[whatwg] Figure without caption (was: Embedding Elements Should be Structured Inline-Level)

[Michel Fortin]

Le 2007-03-14 à 16:24, Lachlan Hunt a écrit :

> Even if figure were allowed to be used without legend, what would  
> be the point?  That would be no better than just adding an  
> extraneous wrapper <div> around the object just to work around the  
> content model restrictions.

If <figure> denotes illustrative content, your image then becomes an  
illustration of the subject in the surrounding text. Otherwise, you  
have no way to distinguish images which are meant to be read as part  
of the text -- mathematic formulas embedded as images for instance --  
and those which are more detached from the prose -- a photo  
illustrating the text's subject.

  - - -

I'd like to submit this example of a news article having two  
pictures; both are styled the same, they both have the same purpose  
(illustration), yet one has no caption while the other has one.

<http://www.radio-canada.ca/arts-spectacles/PlusArts/2007/03/13/003- 
viacom_youtube.asp>

If we say the second picture is a figure, how can we reasonably say  
the first one is not? A table does not need a caption to be a table,  
and I don't think a figure needs a caption to be a figure: it just  
needs to be an illustration of the surrounding subject.


Michel Fortin
michel.fortin at michelf.com
http://www.michelf.com/