RE: RSS Profile Character Data Advice

>> MSIE 7 has given us an ideal opportunity to discourage HTML markup
>> outside item-description. We should take it.

> I'm not sure using a bad tool as a reference is a good idea.  God help you
> when the other limitations of a tool start being offered as excuses to
> further bastardize a spec.  Just because the tools suck doesn't mean the
> spec has to bend to tyranny.

> That said, I agree that markup outside of item/description is a bad thing.

One man's feature is another man's bug, as they say. As the person who designed how and when HTML markup would be supported in IE7's RSS view, I'll try not to be offended :).

My opinion on this is pretty straightforward. In order to make it possible for publishers to know when and how to encode their text so that it works in the client in a predictable way, you have to make a call about whether or not markup is supported in each element. For all elements other than item/description, it seemed clear that in widespread practice, HTML markup was only needed in item/description. More abstractly, it is difficult for many clients to display free-form HTML in fields other than description, and still have some level of control over the output. Also, some clients that use a three-pane layout, e.g. Thunderbird, that includes a list of titles, it's impossible/impractical to display markup.

Since we've shipped, this approach has only been an issue for a small percentage of sites that use HTML markup in the item/title (usually for ampersands or quotes).








 
Yahoo! Groups Links

<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rss-public/

<*> Your email settings:
    Individual Email | Traditional

<*> To change settings online go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rss-public/join
    (Yahoo! ID required)

<*> To change settings via email:
    mailto:[email protected] 
    mailto:[email protected]

<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
    [email protected]

<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
    http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/