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Isn't that just HTML 5? "Persistent storage. Both key / value and a SQL database are supported. ... An API that enables offline Web applications. " - we don't need another program, we need spec-following browsers, unlike IE has been in the past. Sure, it'll be 10 years before HTML5 is widespread, but it's better to have a standard than use a proprietary, closed-source runtime enviroment. Look at how long Java took to become standardized.

Though this is different from the OP's areas of excitement, I'd suggest taking a look at the architecture of the web, and Roy Fielding's (quite readable, IMO) thesis on the development of that architecture while he was working on HTTP 1.1. A major factor behind why the Web has become successful is that it focuses on the data, not the roles of the participants. Similarly, this is why systems like UNIX pipes are so useful -- a uniform interface provides for many benefits (at the cost of some tradeoffs, such as latency). Unfortunately the mainstream seems to have missed this, though times are 'a changin'

>> * Self closed tags can't have a space between the slash and bracket

My reading of this http://www.w3.org/TR/2006/REC-xml-20060816/ (especially production 44) was that the slash and the bracket *MUST* be together.

Actually XOP has W3C technical recommendation status since October 2005: http://www.w3.org/TR/xop10/

Yet Daredevil can't even solve the average CAPTCHA.

There are already numerous meta tag schemes for content rating.

http://www.icra.org/label/
http://www.w3.org/PICS/
http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/wcl/

There are already numerous meta tag schemes for content rating.

http://www.icra.org/label/
http://www.w3.org/PICS/
http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/wcl/

The company I work for, Garlik has two products that are run off semantic web technology. DataPatrol (for pay) and QDOS (free, in beta).

We use RDF stores instead of databases in some places as they are very good at representing graph structures, which are a real pain to real with in SQL. You often hear the "what can RDF do that SQL can't" type arguments, which are all just nonsense. What can SQL do that a field database, or a bunch of flat files can't? It's all about what you can do easily enough that you will be bothered to do it.

A fully normalised SQL database has many of the attributes of an RDF store, but
a) when was the last time you saw one in production use?
b) how much of a pain was it to write big queries with outer joins?

RDF + SPARQL makes that kind of thing trivial, and has other fringe side benefits (better standardisation, data portability) that you don't get with SQL.

I guess it shouldn't be a surprise to see the comments consisting of the usual round of more-or-less irrelevant jokes and snide commentary - this is Slashdot after all - but I can't help responding.

The semantic web refers to a specific attempt/vision put forth by w3c.

http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/

This article is about a news organization using semantic tools to help extract and manipulate certain data. Sure, they are related a little maybe, but if related meant equal, then every computer would break.

Just because the word "semantic" matches, they've confused the two domains, and if humans can't even do it, I wonder what our automated semantic web would look like with robots trying to make connections. I cannot even begin to imagine how hackable that would be.

That problem with the validator precisely illustrates the point of the article. The validator started using an XML library which does not do the right thing and cache the entity files it's retrieving. The validator team found out about this issue and worked around the XML library bug in less than two weeks.

No no no, that's not the intent at all, documents should continue to point to DTDs on W3C's site. In fact the next version of W3C's markup validator will issue a warning if the FPI and system ID do not match.

People who are simply creating HTML documents generally don't need to worry about this issue at all, sorry if the article was unclear.

Or the copyright. If they want to encourage replication of the document, they should eliminate constraints on that.
http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Legal/copyright-documents-19990405.

If they're okay with developers including static copies of the DTDs in client software, it should fucking well say so in the DTDs. Instead they make absolutely no mention of intellectual property issues whatsoever. Writing software is an IP minefield. Copy/pasting other peoples' work into your code is a damn fine way to get yourself sued. People don't want to get sued. The w3c have never understood this kind of real-world concern.

This is perfectly in line with the standard, as the identifier would still be the same (without .physical). That would cause all software that is erroneously donwloading it to fail, as well as future badly written software that rely on it to exist at the URI-as-URL, teaching the devs a lesson.

See this comment. /. is NOTHING compared to the traffic generated by DTD requests.

http://www.w3.org/blog/systeam/2008/02/08/w3c_s_excessive_dtd_traffic#c1821

From the W3C specifications for XHTML documents [Link]

3.1.1 - Strictly Conforming Documents ...There must be a DOCTYPE declaration in the document prior to the root element. The public identifier included in the DOCTYPE declaration must reference one of the three DTDs found in DTDs using the respective Formal Public Identifier. The system identifier may be changed to reflect local system conventions... An XML declaration is not required in all XML documents; however XHTML document authors are strongly encouraged to use XML declarations in all their documents.

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

This is the DTD they require. Because the DTD is not declared inline in an XHTML document, it must contain the external reference (the second part - the link to "w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-XXXX.dtd") to the W3C's DTD - which is, presumably, what they're bitching about.

http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml For further information, see: http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1 Copyright (c) 1998-2002 W3C (MIT, INRIA, Keio), All Rights Reserved. This DTD module is identified by the PUBLIC and SYSTEM identifiers: PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" SYSTEM "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" $Revision: 1.1 $ $Date: 2002/08/01 13:56:03 $ --> %HTMLlat1; %HTMLsymbol; %HTMLspecial;

That doctype is simply <!DOCTYPE HTML>!

They literally wrote the standard.

"Webmasters" refers to people who run websites, not the W3C. And this particular feature is an artefact of SGML, which was around for over a decade before the W3C ever existed.

If they didn't want the traffic they should have specified the matter in their RFCs.

You mean like how RFC 2616 describes the caching mechanism that is being ignored by the problem clients? Or are you referring to the established-for-decades SGML system catalogue that they mention in the HTML 4 specification multiple times?

You can tell them apart by their attention to the consequences of their actions.

If people writing client software actually did what they were supposed to, this wouldn't be a problem. This is not a designed-in bug, this is caused by a minority of developers eschewing the specifications and standard practice out of either ignorance or apathy.

They literally wrote the standard.

"Webmasters" refers to people who run websites, not the W3C. And this particular feature is an artefact of SGML, which was around for over a decade before the W3C ever existed.

If they didn't want the traffic they should have specified the matter in their RFCs.

You mean like how RFC 2616 describes the caching mechanism that is being ignored by the problem clients? Or are you referring to the established-for-decades SGML system catalogue that they mention in the HTML 4 specification multiple times?

You can tell them apart by their attention to the consequences of their actions.

If people writing client software actually did what they were supposed to, this wouldn't be a problem. This is not a designed-in bug, this is caused by a minority of developers eschewing the specifications and standard practice out of either ignorance or apathy.

It does contain a URL. It also contain a URN (for instance "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"). The point of a URN is that it doesn't have a universal location - you're supposed to find it wherever you can, probably in local cache somewhere.

The URL can be seen as a backup ("in case you don't know the DTD for W3C HTML 4.01, you can create a local copy from this URL" - in the future, when people have forgotten HTML 4.01, that can be useful), or the same way XML namespaces is used - you don't have to send a HTTP request to http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml to know that a document that uses that namespace is a xhtml document - it's just another form of a unique resource identifier (URI), just like a URN or a guid.

What the W3C is having a problem with is applications that decide to fetch the DTD every single request. That's just crazy. Why do you even need to validate it, unless you're a validator? Just try to parse it - it probably won't validate anyway, and you'll have to do either do it in some kind of quirks mode or just break. If you can parse it correctly, does it matter if it validates? If you can't parse it, does it matter if it validates? And if you actually do want to validate it, why make the user wait a few seconds while you fetch the DTD on every page request? The only reasonable way this could happen that I can think of is link crawlers who find the URL - but doesn't link crawlers usually avoid to revisit pages they just visited?

I have a solution to the problem; I wrote it down at http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd !

Only if your XML Parser doesnt support W3C XML Schema Part 2.

"XML is really just data dressed up as a hooker."

--Dave Thomas

XML does suck if you stick with some of the W3C standards and common tools. Suggestions to make it less painful:

• Ditch W3C's XML Schema

  W3C Schema is painful; it forces object-oriented design concepts onto a hierarchical data model. Consider RELAX NG (an Oasis-approved standard) instead; it's delightful in comparison. Use the verbose XML syntax when communicating with the less technical - if you've seen XML before, it's pretty easy to comprehend:

  <r:optional>
  <r:element name="w3cSchemaDescription">
  <r:choice>
  <r:value>painful</r:value>
  <r:value>ugly</r:value>
  <r:value>inflexible</r:value>
  </r:choice>
  </r:element>
  </r:optional>

  Switch to the compact syntax when you're among geeks:

  element w3cSchemaDescription { "painful" | "ugly" | "inflexible" }?

  There's validation support on major platforms, and even a tool (Trang) to convert between verbose/compact formats, and output to DTD and W3C Schemas. And, if you need to specify data types, it borrows the one technology W3C Schema got right: the Datatypes library.

• Don't use the W3C DOM

  The W3C DOM attempts to be a universal API, which means it must conform to the lowest common denominator in the programming languages it targets. Consider the NodeList interface:

  interface NodeList {
  Node item(in unsigned long index);
  readonly attribute unsigned long length;
  };

  While similar to the native list/collection/array interfaces most languages provide, it's not an exact match. So, DOM implementers create an object that doesn't work quite like any other collection on the platform. In Java, this means writing:

  for(int i = 0; i < nodeList.length(); i++)
  {
  Node node = nodeList.item(i);
  // Do something with node here...
  }

  Instead of:

  for(Node node : nodeList)
  {
  // Do something with node here...
  }

  Dynamic languages allow an even more concise syntax. Consider this Ruby builder code to build a trivial XML document:

  x.date {
  x.year "2006"
  x.month "01"
  x.day "01"
  }

  I thought about writing the W3C DOM equivalent of the above, but I'm not feeling masochistic tonight. Sorry.

  The alternatives depend on your programming language, but plenty of choices exist for DOM-style traversal/manipulation.

• Forget document models entirely (maybe)

  In-memory object models of large XML document can consume a lot of resources, but often, you only need part of the data. Consider using an XMLPull or StAX parser instead. Pull means you control the document traversal, only descending into (and fully parsing) sections of the XML that are of interest. SAX based parsers have equivalent capabilities, but the programming model is uncomfortable for many developers.

  Even better, some Pull processors are wicked fast, even when using them to construct a DOM. In Winter 2006, I benchmarked an XML-heavy application, and found WoodStox to be an order of magnitude faster at constructing thousands of small DOM4J documents

"XML is really just data dressed up as a hooker."

--Dave Thomas

XML does suck if you stick with some of the W3C standards and common tools. Suggestions to make it less painful:

• Ditch W3C's XML Schema

  W3C Schema is painful; it forces object-oriented design concepts onto a hierarchical data model. Consider RELAX NG (an Oasis-approved standard) instead; it's delightful in comparison. Use the verbose XML syntax when communicating with the less technical - if you've seen XML before, it's pretty easy to comprehend:

  <r:optional>
  <r:element name="w3cSchemaDescription">
  <r:choice>
  <r:value>painful</r:value>
  <r:value>ugly</r:value>
  <r:value>inflexible</r:value>
  </r:choice>
  </r:element>
  </r:optional>

  Switch to the compact syntax when you're among geeks:

  element w3cSchemaDescription { "painful" | "ugly" | "inflexible" }?

  There's validation support on major platforms, and even a tool (Trang) to convert between verbose/compact formats, and output to DTD and W3C Schemas. And, if you need to specify data types, it borrows the one technology W3C Schema got right: the Datatypes library.

• Don't use the W3C DOM

  The W3C DOM attempts to be a universal API, which means it must conform to the lowest common denominator in the programming languages it targets. Consider the NodeList interface:

  interface NodeList {
  Node item(in unsigned long index);
  readonly attribute unsigned long length;
  };

  While similar to the native list/collection/array interfaces most languages provide, it's not an exact match. So, DOM implementers create an object that doesn't work quite like any other collection on the platform. In Java, this means writing:

  for(int i = 0; i < nodeList.length(); i++)
  {
  Node node = nodeList.item(i);
  // Do something with node here...
  }

  Instead of:

  for(Node node : nodeList)
  {
  // Do something with node here...
  }

  Dynamic languages allow an even more concise syntax. Consider this Ruby builder code to build a trivial XML document:

  x.date {
  x.year "2006"
  x.month "01"
  x.day "01"
  }

  I thought about writing the W3C DOM equivalent of the above, but I'm not feeling masochistic tonight. Sorry.

  The alternatives depend on your programming language, but plenty of choices exist for DOM-style traversal/manipulation.

• Forget document models entirely (maybe)

  In-memory object models of large XML document can consume a lot of resources, but often, you only need part of the data. Consider using an XMLPull or StAX parser instead. Pull means you control the document traversal, only descending into (and fully parsing) sections of the XML that are of interest. SAX based parsers have equivalent capabilities, but the programming model is uncomfortable for many developers.

  Even better, some Pull processors are wicked fast, even when using them to construct a DOM. In Winter 2006, I benchmarked an XML-heavy application, and found WoodStox to be an order of magnitude faster at constructing thousands of small DOM4J documents

And if all you're sending are images, you're not sending them as XML to begin with are you. hmmm maybe

Ahem, if all you're sending are bitmapped images, you're not sending them as XML to begin with are you.

Better?

| And if all you're sending are images, you're not sending them as XML to begin with are you. hmmm maybe

JSON is fit mostly for communication and transfer of simple data between JS and server side scripts through object serialization. But it remains limited. You can compare JSON to XML only if your knowledge of XML stops at the X in AJAX
Beyond that scope comparing these two unrelated "things" is irrelevant.

The tools and libraries available for XML go well beyond JSON's scope. DOM, RSS & ATOM, OASIS, Xpath, XSLT, eXist DB are just few examples of tools and libraries surrounding XML.
XML is designed to let you create your own protocols and formats while using only one simple base format (XML), one simple descriptor language (Schema or DTS) and you can convert your formats and protocols using one transformation technology (XSLT).
There are languages to query XML files and collections, XLM databases and many more examples including scientific, vectorial and 3d imaging formats.
I believe the word Interoperability was created with XML in mind... Or maybe the other way round... whatever.

3rd Undersea Internet/Communications Cable Cut in 3 Days (CNN) -- An undersea cable carrying Internet traffic was cut off the Persian Gulf emirate of Dubai, officials said Friday, the third loss of a line carrying Internet and telephone traffic in three days. (UAFF/ARM) -- My sources told me today that this is clearly a message to other countries by The United States Government and Military that they own the Internet/World Communications and can shut them down anytime they wish. The Internet was invented by Tim Berners-Lee http://www.w3.org/People/Berners-Lee/, and is still owned and operated by The Department Of Defense. ARPANET / DARPANET. Do your research and you will find out this is true. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET

3rd Undersea Internet/Communications Cable Cut in 3 Days (CNN) -- An undersea cable carrying Internet traffic was cut off the Persian Gulf emirate of Dubai, officials said Friday, the third loss of a line carrying Internet and telephone traffic in three days. (UAFF/ARM) -- My sources told me today that this is clearly a message to other countries by The United States Government and Military that they own the Internet/World Communications and can shut them down anytime they wish. The Internet was invented by Tim Berners-Lee http://www.w3.org/People/Berners-Lee/, and is still owned and operated by The Department Of Defense. ARPANET / DARPANET. Do your research and you will find out this is true. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET

Actually it's not quite as dumb as it sounds. They're not simple static pictures, they're actually vector graphics, and with Silverlight you can view them fullscreen, without any stretching or distortion. (Guess who had to install Silverlight at work?)

It works in Firefox under Windows, by the way. (Word of warning: Silverlight and FlashBlock do NOT work together. However, Silverlight, NoScript, AdBlock Plus, and Firebug all work fine together.)

Now if only there were an open scalable vector graphics format that they could have used instead... if only...

Wish I could. Check this out:

From 8.1.2.3. Attributes:

Attributes can be specified in four different ways:

Empty attribute syntax

Just the attribute name.

Unquoted attribute value syntax

The attribute name, followed by zero or more space characters, followed by a single U+003D EQUALS SIGN character, followed by zero or more space characters, followed by the attribute value, which, in addition to the requirements given above for attribute values, must not contain any literal space characters or U+003E GREATER-THAN SIGN (>) characters, and must not, furthermore, start with either a literal U+0022 QUOTATION MARK (") character or a literal U+0027 APOSTROPHE (') character.

Single-quoted attribute value syntax

[as in XML]

Double-quoted attribute value syntax

[as in XML]

And don't forget:

From 8.1.2.4. Optional tags:

A head element's end tag may be omitted if the head element is not immediately followed by a space character or a comment.

A li element's end tag may be omitted if the li element is immediately followed by another li element or if there is no more content in the parent element.

A tr element's end tag may be omitted if the tr element is immediately followed by another tr element, or if there is no more content in the parent element.

So yes, right now, today, in 2008, people are seriously discussing rolling out another non-XML HMTL spec.

I direct you to 8.3. Namespaces:

The HTML namespace is: http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml

I hope that's sufficient.

Wish I could. Check this out:

From 8.1.2.3. Attributes:

Attributes can be specified in four different ways:

Empty attribute syntax

Just the attribute name.

Unquoted attribute value syntax

The attribute name, followed by zero or more space characters, followed by a single U+003D EQUALS SIGN character, followed by zero or more space characters, followed by the attribute value, which, in addition to the requirements given above for attribute values, must not contain any literal space characters or U+003E GREATER-THAN SIGN (>) characters, and must not, furthermore, start with either a literal U+0022 QUOTATION MARK (") character or a literal U+0027 APOSTROPHE (') character.

Single-quoted attribute value syntax

[as in XML]

Double-quoted attribute value syntax

[as in XML]

And don't forget:

From 8.1.2.4. Optional tags:

A head element's end tag may be omitted if the head element is not immediately followed by a space character or a comment.

A li element's end tag may be omitted if the li element is immediately followed by another li element or if there is no more content in the parent element.

A tr element's end tag may be omitted if the tr element is immediately followed by another tr element, or if there is no more content in the parent element.

So yes, right now, today, in 2008, people are seriously discussing rolling out another non-XML HMTL spec.

I direct you to 8.3. Namespaces:

The HTML namespace is: http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml

I hope that's sufficient.

Wish I could. Check this out:

From 8.1.2.3. Attributes:

Attributes can be specified in four different ways:

Empty attribute syntax

Just the attribute name.

Unquoted attribute value syntax

The attribute name, followed by zero or more space characters, followed by a single U+003D EQUALS SIGN character, followed by zero or more space characters, followed by the attribute value, which, in addition to the requirements given above for attribute values, must not contain any literal space characters or U+003E GREATER-THAN SIGN (>) characters, and must not, furthermore, start with either a literal U+0022 QUOTATION MARK (") character or a literal U+0027 APOSTROPHE (') character.

Single-quoted attribute value syntax

[as in XML]

Double-quoted attribute value syntax

[as in XML]

And don't forget:

From 8.1.2.4. Optional tags:

A head element's end tag may be omitted if the head element is not immediately followed by a space character or a comment.

A li element's end tag may be omitted if the li element is immediately followed by another li element or if there is no more content in the parent element.

A tr element's end tag may be omitted if the tr element is immediately followed by another tr element, or if there is no more content in the parent element.

So yes, right now, today, in 2008, people are seriously discussing rolling out another non-XML HMTL spec.

I direct you to 8.3. Namespaces:

The HTML namespace is: http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml

I hope that's sufficient.

Wish I could. Check this out:

From 8.1.2.3. Attributes:

Attributes can be specified in four different ways:

Empty attribute syntax

Just the attribute name.

Unquoted attribute value syntax

The attribute name, followed by zero or more space characters, followed by a single U+003D EQUALS SIGN character, followed by zero or more space characters, followed by the attribute value, which, in addition to the requirements given above for attribute values, must not contain any literal space characters or U+003E GREATER-THAN SIGN (>) characters, and must not, furthermore, start with either a literal U+0022 QUOTATION MARK (") character or a literal U+0027 APOSTROPHE (') character.

Single-quoted attribute value syntax

[as in XML]

Double-quoted attribute value syntax

[as in XML]

And don't forget:

From 8.1.2.4. Optional tags:

A head element's end tag may be omitted if the head element is not immediately followed by a space character or a comment.

A li element's end tag may be omitted if the li element is immediately followed by another li element or if there is no more content in the parent element.

A tr element's end tag may be omitted if the tr element is immediately followed by another tr element, or if there is no more content in the parent element.

So yes, right now, today, in 2008, people are seriously discussing rolling out another non-XML HMTL spec.

I direct you to 8.3. Namespaces:

The HTML namespace is: http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml

I hope that's sufficient.

Social Logic will help mitigate obstacles. Technology Logic as infrastructure is a partial solution. Business logic only, will fail.

A community (Social Logic) is always sharing implicit content to sustain the social relationships (work, pay, play, safety ...). In the work environment infrastructure (significant, maybe complete) community implicit content can be collected, grown, and maintain then mined, recovered, and recycled for business logic purposes.

With internal VoIP, email, PIM+, web-browsing history, VTC/Social conferencing, BioPKI tokens/authentication ... data/content bulk collection and Biz and HR essential information ... it should be possible to initially chart the conceptual ideal core-biz processes to core-personnel, then to external B2B/B2C processes and their essential contact information. All along this flow/path the core data/content bulk can be used to convert internal into explicit codified knowledge publications. Then, you must maintain the data/content bulk/audit trail to discover innovative, transitional, and situational variations in new implicit activities for intelligently transition of explicit knowledge publications and future BizTransformation (why, because shit happens and things change, thank god).

Tools to consider as part of the solution:
CMS, Syntax: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML
CMS, Syntax: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntax
CMS, Syntax: http://www.w3schools.com/
CMS, Syntax: https://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&type_of_search=soft&words=XML
CMS, Syntax: https://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&type_of_search=soft&words=Content+Management+System
CMS, Syntax: https://sourceforge.net/services/buy/service_providers.php?words=XML+schema+syntax+
KMS, Semantics: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_Web
KMS, Semantics: http://www.w3.org/2002/ws/swsig/
KMS, Semantics: https://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&type_of_search=soft&words=Knowledge+management+system
BPM, Semantics: https://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&type_of_search=soft&words=Bussiness+Process+management
BRM, Synergy: https://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&type_of_search=soft&words=business+relationship+managemnt
RMM, Synergy: https://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&type_of_search=soft&words=relationship+managment+model
RMS, Synergy: http://nwn.blogs.com/
RMS, Synergy: http://secondlife.com/whatis/
TCM, Practical: http://www.sei.cmu.edu/isis/model-problems.htm
TCM, Practical: http://www.sei.cmu.edu/intro/documents/concept/
TCM, Practical:

All your BASE are belong to us.

Ah, nevermind. It looks like it's in the CSS3 spec right now.
http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-ui/#box-sizing

Off topic, but this is a pet hate of mine -- why bother sticking the logos of web standards on your page when it fails so thoroughly to comply to said standards?

Off topic, but this is a pet hate of mine -- why bother sticking the logos of web standards on your page when it fails so thoroughly to comply to said standards?

For instance, if I have a single element that could be some combination of red or green, bold or italic, floated left or floated right, and 12 or 22 point text, I would have to draft 2^4 different styles that this element could be.

You can actually combine classes:
<div class="bigfont leftfloat italic">blah</div>

I agree though that html coding would get hard if an occasional style attribute is not allowed anymore. But the spec says:[ref]: We probably need to move this [style] attribute to more elements, maybe even all of them, though if we do that we really should find a way to strongly discourage its use (and the use of its DOM attribute) for non-WYSIWYG authors.

The namespace for the XML version of HTML5 is the same as XHTML 1.0 and 1.1: http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml

Isn't that a problem if I want to do XHTML1.0 strict with just html5:video? I can emit that without retooling.

What should that sentence say instead?

Implementors should already understand the issues with not supporting dynamic content, the real problem is that so much script is completely unnecessary. Authors are reminded that not all user agents have scripting available and that users may have scripting disabled or filtered. ??? Org policy, "web firewalls", browser prefs, noscript extension, lynx, dillo, netSurf. The authors intent is irrelevant here; my intent is telekinesis tho I'm not prepared to read any texts on the subject.

You said somewhere below that XHTML failed. By the same metric, I could say that HTML5 has failed! Everyone knows where the failure really lies, I'm (^wA) certain mainstream browser support is required for both.

If you love the blink tag, just wait until you get a hold of text-decoration: blink.
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/text.html#propdef-text-decoration

The namespace for the XML version of HTML5 is the same as XHTML 1.0 and 1.1: http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml

I don't think the spec ignores that the user has the final say, I think it is entirely true that if you have scripting disabled, you MIGHT be unable to fully convey the author's intent. What should that sentence say instead?

Here's the XHTML5 version of the page you quoted (basically no need for a DOCTYPE, and the type="" attribute on <script> is optional for JavaScript):

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en">
<head>
<title>js</title>
<script>
<![CDATA[
function rewrite_noscript(){
var e = document.getElementById('noscript');
// Repopulate with innerHTML
}
window.onload = rewrite_noscript;
]]>
</script>
</head>
<body>
<div id="noscript">
No attempt has been made to ensure this page functions without javascript.
</div>
</body>
</html>

No really, what a waste of time

http://www.w3.org/TR/2008/WD-html5-20080122/#the-irrelevant

Henri Sivonen and his elitist friends really have outdone themselves.

Idiots, go back to 1999....