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There is a residue taste of condescending snobbery left from reading both (some of) the commentary on this thread and the Hickson article which implies that all but an elite band of standards-cogniscenti (sp?) are basically light-weight "fools" who really shouldn't be playing with XHTML at all.
Indeed, I'm left wondering who the members of this standards-cogniscenti actually are? Probably the same people that forged them no doubt!
I'm angry 'cos XHTML was meant to be simpler, cleaner, more accessible and more efficient. Instead, at every step of the way, we've had browser-makers and code-writers alike struggle to understand and implement the darned thing!
Encyclo says it's 'flawed, or even broken': After reading this, I couldn't agree more... but what annoys me more is why the hell this is only now hitting the radar?!
I know I've invested a lot of time studying this area and would even assert that I know more than the average person. There is a limit however, to how deep one goes before pledging one's life over completely to the altar of every frickin standard going ('cos they tend to interconnect at some juncture or another don't they!).
How long has the XHTML standard been with us? 7yrs or so? If it were a commercial venture it'd long been abandoned and bankrupt... and whose fault is it? The W3C themselves!
They can't explain things clearly; Can't say things loud enough (How old is Hickson's article?... 2002 FFS!) and don't get out into the web community enough.
Web-tech these days is split into many disciplines: A web designer shouldn't have to go into the dark depths of the RFC specs and server config to do his job!
Those that are fortunate (or not) to devote their lives to the Cause would be better serving us all if they remember that and allow the rest of us who have to straddle many disciplines to use an infrastructure that works and is understandable.
Apart from that, good find DrDoc and interesting posts Encyclo too.
Encyclo says it's 'flawed, or even broken': After reading this, I couldn't agree more... but what annoys me more is why the hell this is only now hitting the radar?!
This is a gripe also. Found this on a website: "in the near future all browsers should be fully compatible with the current W3C XHTML standards"
--- That was written in 1999, and we ain't there yet.
And apparently some of the glitches in the actual W3C standards have been documented for some time - they just never hit the front page until recently. That might be one reason why browsers are behind.
IMO, there are two real questions here - why the hype in the first place about XHTML, and why have browsers been so slow to get compatible. The first one I can kind of understand - what I don't understand is why the hype continues when it is becoming obvious that some (most?) browsers will never really be compatible.
In fact, I have read a couple of rumors that FireFox may implement some of what is being called HTML 5.0, even though it has not even hit W3C yet for finals. So it is quite possible that XHTML in its present form will not go much further - it might be replace by a new standard.
And apparently even Microsoft does not know what it is doing. Someone mentioned in this thread that IE7 would not be XHTML compatible, yet MS is saying that the new replacement for FrontPage WILL be..(well sort, of they said it would produce XHTML compliant code).
So, for us at least for now, we are back to the old 4.01/ISO. When (if) W3C and the browser folks actually get their act together we will look again.
There is a residue taste of condescending snobbery left from reading both (some of) the commentary on this thread and the Hickson article which implies that all but an elite band of standards-cogniscenti (sp?) are basically light-weight "fools" who really shouldn't be playing with XHTML at all.
The adoption of XHTML to date is imho characterised by an element of foolishness. It's snobby and condescending to say so, but there's no other way to say it: many people invested time and effort in XHTML for no apparent reason. They did so because they were told to by self-appointed "experts" (or perhaps more accurately: famous, light-weight fools ;)).
The W3c and standards-cogniscenti said everyone should use XHTML because it's the future, then tried to come up with some reasons why:
The problem with these benefits is they're completely bogus. Utter bobbins. Then the first xhtml2 draft appeared and even Zeldman lost his faith [zeldman.com] in the W3C's direction.
See also WASP asks the W3C: Which should we use, HTML or XHTML, and why?, 2003 [webstandards.org]
It should be noted that WaSP were still recommending XHTML as the one and only "web standard" structural markup language up until their re-design last month, when (unannounced) HTML4.01 quietly became a "web standard" again:
Before March 2006 redesign:
"When we speak about “standards” for the Web, we mean: XHTML 1.0, XHTML1.1, XML1.0" (edited for brevity)
After:
"When we speak about “standards” for the Web, we mean: HTML 4.01, XHTML 1.0, XHTML1.1, XML1.0" (edited for brevity)
Is it any wonder that normal web authors are confused when even the standards-cogniscenti have taken this long to work it out?
Knighty:
[...] the leap to XHTML will happen at some time[...]
The W3C say it will, but that's not exactly the most convincing argument I've ever heard. How will we handle the backwards compatibility problem introduced by XHTML2?
A quote from the developerworks article Allan linked to on his blog helps throw light on this situation:
"Embedded devices such as phones and digital TVs have no need to support the Web's legacy of messy HTML, and are free to take unburdened advantage of XHTML 2.0 as a pure XML vocabulary"
The need to browse any of the millions of existing websites is simply dismissed, in favour of the (unspecified) advantages conferred by XML's purity. It's breathtaking.
[edited by: encyclo at 12:13 pm (utc) on April 4, 2006]
I'm producing sites that look great in all browsers, are cleanly coded and easy to maintain. As long as I continue to serve XHTML as text what is the big deal?
No one seems to answer the one key question - why is producing XHTML a bad thing?I'm producing sites that look great in all browsers, are cleanly coded and easy to maintain. As long as I continue to serve XHTML as text what is the big deal?
It all comes back to standards. Sending GIF images as
image/jpegtext/plainWith XHTML ... the fact that it works is slightly besides the point. XHTML was explicitly designed to be XML based. When you read the XHTML specification you hear things over and over again about how the pages "must be wellformed" and how this error checking functionality would ensure that it renders the same in all browsers. While that is true, it is only true as long as you really send the page as XML. Sending it as HTML nullifies all of that. While the XHTML standard clearly states that all the benefits only exist when the document is sent as XML, few really realize that. Even fewer will realize the implications. What happens when IE eventually supports
application/xhtml+xmlThis is what Ian says in his article as well (which, for everyone's knowledge, was updated as late as 2004). He's not saying that XHTML is bad. XHTML is great! Poorly implemented XHTML, however, is misleading and takes your website in the wrong direction. Instead of gaining anything, you have started a dangerous cycle which eventually can lead to unexpected results.
I'm not saying XHTML is bad either. Please don't take it that way. I, too, think that XHTML is great. I believe it is the future. I use it.
But I also realize that it takes a conscious effort to implement it correctly, as the current "compatibility mode" (which is required for IE support) is quite the tricky thing to get right. It takes more than just being able to write the markup. It requires knowing how it changes your stylesheets and scripts. It requires careful setup of server headers. But if you can handle that, hey, go for it! More power to you. If you can't, or if you have no clue why those changes would be required ... HTML 4.01 is truly for you, as it is what you can handle (and it is what the browsers would see anyway), but without any of the drawbacks or dangers stemming from incorrect XHTML implementations.
but what annoys me more is why the hell this is only now hitting the radar?!
Actually, I remember reading about this years ago. I had forgotten where I read this... I think it may have been in the W3 mailing lists. But if you notice, Ian's document states:
This was originally written in September 2002
Ironically, the article referenced in the opening post is totally broken and unreadable in Safari.
Is that a joke? The page looks fine (like FireFox) in Safari on my machine.
Are we forgeting the difference between strict and transitional? Transitional CAN be served as text according to the W3C - you only need to change if you are using strict.
Transitional is just a steppting stone until IE catches up.
Are we forgeting the difference between strict and transitional? Transitional CAN be served as text according to the W3C - you only need to change if you are using strict.
Both XHTML 1.0 Strict and Transitional may be served as
text/html
