XHTML compliance

[Marshall Roch <ma...@exclupen.com>]

Hi all,

I made a couple of changes and got my custom skin to validate as XHTML 
1.0 Strict!  Nothing too major, but the default skins will still need 
some tweaking.  I only modified the things that got imported into my 
skin or were part of Forrest and not a specific skin (e.g. sitemap.xmap).

See the patch I attached at 
http://issues.cocoondev.org/jira/secure/ViewIssue.jspa?key=FOR-15

I'd appreciate it if people could test this out, both so Forrest can 
output clean XHTML, and so I can identify and fix any other errors that 
might crop up if one of my content editors does something unusual.

Happy coding!

--
Marshall Roch

Re: XHTML compliance

[Ivan Kurmanov <ku...@openlib.org>]

On 03-12-16, Marshall Roch wrote:

> >So we were deliberately not doing the XHTML by default.
> >Also there is the issue of compatibility with older browsers (which
> >has been thrashed out on this list). So the big question is probably
> >"What should be the default".
> 
> I don't want to restart discussions that have already been had, but it 
> was my understanding of XHTML 1.0 that it is backwards-compatible with 
> old browsers, and that CSS is what starts having some problems with any 
> browser 4.0 or older.  Old browsers, however, will still get the 
> unstyled text instead of completely breaking.

Here is a nice essay on XHTML practical value.  Including
arguments against using XHTML:

  http://www.hixie.ch/advocacy/xhtml


Also when talking about HTML 4.01 complience, would be nice
to be specific: which HTML 4.01 DTD you mean (there are 4 of
them).  I guess it is HTML 4.01 Transitional, but Strict
would make me happier.  No font tags, at least.



Ivan Kurmanov

http://www.ahinea.com/

Re: XHTML compliance

[David Crossley <cr...@indexgeo.com.au>]

Marshall Roch wrote:
> David Crossley wrote:
> > I meant the "media type" http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml-media-types/
> > Whether text/html is the correct thing to do.
> 
> Whoops, my mistake.  I would say text/html, since that's most likely to 
> work in old browsers and other user agents (cell phones, PDAs, 
> java-enabled toasters ;-), and XHTML still has more of its roots in HTML 
> than XML.

But did you see the discussion in the document that Ivan mentioned?
Much of the talk is about "XHTML delivered as text/html is broken".

This is why we have been treading very carefully in this area and
why i would prefer that we continue to deliver HTML by default.
What do others think?

--David

Re: XHTML compliance

[Marshall Roch <ma...@exclupen.com>]

David Crossley wrote:
> I meant the "media type" http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml-media-types/
> Whether text/html is the correct thing to do.

Whoops, my mistake.  I would say text/html, since that's most likely to 
work in old browsers and other user agents (cell phones, PDAs, 
java-enabled toasters ;-), and XHTML still has more of its roots in HTML 
than XML.

--
Marshall Roch

Re: XHTML compliance

[David Crossley <cr...@indexgeo.com.au>]

Marshall Roch wrote:
> David Crossley wrote:
<snip/>
>
> > What is the mime type for XHTML? Eeek, i thought that this would be
> > a big issue, but when i Googled for an answer i became more horrified.
> 
> IIRC, it has to follow the XML spec, which is either UTF-8 or ISO-8859-1 
> (or US-ASCII, which is a subset).  Not sure on that, though.

That is the encoding. Yes we need to decide on that too.
I meant the "media type" http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml-media-types/
Whether text/html is the correct thing to do.

--David

Re: XHTML compliance

[Marshall Roch <ma...@exclupen.com>]

David Crossley wrote:
> IIRC forrest-dev decided to start off with trying to get compliant
> HTML first.

The few pages I validated at xml.apache.org/forrest/ were valid HTML 4.01.

> So we were deliberately not doing the XHTML by default.
> Also there is the issue of compatibility with older browsers (which
> has been thrashed out on this list). So the big question is probably
> "What should be the default".

I don't want to restart discussions that have already been had, but it 
was my understanding of XHTML 1.0 that it is backwards-compatible with 
old browsers, and that CSS is what starts having some problems with any 
browser 4.0 or older.  Old browsers, however, will still get the 
unstyled text instead of completely breaking.

> If the default does remain as HTML then we could simply add an FAQ
> to explain how to get XHTML instead. It should be just a matter of
> changing the serializer in sitemap.xmap. (Yes, i know that you have
> found some other issues which must be fixed whatever happens.)

How about a skinconf setting?  Maybe "project.serializer=html" by 
default, then the option to switch to "xhtml-trans" or "xhtml-strict" 
(to have the option of either doctype) if you want and your skin is valid.

> We have been trying to get everything that should be done with CSS
> into the associated skin/page.css rather than in the HTML code.
> Perhaps we should switch to the "forrest-css" skin to expedite this.

Has anyone taken a look at Sliding Doors[1], the recent A List Apart 
article that details how to make curved tabs with just an unordered list 
and some CSS?  I've used that article to make some (IMHO) pretty cool 
tabs on the site I'm working on[2].

> Why do you need to hard-code the mime type? Doesn't the serializer
> add that?

I expected it to, but I don't think it did.  Something to look into, for 
sure.

> What is the mime type for XHTML? Eeek, i thought that this would be
> a big issue, but when i Googled for an answer i became more horrified.

IIRC, it has to follow the XML spec, which is either UTF-8 or ISO-8859-1 
(or US-ASCII, which is a subset).  Not sure on that, though.

--
Marshall Roch

[1] http://www.alistapart.com/articles/slidingdoors
[2] http://whs.winnacunnet.k12.nh.us:81/

Re: XHTML compliance

[David Crossley <cr...@indexgeo.com.au>]

Marshall Roch wrote:
> 
> I made a couple of changes and got my custom skin to validate as XHTML 
> 1.0 Strict!  Nothing too major, but the default skins will still need 
> some tweaking.  I only modified the things that got imported into my 
> skin or were part of Forrest and not a specific skin (e.g. sitemap.xmap).
> 
> See the patch I attached at 
> http://issues.cocoondev.org/jira/secure/ViewIssue.jspa?key=FOR-15

Thanks.

IIRC forrest-dev decided to start off with trying to get compliant
HTML first. So we were deliberately not doing the XHTML by default.
Also there is the issue of compatibility with older browsers (which
has been thrashed out on this list). So the big question is probably
"What should be the default".

If the default does remain as HTML then we could simply add an FAQ
to explain how to get XHTML instead. It should be just a matter of
changing the serializer in sitemap.xmap. (Yes, i know that you have
found some other issues which must be fixed whatever happens.)

> I'd appreciate it if people could test this out, both so Forrest can 
> output clean XHTML, and so I can identify and fix any other errors that 
> might crop up if one of my content editors does something unusual.

No time to test at the moment, but i had a quick look at your patch.
A few comments ...

We have been trying to get everything that should be done with CSS
into the associated skin/page.css rather than in the HTML code.
Perhaps we should switch to the "forrest-css" skin to expedite this.

Why do you need to hard-code the mime type? Doesn't the serializer
add that?

What is the mime type for XHTML? Eeek, i thought that this would be
a big issue, but when i Googled for an answer i became more horrified.

Thanks for starting to address this issue. Forrest definitely needs to
be compliant with both HTML and XHTML, whatever each developer chooses.

--David

Re: XHTML compliance

[Marshall Roch <ma...@exclupen.com>]

Antonio Gallardo wrote:
> Great job! Are you tried it in Mozilla and IE?

I haven't tried it with the default skins, but those changes will get 
you closer (not all the way unless you already have a valid skin) to 
passing the W3C's validator.

--
Marshall Roch

Re: XHTML compliance

[Antonio Gallardo <ag...@agsoftware.dnsalias.com>]

Great job! Are you tried it in Mozilla and IE?

Best Regards,

Antonio Gallardo

Marshall Roch dijo:
> Hi all,
>
> I made a couple of changes and got my custom skin to validate as XHTML
> 1.0 Strict!  Nothing too major, but the default skins will still need
> some tweaking.  I only modified the things that got imported into my
> skin or were part of Forrest and not a specific skin (e.g. sitemap.xmap).
>
> See the patch I attached at
> http://issues.cocoondev.org/jira/secure/ViewIssue.jspa?key=FOR-15
>
> I'd appreciate it if people could test this out, both so Forrest can
> output clean XHTML, and so I can identify and fix any other errors that
> might crop up if one of my content editors does something unusual.
>
> Happy coding!
>
> --
> Marshall Roch
>

Re: XHTML compliance

[Johan Kok <jk...@messianic.dyndns.org>]

> That's a good start in the right direction.......
>
>
> Marshall Roch wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I made a couple of changes and got my custom skin to validate as 
>> XHTML 1.0 Strict!  Nothing too major, but the default skins will 
>> still need some tweaking.  I only modified the things that got 
>> imported into my skin or were part of Forrest and not a specific skin 
>> (e.g. sitemap.xmap).
>>
>> See the patch I attached at 
>> http://issues.cocoondev.org/jira/secure/ViewIssue.jspa?key=FOR-15
>>
>> I'd appreciate it if people could test this out, both so Forrest can 
>> output clean XHTML, and so I can identify and fix any other errors 
>> that might crop up if one of my content editors does something unusual.
>>
>> Happy coding!
>>
>> -- 
>> Marshall Roch
>>
>>
>