Is It Time for a 'Kinder, Gentler HTML'?

jg21 writes "Via the Web 2.0 Journal, a worthy link to Yahoo! Architect and JSON inventor Douglas Crockford's latest ideas to fix HTML. He's categorically not a fan of HTML 5, which is still just an Editor's Draft and not endorsed by W3C yet. Crock puts forward ten ideas that in his view would provide extensibility without complexity, adding that the simplification of HTML he is proposing would reduce the cost of training of web developers and incorporates the best practices of AJAX development. From the article: 'The problems with HTML will not be solved by making it bigger and more complicated. I think instead we should generalize what it does well, while excising features that are problematic. HTML can be made into a general application delivery format without disrupting its original role as a document format.'"

Comments

Not Impressed

[AKAImBatman]

You can read his proposal in full over here: http://www.crockford.com/html/

Make sure you have about 2 minutes to spare. You're going to need about that long to read it from beginning to end. What you'll probably find is that he hasn't really solved any of the major issues plaguing HTML or even thought through many of the problems and use-cases that HTML 5 is trying to solve. In fact, his entire "design" can be summed up with the following sentence: "Let's get rid of HTML features that I believe cause problems."

Meanwhile, he still leaves the problems of consistent parsing, semantic meaning, multimedia presentation, and a whole host of other issues unaddressed. Which means that his "design" fails to compete with the intended purpose of HTML 5 at even the most basic level.

I have the highest respect for Mr. Crockford, but my opinion is that he should study the reasons behind HTML 5 a bit more carefully, as well as solicit a bit more feedback from the community before attempting to push a non-solution to their problems. Best of luck to him. :-)

"Kinder Gentler," What the Hell Is That?

[eldavojohn]

As an engineer, the words "kinder gentler" don't mean much to me. I mean, they do when you're talking about other things like leaders or puppies but what the hell do those attributes have to do with a communication standard like HTML?

From the part of the proposal entitled "That's It" I learn:

These changes significantly improve the reliability, security, and performance of HTML applications. The simplification of the language reduces the cost of training of web developers. It incorporates the best practices of Ajax development. It provides extensibility without complexity. The deltas from HTML 4 are generalizations and reductions, which should make browser implementation more straightforward. This is particularly important for mobile devices that cannot tolerate the power demands of complex platforms. The only new feature here is the module, which is critical for security. Modules makes safe mashups possible. So what I'm reading here is you think these changes make it more "straightforward mobile-friendly?"

I am by no means an expert on this but I do code web applications for a living. I will tell you that these changes do not necessarily "improve reliability, security and performance" of HTML. You are suggesting changes with mobile devices in mind and the developers in mind. Adding another getElementsByTagName method to Javascript will make it easier for developers but over use of that will only make searching the DOM more intensive and lead to worse performance. And remember the original intent of HTML! If you are complaining that mobile devices can't render what a desktop can, perhaps it's time to look at a mobile-HTML standard and either you put a cross translator on the mobile browsers or you entice developers to make two sites. I'm not opposed to these ideas, I just don't see how they're going to really help anything but the specific users this guy has in mind. They certainly wouldn't help me at all or provide a better user experience for my end users.

This is ridiculous. You are attacking the wrong target here, you should be attacking the browsers that don't behave according to standards like the cowboy Internet Explorer browser that sometimes does whatever it wants. Many nights I have spent hacking code that checks what browser is being run and behaves differently because it's Internet Explorer and not "everybody else."

Also, a bit offtopic but I Googled "kinder gentler" in an attempt to understand its meaning and for some reason the first result was the White House page for George Herbert Walker Bush. What the hell?