[whatwg] The problems with namespaces in text/html (Was: MathML-in-HTML5)

[Elliotte Harold]

Ian Hickson wrote:
> On Mon, 9 Oct 2006, dolphinling wrote:
>>> I'm not saying don't add MathML to HTML. I'm saying don't add 
>>> namespace syntax to HTML.

As I've said elsewhere, I find this viewpoint simply incomprehensible. 
Namespaces are ugly, but they're not that ugly or that problematic. They 
are also at the core of XML processing. Throwing out namespaces makes it 
  nearly impossible to process HTML with the very large and powerful set 
of XML tools.

Eliminating namespaces is possible (though not desirable) if all you 
want is HTML+a few more random elements; but if you're talking about 
integrating MathML, XForms, SVG, and other applications into web pages, 
then namespaces is critical and indispensable. The benefits are worth 
the costs.

-- 
Elliotte Rusty Harold  elharo at metalab.unc.edu
Java I/O 2nd Edition Just Published!
http://www.cafeaulait.org/books/javaio2/
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0596527500/ref=nosim/cafeaulaitA/