[whatwg] Suggestion for a Specification: XUL Basic

[Ian Hickson]

On Thu, 10 Jun 2004, Matthew Raymond wrote:
>
> Interesting. This would probably be an appropriate solution. I'm
> concerned that we may be turning HTML into an HTML/XUL hybrid, though.
> Then again, would it really hurt to have part of XUL in HTML?

Don't think of it as XUL, just think of it as HTML extensions. Then it's
just HTML...


>>>    box
>>>    hbox
>>>    vbox
>>
>> These are presentational, and belong in CSS.
>
> You could make the argument against box, but hbox and vbox are two of
> the best supported XUL tags in existence.

And <font> is one of the most supported HTML tags, but that doesn't make
it a good tag either. :-)


>> Context menus, drop down menus, and tabs (as seen on Web pages now) are
>> needed, yes. I don't know that the XUL content model is the best
>> though.
>
> Please elaborate. I'm still in the learning stage with XUL and would
> like to know its weaknesses as well as its strengths. (I actually plan
> to use XUL Basic for a game engine I'm working on.)

I'm just saying that the markup XUL uses may not be the best, and that
anything that is put into the WHAT specs would be designed on its own
merits, with a look for compatibility with HTML. For example the <menu>
element already means something in HTML so couldn't be used.


> In other words, XUL Basic is target for both browsers and XUL motors.

The term "XUL motor" doesn't mean anything, maybe you mean "XUL rendering
engine" or "XUL host". In either case, the WHATWG work is not aimed at XUL
rendering engines but at HTML and XML+CSS rendering engines (primarily IE,
Mozilla, and Opera).

-- 
Ian Hickson               U+1047E                )\._.,--....,'``.    fL
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