o I'd like to put in a bid for disallowing nested tables, and I also question
the need for vertical alignment in a table cell. Yeah, you can probably think
of cases where someone could use them, but are they really all that useful?
I'll be perfectly honest and admit that my main concern here is the
complexity of implementing these features in a browser. Implementing tables
according to to the HTML+ specification was enough of a headache, having to
handle vertical alignment and nested tables would be an order of magnitude
more difficult. What ever happened to Keep It Simple?
I also would question whether COLSPEC is truly desirable. What should be
done in the case where the cell contents are too large for the width
specified by COLSPEC? The browser may have already started drawing the table,
so now what should it do? Either way, it's going to look ugly. This problem
does not arise when using explicit widths on individual TD or TH cells, since
the browser can figure out that the WIDTH value is too small and adjust it
upward during the pre-scan stage. If the browser has to scan the table anyway
to avoid such problems with COLSPEC, then the value of COLSPEC takes a
nosedive.
o Since FN has been revealed to be a footnote element, is it semantically the
same as the HTML+ FOOTNOTE element, or is it different?
o What is the need that is being addressed by the POSITION attribute on the
BODY element? I can see how ALIGN would be useful for specifying default
horizontal alignment in a body section, but what is this business about
attaching it to one side of the window?
o I'd suggest that perhaps DINGBAT might be a better attribute name than
BULLET, since the meaning of "bullet" is "a small ball" whereas "dingbat" is
a printer's term for funny characters such as those used to mark items in a
list.
o I take it that the BLEEDLEFT and BLEEDRIGHT alignment values on the FIG
element have been superceded by the CLEAR attribute?
o So, when a FIG has ALIGN=CENTER the browser automatically positions
subsequent elements down past the FIG?
o What does ALIGN=JUSTIFY do?
Michael Johnson
Relay Technology, Inc.