si-blog
the web log of Simon Jessey
Thursday, January 23rd, 2003
More XHTML 2.0 musings
Jeffrey Zeldman has once again
perfectly encapsulated the current feeling of mainstream web designers. The recent row
about XHTML 2.0 has split designers down
the middle, with the junkies of the semantic web wishing to see the specification stripped down to the
barest minimum, and Joe Web Designer feeling a little annoyed about being called stupid because
he wants to use a style attribute from time to time. Tantek rightly
points out, the
HTML Working Group at the
W3C is one of the few parts of that organization
that really seems to keep the views and needs of the ordinary developer/designer in mind. I am
sure that the current Working Draft for
XHTML 2.0 isn't set in stone. There
is likely to be some more evolution based on the discussions that have been raging recently before the
specification is finalized. Before anyone asks which faction I belong to, I should say that I
sit on the fence. I would love to see the Semantic Web properly come into existence, but I believe that
restricting the tools available to the designer for its creation is not the best way to go
about it.