Re: page control in HTML

H&kon W Lie (howcome@w3.org)
Tue, 30 May 1995 05:48:21 +0500


dba@althingi.is writes:

> Thanks to Andrew for his comments
> he wrote
> >>>>>>>>>
> I think the simplest problem with this approach is that it clutters up
> HTML with features that are relevant only to one specific style of output.
> If tags or attributes are added specifically for printing, then what about
> screen display?
> <<<<<<<<<<
> it seems to me that HTML only has features that are relevant to
> screen display and I would like to have some very primitive control
> over the page layout so I want need to keep duplicates or what ever

Ideally, HTML should be independant of output (and input!) media. You
can only render <BLINK> on a visual, dynamic display, and that is why
it upsets a lot of people.

Style sheets offer a better way to handle these issues than adding
HTML tags. Unfortunately, HTML style sheets are still immature, and
the implementations we've seen so far are screen oriented. However,
multiple output media have been discussed in some of the proposals
that are out [1].

Recently, a style sheet mailing list -- www-style@w3.org -- has been
started. You can add yourself from [2].

[1] http://www.w3.org/hypertext/WWW/Style/
[2] http://www.w3.org/hypertext/WWW/Mailing/Form.html

-h&kon

Hakon W Lie, WWW project CERN, CH-1211 Geneva 23
http://www.w3.org/hypertext/WWW/People/howcome/