Re: HTML vs XHTML

[Victor Engmark]

On 2/25/07, Davi Leal <address@hidden> wrote:

gnu.org   uses    XHTML 1.0 Strict
fsf.org   uses    XHTML 1.0 Transitional  (Plone)
fsfe.org  uses    XHTML 1.0 Transitional  (eZ Publish)

IE6 does not support application/xhtml+xml  in fact it does not support XHTML
at all. XHTML is planned for IE8.

fsf.org "works" on IE6 because of they send XHTML with a content-type
of "text/html".  Sending XHTML that way means you get none of the XML-related
benefits due to browsers use the HTML parser -- It is written with XHTML but
actually working as HTML.

Sending a content-type of application/xhtml+xml means that 80% of todays
browsers will prompt you to download the document instead of attempting to
render it.  It does not look like the browser market can handle
application/xhtml+xml yet.

XHTML 1.0 and 1.1 do not provide benefits. So, I propose stay with  HTML 4.01
Transitional  and cancel the XHTML tasks. David, what do you think?. It seems
it would be a lot of work to no benefit.

So there's three major open source organizations which use XHTML, but none of them know what they're doing, because "XHTML 
1.0 and 1.1 do not provide benefits"? There are many other arguments for and against XHTML on other sites:

HTML Versus XHTML:

• HTML 4.01 and XHTML 1.0 assign the same semantics to their elements and attributes (so if you only care about semantics, they are equivalent)
  
• XHTML is easier to maintain (because of stricter formatting rules)
  
• XHTML is XSL ready
• XHTML is easier to teach and to learn (rules are more consistent)
• XHTML is ready for the future (mobile devices, XHTML 2.0 (which is much better semantically))

Better Living Through XHTML, by Jeffrey Zeldman: "
With a little care and feeding, XHTML will help your sites work better
in more browsers and devices, thus reaching greater numbers of readers,
now and for years to come."

HTML or XHTML?, by Robert Nyman: "My personal opinion is that the most important thing is that you choose a strict doctype, be it HTML or XHTML."

Retrofit your Web pages for wireless compatibility, by Brett McLaughlin, Author and Editor, O'Reilly Media, Inc.: "
If you're serious about supporting wireless devices, you need to be using at least HTML 4.01 Strict for your Web pages, and you should seriously consider moving to XHTML 1.0 Strict." "After you've moved to HTML 
4.01 Strict [...] you'll want to think seriously about moving to XHTML 1.0 Strict."

55 Reasons to Design in XHTML/CSS:

• You don't have to spend extra thought and time deciding on styling the mark up of your document (upper- or lowercase, quotes or no quotes on attributes)
• You don't need to spend extra thought on which tags should be closed and which can (or should) be left open
• It's going to be easier for you to switch to XHTML 2.0 which will give you more semantic tools
• Well-formed code ensures your site works in more browsers
• Well-formed code would help browser coders to spend more time on useful features than rendering engines that try to understand borken code
• Your website will work in future browsers
• Your website works in mobile (and other new) devices
• You learn the basics of XML which has many other uses
• Your documents are easy to convert back and forth another format using XSLT
• Modern browsers render a valid document faster
• They are doing it: Dan Cederholm , Jeffrey Zeldman, Jason Santa Maria, Shaun Inman, Cameron Moll , Douglas Bowman, Dave Shea…
• You learn to appreciate newer browsers which makes for more competition and later for better browsers
• Strict coding makes you learn to see mistakes quicker
• You start to care more about metadata, document and character types
• There are more people thinking about the advantages and disadvantages and coding tricks of XHTML which makes for a bigger learning forum
• When all browsers start to understand the correct MIME-type (xml), you don't have to convert all your websites from html, just to switch to correct MIME
• By more people using xhtml you ensure that in the future IE will need to understand the correct MIME-type
• Accessibility is enforced with requiring Alt attribute for images

How's them on for size? :)

-- 
Victor Engmark
Quid quid latine dictum sit, altum viditar - What is said in Latin, sounds profound