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Font Tags Considered Harmful... but probably not by me
Subject:Font Tags Considered Harmful... but probably not by me From:"Mike Starr" <writstar -at- wi -dot- net> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Thu, 22 Nov 2001 02:12:34 -0600
At Sandy's recommendation, I wandered over to the w3.org site and read the
"Font Tags Considered Harmful" section and I have to say that their
reasoning seems to me to be rather poor. Now don't get me wrong... I prefer
to do stuff with styles so the objective they're advocating is fine.
However, font tags are harmful?? Maintenance becomes impractical?
Puhleeze!!! Give me a break. They're saying that some tools produce HTML
that's difficult to maintain but it seems to me that the tools that produce
this "non-standard" HTML don't have a bit of trouble maintaining it. Now
okay, I'll acknowledge that if I produce an HTML document with Word (or
Dreamweaver or any other WYSIWYG tool) and then try to edit it with
Notepad, I may have a difficult time following the HTML Difficult but not
that difficult. But if I produced the original document with Word, why
wouldn't I just maintain it with Word?
Now I know I'm a contrary old fart and sometimes I just like to stir the
pot (this just might be one of 'em but I won't tell) but unless I'm missing
something obvious, their argument just doesn't hold water and smacks more
of the purist's insistance that I not spoil the pristine beauty of
"natural" HTML. Anybody want to give me a more convincing argument than
w3c's??
Mike (see what happens when I've got too much spare time) Starr
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-----------------------Original Message-----------------------
>Subject: Re: Netscape on Linux and Windows
>From: Sandy Harris <sandy -at- storm -dot- ca>
>Date: Wed, 21 Nov 2001 15:12:31 -0500
>X-Message-Number: 54
>
>Bruce Byfield wrote:
>
>> ... But, if you specify fonts
>> in your HTML code, include "serif" or "sans serifs" as alternatives.
>
>Also, read the "Font Tags Considered Harmful" section of W3C's guidelines
>for HTML authors:
>http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/#guidelines
>
>Basically, if your HTML text, rather than your stylesheets, specifies
>fonts, then you are doing it wrong and should stop.
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