Comments on: From the Top: Defining Content Language http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/content-language/ a web developer with standards Sun, 24 Jan 2010 17:34:11 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Karl Dawson http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/content-language/comment-page-1/#comment-58 Karl Dawson Wed, 25 Jan 2006 19:38:21 +0000 http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/22/defining-content-language/#comment-58 Andrew / Mike, Yes, I can't remember the source of my opinion on including dir="ltr" it goes back at least a year I think, it must have been based on something more than redundancy of function but if it's not in <a href="http://del.icio.us/thatstandardsguy" rel="nofollow">my del.icio.us</a> I'm doomed to forget. In the research around this article, I didn't even discover the default behaviour info as obviously that would have changed my mind immediately. Thanks for posting about it, I'm always ready to modify an opinion I may hold about something. Mike: No, you didn't miss anything - this article caters for both markup languages. Andrew / Mike,

Yes, I can’t remember the source of my opinion on including dir=”ltr” it goes back at least a year I think, it must have been based on something more than redundancy of function but if it’s not in my del.icio.us I’m doomed to forget. In the research around this article, I didn’t even discover the default behaviour info as obviously that would have changed my mind immediately. Thanks for posting about it, I’m always ready to modify an opinion I may hold about something.

Mike: No, you didn’t miss anything – this article caters for both markup languages.

]]> By: Mike Cherim http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/content-language/comment-page-1/#comment-56 Mike Cherim Wed, 25 Jan 2006 18:44:05 +0000 http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/22/defining-content-language/#comment-56 The use of the letter direction isn't always needed as it can be implied by DTD, charset, language, etc. But I don't feel its use is a boo-boo per se. Being redundant isn't bad until its redundancy interferes with something. In this case adding it to this article is good "general" advice, especially since this article isn't confined to XHTML alone (or it is and I missed that part). The use of the letter direction isn’t always needed as it can be implied by DTD, charset, language, etc. But I don’t feel its use is a boo-boo per se. Being redundant isn’t bad until its redundancy interferes with something. In this case adding it to this article is good “general” advice, especially since this article isn’t confined to XHTML alone (or it is and I missed that part).

]]> By: Andrew Cunningham http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/content-language/comment-page-1/#comment-54 Andrew Cunningham Mon, 23 Jan 2006 22:53:46 +0000 http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/22/defining-content-language/#comment-54 A couple of comments, in addition to Lachlan's: The dir="ltr" on the html tag is redundant. By default a x/html document is "ltr" unless otherwise specified. An interesting chase for language tags, are Unicode documents containing hanzi/kanji/hanji (CJK ideographs). Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, japanese and Korean can share a codepoint, but have different glyph variations for the character represented by that glyph. If there is no appropriate font declaration in the style sheet, and no language tagging, then web browsers will use a default language for rendering. This may result in an incorr3ect font being used, e.g. a Japanese font used to render Simplified Chinese text. Appriopriate langauge tagging of CJK text is important in order for culturally appropriate glyphs to be used. A couple of comments, in addition to Lachlan’s:

The dir=”ltr” on the html tag is redundant. By default a x/html document is “ltr” unless otherwise specified.

An interesting chase for language tags, are Unicode documents containing hanzi/kanji/hanji (CJK ideographs). Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, japanese and Korean can share a codepoint, but have different glyph variations for the character represented by that glyph. If there is no appropriate font declaration in the style sheet, and no language tagging, then web browsers will use a default language for rendering. This may result in an incorr3ect font being used, e.g. a Japanese font used to render Simplified Chinese text. Appriopriate langauge tagging of CJK text is important in order for culturally appropriate glyphs to be used.

]]> By: Karl Dawson http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/content-language/comment-page-1/#comment-53 Karl Dawson Mon, 23 Jan 2006 10:18:02 +0000 http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/22/defining-content-language/#comment-53 Thanks Lachlan, The article is about writing a complete tag. If you are writing a document in XHTML then you need to include the xml namespace too. I added it for completeness. I am also trying to protect novice or busy developers from the really technical details by pitching a concise summary of "what", "why" and "how". The references can then lead the keen into the technical background. Thanks Lachlan, The article is about writing a complete tag. If you are writing a document in XHTML then you need to include the xml namespace too. I added it for completeness.

I am also trying to protect novice or busy developers from the really technical details by pitching a concise summary of “what”, “why” and “how”. The references can then lead the keen into the technical background.

]]> By: Lachlan Hunt http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/content-language/comment-page-1/#comment-52 Lachlan Hunt Mon, 23 Jan 2006 10:05:17 +0000 http://www.thatstandardsguy.co.uk/2006/01/22/defining-content-language/#comment-52 One more thing, it doesn't make any sence to discuss <code>xmlns</code> in an article about natual languages. Can you explain why that was included? One more thing, it doesn’t make any sence to discuss xmlns in an article about natual languages. Can you explain why that was included?

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