Re: [docbook] strict versus transitional XHTML tables [was: DocBook Technical Committee Meeting Minutes: 18 Mar 2003]

[Tobias Reif <tobiasreif at pinkjuice dot com>]

Paul Grosso wrote:

> The strict model makes it clear that the attributes it omits are to
> be replaced by use of CSS.

Absolutely.

> (Of course, DocBook users don't really have recourse to CSS,

I don't see why not, but that should be their choice.

DocBook to XHTML is a (lossy) conversion from one structural/semantic 
markup language to the other.

It can also be a styling process, but that's limiting, and is not 
necessary with XHTML. XHTML is not a presentational markup language 
(unlike SVG, XSLFO, etc), but is more like DocBook.

There's xsl:stylesheet, but also xsl:transform :)

> so the XSL stylesheets would have to pick up the task,

I don't think so.

XSLTs can be written to do styling, but they can also be written to to 
transformations without styling.

> and the question is how would they know what style to use

None. They should not be concerned with style (although they could offer 
this to users who want to mix presentational code into their XHTML 
documents).

> unless
> there is an attribute to key in on.)

There is no technical requirement for lots of presentational code in 
XHTML or DocBook AFAICS. People are free to use what they want, but you 
can style stuff in almost any way without including presentational code 
in DocBook or XHTML. Attributes or not.

> I think users would miss the background color attribute on table, tr,
>  th, and td.

Offering what you suggest ((X)HTML Transitional) means that the
choice is left to the users of DocBook, so that's cool with me. But
personally, I'd prefer XHTML Strict:

XHTML 1.1 is the successor of 1.0, and is built on XHTML 1.0 Strict. The
direction is clear:

http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/changes.html
"Most significant is the removal of features that were deprecated. In
general, the strategy is to define a markup language that is rich in
structural functionality, but that relies upon style sheets for
presentation."

It would be a little backwards to go with Transitional, which as its 
name indicates is superseded, by versions such as Strict or 1.1.

> The XHTML 1.1 Module-based spec [11] became a Recommendation  in May
>  2001.  In this spec, the XHTML 1.1 doctype is described  as
> follows [12]:
>
> The XHTML 1.1 document type is a fully functional document type with
>  rich semantics. It is not, however, as varied in functionality as
> the XHTML 1.0 Transitional or Frameset document types. These document
>  types defined many presentational components that are better
> handled through style sheets or other similar mechanisms. Moreover,
>  since the XHTML 1.1 document type is based exclusively upon the
> facilities defined in the XHTML modules [XHTMLMOD], it does not
> contain any of the deprecated functionality of XHTML 1.0 nor of
> HTML 4.
>
> Therefore there is no strict/transitional distinction.

I don't understand what you mean here.

> It is  basically
>  strict because "many presentational components ... are better
> handled through style sheets."

Yes. So why go with Transitional?

> Personally, I'd have a hard time taking background color and fixed
> height rows away from users.

The W3C did, so you can direct users to the W3C XHTML specs.

Color can be semantic content (color specs etc), but most of the time, 
they are styling. *Why* should the table head row cells be red? If they 
are warnings, then this should be reflected in the markup. Styling is 
the second step.

> While I could live with omitting some of
> the presentation attributes, that seems too confusing.

What's confusing?

> Since tables
> by definition already have a fair number of presentation attributes
> even
> in the "strict" version, I see no harm in using the transitional
> version
> of the XHTML 1.0 table model [2].

This doesn't make sense to me. Just because there's border (which I 
wouldn't use in most cases since it's presentational) in Strict you 
suggest to go with Transitional which has bgcolor in addition?

Tobi

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