[ruby-talk:20921] Re: Minor cgi.rb question

David Alan Black wrote:


>>http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/appendix/changes.html#h-A.3.2
>>     * Almost all attributes that specify the presentation of an HTML
>>document (e.g., colors, alignment, fonts, graphics, etc.) have been
>>deprecated in favor of style sheets. The list of attributes in the
>>appendix indicates which attributes have been deprecated.
>>
>>http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/index/attributes.html
>>Index of Attributes
>>Legend: D = Deprecated, L = Loose DTD, F = Frameset DTD
>>
>>Use CSS.
>>
>>Ruby libraries should be up to date.
>>
> 
> For writing HTML, though, a tool like the CGI library (or the kind of
> HTML writer we've been talking about) is just a convenience, because
> it doesn't validate or even impose any mild constraints based on the
> DTD (such as limiting choice of elements).  You can always just print
> whatever you want, which means that whether or not there's a specific
> method to print <b> doesn't really have any deep implications.


Well an HTML lib doesn't have to validate to provide some nice API for 
generating well-formed (and potentially valid) XHTML + CSS.


> So something like having an HTML 3.2 mode, as opposed to an HTML 4.01
> mode, or whatever, is mainly a matter of saving some typing.
> Excluding the older modes would just inflict a mild punishment on
> people who wanted to write HTML 3.2.  (Maybe that's what you want :-)


Not at all.
I want a lib (be it included in any CGI lib or not), that provides 
XHTML classes, and thus a specialized XML serializer.
I just think it would be great fun; and it would be great for Ruby's 
popularity to have some more comprehensive up-do-date libs that provide 
solutions for today's needs. Users of that lib are free to choose from 
the options, according to their needs, environment, and audience.


> In case it's not clear, I'm not saying not to use stylesheets.
> (That's "a whole 'nother" topic, as they say.)  I'm just saying that
> since the CGI library isn't a validating SGML/XML tool, the question
> of what convenience methods it does or does not provide is separate
> from the question of what Web authors should or should not be doing.


I didn't talk about what Web authors should or should not be doing; 
absolutely not (with "use CSS" I meant implementers, about which we were 
talking; better: "implement CSS"). I just suggested for any HTML writing 
library to be up-to-date, and thus provide means to generate the current 
version of HTML. (If it also provides means to generate older versions 
of HTML, to cater older browsers; fine.)

Tobi

-- 
Tobias Reif
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