no wonder why sites look like they do. Nobody gives a damn anyway... I think that's scary.

But, even though this has been a case for quite a while it doesn't mean I believe that the blind can sue AOL. As others have mentioned, if AOL hasn't gone out saying it's accessible to the blind they, in my opinion, don't have a case. They can ask AOL to create a site they can use, but they shouldn't be able to force AOL to do so. With the amount of publicity this gets AOL might feel it's good PR to create a site usable for the blind, maybe simply because they don't want to lose the case. In my opinion it's only the government and other official sites that should be required to be accessible to everyone.

The 'net is in my opinion well suited for being accessible for the blind. Provided they have the right aids mail, news, and to a certain extent, the web, is quite easy to use (since most of it is text). We shouldn't simply lock them out saying "this is a graphical medium, it wasn't ment for you" or anything like that.

• 20 question Fact Sheet
• accessibility checklist
• full WAI guidelines

• 20 question Fact Sheet
• accessibility checklist
• full WAI guidelines