On 12/12/2011 17:28, Patrick H. Lauke wrote:
On 12/12/2011 17:18, Nancy Johnson wrote:
I noticed this validator only checks for xhtml 1.1 basic or mp1.2. Is
it going to checking again html5? http://validator.w3.org/mobile/
Not to my knowledge, no. You could argue that it's aimed at older
generations of phones/browsers.
We (W3C) have been discussing this issue. The mobile checker is an
implementation of the mobileOK Basic Tests [1] which is the machine
testable subset of the Mobile Web Best Practices [2]. As long as that is
true we have:
- a checker rooted firmly in a specification - which is a good thing;
- a checker that is growing old and, as is obvious, increasingly out of
date - which is a bad thing.
If we were to update the checker to, for example, cover HTML5 or any
other technology (CSS3, SVG or whatever) then how would we root that in
a spec? It becomes a dynamic system without a reference point.
Now - since a lot of work went in to the checker (and the specs behind
it) and it's a potentially useful tool, we don't want to lose it.
However, we would need some sort of community effort to determine what
the checker would check. There's also an issue of cost - maintaining the
validation suite means writing new code.
For now, I think we can say that the mobileOK checker is a useful guide.
A lot of the best practices are still entirely valid. Taken with the
Mobile Web Applications Best Practices [3] they form good advice to any
mobile developer. However, it does need some interpretation - which is a
pity.
For example, the checker will warn you if you don't use the
application/xhtml+xml MIME type. If you're coding in HTML5 that's simply
wrong and I haven't seen an instance where there's an advantage in using
the XHTML MIME type.
The checker will scream at you if you don't include cache control or
image dimensions - those are very much right!
What about media queries... Is the mobile checker suitable for if
you are creating one set of htmls code and for mulitple devices?
No.
I'd say not yet. What we need is the mechanism for how to manage change
and how to effect change in the checker. Keep nagging us - that might
help us get it higher on the agenda.
HTH
Phil.
[1] http://www.w3.org/TR/mobileOK-basic10-tests/
[2] http://www.w3.org/TR/mobile-bp/
[3] http://www.w3.org/TR/mwabp/
--
Phil Archer
W3C eGovernment
http://www.w3.org/egov/
http://philarcher.org
@philarcher1
*******************************************************************
List Guidelines: http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm
Unsubscribe: http://webstandardsgroup.org/join/unsubscribe.cfm
Help: memberh...@webstandardsgroup.org
*******************************************************************
