[whatwg] The blockquote element spec vs common quoting practices

[Jukka K. Korpela]

14.07.2011 13:49, Karl Dubost wrote:

> using that for years (almost every day), an example
> http://www.la-grange.net/2011/06/05/fruit
>
> <blockquote cite="urn:isbn:978-2-07-07533-7">
>      <p>Sur un pétale de lotus, j'écrivis ces quelques vers :</p>
>      <p>«<q>Même si l'on vient me chercher<br/>
>          Comment, abandonnant la rosée<br/>
>          De pareil lotus,<br/>
>          Retournerai-je<br/>
>          Dans le monde changeant et frivole ?</q>  »</p>
>      <p>et j'envoyais ce pétale.</p>
>      <p class="source">
>          <cite class="auteur">Shonagon, Sei</cite>,
>          <cite class="titre">Notes de chevet</cite>, p.64, Unesco, NRF, 1966.</p>
> </blockquote>

That’s quite good, though I think <footer class="source"> would be in 
principle better than <p class="source">, though using <footer> still 
requires some precautions in practice (I mean “teaching” it to old IE 
using document.createElement('footer') in JavaScript, so that your 
styling will take effect).

Microdata or microformats might be used to standardize the use of 
specific attributes to be used, like class="credits", class="author", 
class="title" etc., if desired. But I don’t think that’s particularly 
important.

(I don't like to nitpick on the author identification, but wouldn’t
<cite class="auteur" lang="jp-Latn">Shōnagon, Sei</cite> be better?)

> My favorite issue being when there is a mix of cite in the prose and blockquotes,
 > there is no mechanism to associate the right cite with the right 
blockquote

It would be nice to be able to associate credits with quotations at the 
markup level, but in practice, presenting credits visibly (or audibly or 
touchably) is much more important. No law requires us to provide credits 
that way, but laws do require us to provide credits the way they are 
normally provided in good style (or in a better way).

-- 
Yucca, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/