Re: LYNX-DEV Re: <pre></pre> <Hx></Hx> BUG

[Filip M Gieszczykiewicz]

You (Rob Partington) wrote:
> J.T. wrote:
> > Lynx 2.8 does not implement the <pre> and </pre> tags as
> > earlier versions do.
> > Every time an html file uses an <Hx> tag the existing
> > <pre> is nullified for the text that follows.  The
> > solution is to add another <pre> tag just after each
> > change in <Hx> level.
> 
> This is lynx implementing the correct behaviour.  The PRE
> element cannot contain a Hx element, so the Hx element closes
> the open PRE element as defined in the DTD.  lynx should
> complain about this, though, since the </pre> is non-optional.
> 
> from the 3.2 DTD (<URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html32.html >)

This is another little pet-peeve of mine. Lynx is not a validator
but a browser. Who CARES what we're _supposed_ to see, let's not
envorce that and stick our head in the sand and let the page look
like crap because it's not "pure". A LOT of pages are written with
Netscape and MSIE in mine - they do NOT care about proper syntax,
and the admins are NOT interested in fixing such problems. So, NOT
handling that code in lynx is just plain silly.

Religious-HTML-validation people may wish to take some lithium:

I'm thinking of just testing my next www.repairfaq.org release
with lynx 2.6, 2.7, 2.8, Netscape 1, 2, 3, 4 and MSIE 1, 2, x
and **NOT** running it through a validator. That blasted thing
is just too ANAL for me... I spend MORE time manually kludging in
HTML "syntax" than getting work done! Who, EXACTLY, am I trying
to please here? The users are getting screwed because the release
take long periods inbetween, I'm getting screwed because I can't
script this crap, and the only winner is the happiness of some
really anal validator that no one else, it seems, uses or cares
that it exists.

BTW, we're talking stuff like the above, "<" and ">" in <pre></pre>
blocks, etc. NOT stuff like alts for images, navigational control,
etc. It's the little, stupid and anal things that piss me off.

GrrrrrrRRRRRRrrrrrrr!

Take care.

P.S. Care to reformat ~17MB of text (some of it with html already in it
in the form of links and lists, etc) into something that a validator
will be happy with? For an example of how "bad" it's likely to REMAIN,
see http://www.repairfaq.org/REPAIR/sam/ls and pick any of the larger
HTML files. That area is pre-release so don't bookmark it because
it will disappear in a week or so :-)