On 17.03.2007 16:43, Jason Johnston wrote:
If by "the lazy guys" you also mean Cocoon itself. For instance, the
CForms forms-field-styling.xsl creates all its output in the null
namespace, which is fine for regular HTML delivery but if for some
reaason you do want to deliver as XHTML you have to set the proper
namespace somehow.
A most trivial XSLT can do this.
To interject a counter-opinion, there is a well-established precendent
on the Web today for delivering XHTML in ways that are consumable by
current-day user agents but without sacrificing the well-formedness or
validity of the XML. True, you have to control certain aspects of the
serialization to avoid tripping up certain browsers, which can be a bit
of a pain.
This can be easily reached by using BrowserSelector.
I think there's a lot of value in having the tool handle these things
transparently rather than making users figure out workarounds themselves.
That's the point where I don't agree. By delivering XHTML while the
browser can't understand it you force it into the quirks mode - and
that's more or less unpredictable. If you deliver standard conform HTML
instead the browser will behave (probably also more or less) standard
conform.
Just an example, probably everybody who has been working with CSS knows
the box model bug in IE. Since IE6 this one is fixed and you will get
expected behaviour IF you are in standard compliance mode [1].
Otherwise, with the one fits all solution, you have to cope with that
bug [2].
Despite this being just an example which I generalize IMO there is not
lot of value doing such things transparently. Once again problems should
get fixed where they arise. This means using HTMLSerializer here when
necessary and not create one workaround (additional stuff in
XHTMLSerializer) which leads to the next one (e.g. fixing IE box model)
both bloating the code. That's just paradoxical. Documenting it is much
more appropriate.
Regards
Jörg
[1]
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb250395.aspx#cssenhancements_topic3
[2]
http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/200612/internet_explorer_and_the_css_box_model/
