trying to achieve Level Triple-A conformance

[Ganesh]

My iCab browser shows this:
http://dorayme.890m.com/justPics/seashell.png

That's strange.
Can you show me a website that has iCab browser smiling?

 

[Ganesh]

mmm... you can't see them at:

<http://validator.w3.org/>

?

My iCab browser shows this:

http://dorayme.890m.com/justPics/seashell.png

That purple face means it is not happy. You might be very surprised by
what that face reveals up close. It is a face that sometimes reveals the
heart of darkness itself.

I added those errors yesterday. oops

 

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

mmm... you can't see them at:

<http://validator.w3.org/>

?

My iCab browser shows this:

http://dorayme.890m.com/justPics/seashell.png

That purple face means it is not happy. You might be very surprised by
what that face reveals up close. It is a face that sometimes reveals the
heart of darkness itself.

 

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

mmm... you can't see them at:

<http://validator.w3.org/>

?

My iCab browser shows this:

http://dorayme.890m.com/justPics/seashell.png

Curious. When I looked at Ganesh's page yesterday with iCab it showed
its smiling face, but today it looks like your PNG. Probably I'm
misremembering what I saw yesterday.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

Curious. When I looked at Ganesh's page yesterday with iCab it showed
its smiling face, but today it looks like your PNG. Probably I'm
misremembering what I saw yesterday.

No, you don't misremember. The page has changed from valid to invalid, still
keeping the icon of validity; there are several clues in this statement,
about the pruhfessionality of the site, about its honesty, about validation
icons, and about life, universe, and everything.

Here's a funny piece of mail I got from Ganesh:

dorayme wrote:
But I wonder why the site does not also advertize high-quality
speling chek services.

That's a good suggestion. But, let me complete the proof reading first"

To me, this is the final proof. Either Ganesh has been trolling all the
time, or he is both ethically and intellectually very challenged. (It is
normally not necessary, and often not possible, to distinguish between such
explanations.)

 

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

That's strange.
Can you show me a website that has iCab browser smiling?

There are many, but the most obvious is the iCab home page at

http://www.icab.de/

All of my pages did until I added a bit of non-modifiable Google code
to some of them. However, you won't be able to verify that today,
because our server gave up the ghost at the end of July and the
replacement one won't be up and running before September (nothing much
in France gets fixed in August).

Most of Jukka's pages used to make iCab smile. The only exceptions I
remember are some pages where he illustrates things you shouldn't do.
However, they now mostly refer to a CSS file containing a property
"-moz-border-radius" that iCab doesn't like. It looks to me like a bit
of Mozilla-specific code, but doubtless he can explain if you can
convince him that you're not a troll (a forlorn hope, I suspect).

The number of pages that make iCab smile has increased very greatly
since I first started using iCab, but they are still a tiny minority of
all the pages out there.

 

[Ganesh]

Summary Till Now
===========================
What came out of this discussion so far?
1. One should check for AAA with multiple testing tools.
-->Some available tools do not completely indicate the issues. I had
left out some problems after testing with Sidar and thinking that the
website was AAA, Cynthia was still reporting for errors
Pointed out by Adrienne Boswell

2. Website has problems with its English, and proof reading is
required.
Pointed out by John Hosking

Is there anything that is left uncovered still?

Cynthia AAA validation tool does not detect XHTML document conventions
properly. So one needs to be careful.

 

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

[ ... ]

Here's a funny piece of mail I got from Ganesh:


That's a good suggestion. But, let me complete the proof reading first"

To me, this is the final proof. Either Ganesh has been trolling all the
time, or he is both ethically and intellectually very challenged. (It
is normally not necessary, and often not possible, to distinguish
between such explanations.)

True, but I try to bear in mind the advice not to invoke ill will as
the explanation for things that can better be explained by stupidity: I
wouldn't assume the "ethically" until convinced that the
"intellectually" was untenable.

 

[Ganesh]

I added those errors yesterday. oops

Ok, I have just corrected that problem. I copy pasted the meta tag and
forgot that I was using a XHTML document. So, the bug got in. Strangle
the Cynthia AAA validator did not detect the error, and I did not
bother to re-validate using W3C original validator.

 

[dorayme]

On 2009-08-21 12:03:38 +0200, dorayme <[email protected]> said:
....

Curious. When I looked at Ganesh's page yesterday with iCab it showed
its smiling face, but today it looks like your PNG. Probably I'm
misremembering what I saw yesterday.

Perhaps not. The boring explanation would be that Ganesh is fiddling
with his site. More interestingly, perhaps it has a mind of its own and
smiles or not according to how it *feels*. It takes into account the
structure and formation of the document but can be distracted by its own
troubles or happiness. <g>

 

[dorayme]

Shouldn't you tell him to click on the icon that falsely claims validity?

I assume hardly anyone uses iCab. Fancy you knowing about it! (As a
coincidence, and irrelevance, I am fond of a theory of mine that holds
that omnipotence and omniscience are logically impossible) <g>

Clicking on a non-green face brings up a report on what is causing its
displeasure (there are levels of its displeasure depending on whether it
finds bad mistakes or cases of bad practise. The distinction is slightly
complicated and is impacted upon by preference settings).

Its genius is that you can check both for HTML and CSS errors with one
click.

About your validity remark, this is what the official iCab site says:

Error protocol (Smiley)
iCab records all HTML errors of Web pages. A smiley-face will indicate
if the HTML code is OK (has no HTML errors, or hazards). In such sites,
the smiley face will be green (and smiling). Errors make the smiling
face red and sad. By clicking the red smileys iCab will open a window
where all the errors are identified with a small description. At
http://validator.w3.org/ you can also test web pages using the official
validator of the W3C.

Perhaps this is a frank recognition that the smiley is a bit dependent
on the settings users can make in their preferences.

 

[dorayme]

That's strange.
Can you show me a website that has iCab browser smiling?

It is pages and not websites that are smiled at. The poor thing has no
sense of generalization!

I could show you pages. In fact, I will *sell* you a list of them, $US1
per dozen. Now that is a special offer because you are a subscriber to
this usenet group.*

I very much doubt that the face would scowl for more than a small
minority of pages made by regular subscribers to this usenet group. In
fact, just mentioning alt.html in the presence of the face briefly
lightens its mood, I have actually seen the flicker of happiness.

You are right to doubt it considering the majority of web pages fail
such exacting standards, but no reason for your pages to be among them.

* Woody Allen told a story about how his grandfather, on his death bed,
tried to *sell* him his pocket watch...

 

[Ganesh]

I think such smiley are added in front of google SERP results will
call immediate response to Standardize. I think the internet community
is still waiting for people to at least get hold of the basics. I used
to have heated arguments with people who interviewed me for job. There
was a CEO who has literally asked me "WHAT IS THE NEED FOR W3C
Validation, it just adds to my Budget. Google.com does not care about
it. It is not going to give me any advantage"

 

[Ganesh]

I think such smiley are added in front of google SERP results will
call immediate response to Standardize. I think the internet community
is still waiting for people to at least get hold of the basics. I used
to have heated arguments with people who interviewed me for job. There
was a CEO who has literally asked me "WHAT IS THE NEED FOR W3C
Validation, it just adds to my Budget. Google.com does not care about
it. It is not going to give me any advantage"

Sorry correction:
I think such smiley only if are added in front of google SERP results
will
call immediate response to Standardize. I think the internet community
is still waiting for people to at least get hold of the basics. I used
to have heated arguments with people who interviewed me for job. There
was a CEO who has literally asked me "WHAT IS THE NEED FOR W3C
Validation, it just adds to my Budget. Google.com does not care about
it. It is not going to give me any advantage"

 

[Adrienne Boswell]

Gazing into my crystal ball I observed Ganesh <[email protected]>
writing in @y10g2000prf.googlegroups.com:

<[email protected]>,

Sorry correction:
I think such smiley only if are added in front of google SERP results
will
call immediate response to Standardize.

That is a lovely thought, but the general public could give a rat's ass
about a smiley in search results.

I think the internet community
is still waiting for people to at least get hold of the basics.

No, I don't think so. The general public has no idea how the Internet
works, all they care about is finding what they want, and the site works
for them.

I used
to have heated arguments with people who interviewed me for job. There
was a CEO who has literally asked me "WHAT IS THE NEED FOR W3C
Validation, it just adds to my Budget. Google.com does not care about
it. It is not going to give me any advantage"

W3C validation is not that important. Validation is more of a tool for
authors to diagnose rendering errors, and to let other authors know that
they are following standards.

With all that said, accessibilty and writing to standards is important.
If your web site is not accessible to search engines, then your page is
never going to show up in the search results.

I knew a man who worked for the Social Security Administration. He was
blind, and he had a braile reader for his computer. His fingers flew
over that, and flew over the keyboard. He cursed under his breath if he
could not find what he was looking for, or something was not working
correctly. I write to standards because I don't want that man muttering
under his breath when he visits something I authored. I don't want
anyone muttering under their breath for that matter.

 

[dorayme]

Gazing into my crystal ball I observed Ganesh:

W3C validation is not that important. Validation is more of a tool for
authors to diagnose rendering errors, and to let other authors know that
they are following standards.

With all that said, accessibilty and writing to standards is important.
If your web site is not accessible to search engines, then your page is
never going to show up in the search results.

I knew a man who worked for the Social Security Administration. He was
blind, and he had a braile reader for his computer. His fingers flew
over that, and flew over the keyboard. He cursed under his breath if he
could not find what he was looking for, or something was not working
correctly. I write to standards because I don't want that man muttering
under his breath when he visits something I authored. I don't want
anyone muttering under their breath for that matter.

Not a bad answer there Adrienne! What can I add?

To want to stick to a standard also gives one the best chance that
updated browsers or brand new ones display your hard work *well*.

Simple argument: what do you think the new browser maker or updater will
use when he or she or it makes it?

1. The standards that have sort of been agreed upon sort of ... W3C and
all that

or

2. Whatever comes into their heads after tossing a few coins, boiling a
few frogs and rat tails and other witchcrafty things?

?

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

Validation is a useful tool for those who understand what it is about. Sadly
enough, less than one per cent of authors understand that. But being
positive, we can hope that some others benefit from it as well, intuitive as
it may be (and intuition is mostly something that leads to mistakes).

These are two different things. Accessibility matters, though sadly enough
it's not commercially as relevant as it should be. "Writing to standards" is
a vague, nonstandard concept that can mean just about anything, and
"standards" in the web field are best regarded as guidelines you should know
rather than rules you must obey.

That's a _third_ thing, though related to accessibility. There's still a
huge difference between being accessible to human beings and being
accessible to search engines. The odds are that improvement in one of these
helps the other as well, or at least does not make things worse, but they
are still two very different things.

Not a bad answer there Adrienne! What can I add?

Well we could print that paragraph in nice big letters and put it on the
wall, or better still, put it on a strong solid plate that you can use to
hit a coworker, a boss, or a customer on the head as needed.

But before printing, I'd change "write to standards" to "aim at
accessibility".

To want to stick to a standard also gives one the best chance that
updated browsers or brand new ones display your hard work *well*.

Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. Web "standards" are full of cruft
that nobody should and nobody will take seriously.

Simple argument: what do you think the new browser maker or updater
will use when he or she or it makes it?

1. The standards that have sort of been agreed upon sort of ... W3C
and all that

or

2. Whatever comes into their heads after tossing a few coins, boiling
a few frogs and rat tails and other witchcrafty things?

?

Do you want an honest answer to that? And do you want the truth?

Well, the truth is neither of them. Even case 2 is far from the reality.
People who do design and programming work on browsers are mostly just as
lazy and sloppy as most of us, rather than devoted to wickedness or
witchcraft.

Yet, it now seems that leading browser vendors are taking the "standards"
much more seriously than they used to. For the most of it, they seem to do
their best to meet the "standards". Sadly enough, this often isn't enough,
but it's still a huge improvement.

 

[William Gill]

Validation is a useful tool for those who understand what it is about.
Sadly enough, less than one per cent of authors understand that. But
being positive, we can hope that some others benefit from it as well,
intuitive as it may be (and intuition is mostly something that leads to
mistakes).

Let me take a swing at summarizing for the other 99+ percent.

Validation tests a document's "physical" structure against a set of
rules (laid out in a DTD) similar to, but more precise than how a spell
checker tests groupings of letters against an accepted word list
(ruleset).

Designers are free to create and publish unique DTD's and their pages
could be validated against them, but that would provide little benefit
in the context assumed here. Authors are similarly free to create their
own unique spellings, and grammar, but the results may be more obvious.

Validation in and of itself only insures a specificity in the structure
of a document, much like the arcane details an engineer considers in the
design of a bridge. Validation does not influence the content, or the
message, but can establish a point of reference for anyone subscribing
to the same ruleset/DTD/standard. The value to a web designer is a
reduction of the already too random nature of presentation. When one
checks a document with a spell checker, it does not insure the message
is more coherent, but when a document begins with unrecognizable
spelling, its chances for coherency are significantly reduced.
Likewise, as Mr. Korpela points out in his cited article, merely
complying with the rules (validating) does not insure clarity.

To appreciate the benefits of validation, examine the archives of this
NG and look at the impact of the inconsistent visual rendering between
the most prevalent browsers and consider how much greater that impact is
when the source document is itself a random structure (i.e. doesn't
comply with an accepted standard.) Now extend this impact onto a host
of other UI's, visual, non-visual, available today, and yet to be
imagined, and the value of validation becomes more obvious. This is why
when addressing a rendering issue, the users here almost always begin by
insuring the "problem document" be validated.

To put it succinctly, a valid document is not guaranteed to render as
you want, but an invalid one is almost assured not to.

 

[dorayme]

Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. Web "standards" are full of cruft
that nobody should and nobody will take seriously.

You have made distinctions that are worth making. I was mainly
concentrating on formal stuff like what the W3C validators deal in. Your
"Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't" is a slight misreading of my
argument from boiled frogs.

Do you want an honest answer to that? And do you want the truth?

I want a lot of things, truth, beauty, soft landings in life...

Well, the truth is neither of them.

Lets take them in turn then. About the first, you surely do not mean the
browser makers take no notice at all of the specifications we read about
on a daily basis. Things like the float rules, the basic rules about
inline display and block? So, they *do* take notice of them.

Now there are a few questions, one of which is how much notice? But how
much notice is not relevant to the argument at the point of laying down
the 1. alternative. That is relevant only to what follows in 2. The idea
is that *in the absence* of knowing quite how the browser maker will
proceed, the most rational thing for a website maker to do, is to assume
the browser maker will implement widely published specifications.

Even case 2 is far from the reality.

You don't say!

People who do design and programming work on browsers are mostly just as
lazy and sloppy as most of us, rather than devoted to wickedness or
witchcraft.

My argument from boiled frogs is not meant as some sort of ethical
argument! It is a serious argument about how to proceed on the basis of
an absence of knowledge. Making a website on the most conservative basis
of having it validate is the safest course in the long run. Yes, even if
you do not understand everything there is to understand about
validation.

Yet, it now seems that leading browser vendors are taking the "standards"
much more seriously than they used to. For the most of it, they seem to do
their best to meet the "standards". Sadly enough, this often isn't enough,
but it's still a huge improvement.

I agree.

 

[dorayme]

It's also very easy just to fail to close a tag by mistake. So you
should validate because it's easy and rules out a bunch of common
errors. But in a lot of cases it won't actually make any difference,
which explains why impatient commercial types get jaded about it.

Yes, and the difficulty that some website makers might have in
explaining such things to commercial interests is that such things can
be the tip of a growing iceberg. Sites can deteriorate over time,
accumulation of small bad practices and mistakes making itself felt and
eventually costing real money, the bigger the site, the more serious it
becomes.