[whatwg] Suggested changes to Web Forms 2.0, 2004-07-01 working

[Matthew Raymond]

Jim Ley wrote:
> How to provide legacy clients with appropriate information without
> confusing WF2 clients.

    To my knowledge, the above is only a problem when dealing with 
<input type="date"> and other similar input types. Someone already 
proposed a solution for this involving a new attribute called |format|:

<label for="date1">Date (Format: MM-DD-YYYY): </label>
<input type="date" name="date1" id="date1" format="MM-DD-YYYY">

    The |format| attribute forces a WF2 client to use a specific format 
for both user input and submission. As a result, both the legacy client 
and the WF2 client have identical date formats, and the server receives 
the format it is expecting.

> How to suggest the appearance of the widgets by the author (who is in
> the best position to know the task involved).

    I don't see where a problem exists here. The <input> element still 
has all the existing CSS 2.1 properties. I can understand if you want 
something in a specific format for the purposes of legacy support, but 
anything beyond what CSS already offers is the realm of browser themes 
and widget design, which is beyond the scope of Web Forms 2.0.

    Personally, I think it's dangerous to start telling user agent 
vendors how to implement various date and time controls. We may actually 
end up with a solution inferior to other solutions introduced later, 
which would result either in most people ignoring the new control 
because they're used to the old one or vendors openly violating the 
specification. Let the marketplace figure out the finer points of 
implementation.