[whatwg] [WA1] <ol type=a> is semantic

[Matthew Thomas]

On 12 Oct, 2005, at 7:26 AM, Mikko Rantalainen wrote:
> ...
> I think the reason for not including "type" attribute in HTML is that 
> one shouldn't ever refer to anything by textual label only - we're 
> using HyperText Markup Language so the only way to refer to something 
> should be in form of hyperlink.

Any argument of the form "X is the only way to do Y because we're using 
HTML", in *a forum about changing the HTML specification*, is begging 
the question.

I'd also like to see <ol type= reintroduced, for the reasons Simon 
gave. It is especially semantically important in legal documents (for 
the same reasons start= is).

> The above example should have markup such as
>
> ...
> <li id="quizanswer">All of the above</li>
> </ol>
> <p><a href="#quizanswer">Correct answer is ...</a></p>
> ...
>
> and the UA should take care of the rest. Activating the link should 
> highlight (or indicate in some other way) the correct answer because 
> it's the target of the activated hyperlink.

But in the real world, that doesn't happen. Your proposed solution 
would be bad in Web browsers (you'd have to click to find out the 
answer instead of just reading it, and even then it would be unclear in 
legacy browsers), very bad in aural UAs, and extremely bad in print.

> As long as the (X)HTML WG believes that this is how the world should 
> work, there's no way we can get the fix in the HTML specification.
> ...

If that was true, there would be little point in the What-WG existing 
in the first place.

-- 
Matthew Paul Thomas
http://mpt.net.nz/