Re: LYNX-DEV LYNX: please say "THIS IS A TABLE!"

[Gregory S. Stark]

Scott address@hidden (Personal) <address@hidden> writes:
> Let me state that I am opposed to any kind of inserted messages when a
> table is encountered. I have created a number of different types of 
> documents that use tables, and work very well with lynx still. Such
> messages would needlessly mess up such pages.

Hm, I wouldn't want to discourage people from making pages lynx-friendly, 
but I think precisely the opposite is really going on.

The pages lynx displays reasonably now are the ones that abuse tables to
handle arbitrary positioning. The fact is that html provides no other way to
control display formatting reasonably, and stylesheets are still not useful
for mass audiences. 

But tables are really only intended for tabular data. It's precisely these
tables where the tabular relationships are significant, that Lynx does the
worst on. 

It shouldn't really bother us if Lynx inserts some extraneous text on pages
that were abusing html in the first place if it helps people understand the
pages that were using tables appropriately.

Of course ultimately someone will just bite the bullet and implement tables.
When they do they'll have to be careful to add features to keep lynx usable
under a screen reader for blind users. 

ALSO: IT would BE MUCH appreciated IF THE person WHO uses ALL CAPS would
KINDLY stop. IT makes your POSTS harder to READ and MAKES you LOOK silly.

greg