[whatwg] Web Forms 2.0 submission to W3C

Olav Junker Kjær olav at olav.dk
Wed Apr 13 04:02:00 PDT 2005


> Finally, just by looking at the markup of the calculator example, I
> don't see WF2 being any less powerful or elegant

Yeah, I agree, and I didn't mean to slam WF2 which I think is a very
fine spec. I was just afraid that W3C would disregard the "killer
features" of WF2 which is backwards-compatibility, familiarity and the
possibility of widespread deployment on the web. The current W3C 
approach of XHTML 2.0 + XForms seem to indicate different priorities. 
The W3C staff comments suggest that they wish to see a merge between the 
WF2 and XForms. This is understandable from a political perspective - 
nobody really wants fragmentation of HTML standards. But if the 
consequence is a spec which is a compromise between XForms and WF2, I 
think it would be the worst of both worlds.

It might however be a good idea to position WF2 and XForms like CSS and 
XSL - specs which technically cover the same ground but which are 
optimized for different use cases. A closer cooperation and sharing of 
ideas between XForms and WF2 communities will certainly be a boon for 
everyone. In the end, HTML extensions do belong in the W3C. So I'll be 
optimistic now!

regards
Olav Junker Kjær



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