[whatwg] Script, style and backwards compatibility

[Ian Hickson]

On Mon, 30 Apr 2007, Simon Pieters wrote:
>
> From http://forums.whatwg.org/viewtopic.php?t=38
> 
> I can extract two requests.
> 
> 1. Explain how authors are supposed to "comment" their <script> and 
> <style> elements in HTML5. (Post #171.)
> 
> Something along the following lines could be inserted as a note in the 
> syntax section, e.g. after the "CDATA elements can have text, ..." 
> paragraph:
> 
>    Old browsers that don't understand the style or script elements
>    (introduced in HTML 3.2) will attempt render their contents. However,
>    the strings "<!--" and "-->" are part of the CSS syntax, and "<!--" is
>    equivalent to "//" in JavaScript, so authors who don't want to reveal
>    their style sheets or scripts to users with such browsers can simply
>    comment them out. [CSS21] [ECMA262]
> 
>       <style>
>       <!--
>       ...
>       -->
>       </style>
> 
>       <script>
>       <!--
>       ...
>       //-->
>       </script>
> 
> (But it is an issue though that ECMAScript 262 still doesn't define the 
> <!-- magic.)

Is there really any need to escape the contents of <script>/<style> at all 
these days?


> 2. Explain how HTML5 and XHTML5 differ in practice. (Post #187.)
> 
> e.g. something like http://wiki.whatwg.org/wiki/HtmlVsXhtml could be 
> included as a non-normative appendix to the spec, or referenced to in 
> the HTML vs. XHTML section, or similar.

I'd rather just leave this to non-normative documentation outside of the 
spec, if that's ok. It's easier to update things that aren't in the spec, 
and this is the kind of thing where we might well find things we've 
missed.

-- 
Ian Hickson               U+1047E                )\._.,--....,'``.    fL
http://ln.hixie.ch/       U+263A                /,   _.. \   _\  ;`._ ,.
Things that are impossible just take longer.   `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.'