Re: [docbook-apps] [QUESTION] Generating XHTML 1.1 from docbook-xsl

[Kevin Ruscoe <kevin@sapphireoflondon.org>]

Hi Jirka

 > The question is whether it is worth to spend time implementing support
 > for XHTML 1.1 when major browser doesn't support it

I must admit that, after waiting for years for Internet Explorer to support
CSS Fixed Positioning and noting that IE7 finally does, I rather assumed 
that
other areas of standards compliance had been addressed as well.  However,
having (just) checked, I see that, although XHTML is better supported than
in IE6, support for the MIME type application/xml+xhtml has slipped to
the next release.

(For other people who did not know this, there is an explanation at:
http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2005/09/15/467901.aspx )

 > without resorting to ugly hacks

Adding a mod_rewrite rule to Apache cfg files is certainly ugly, but no
great problem.  IMHO, reducing the priority of support for
standards because certain vendors don't do a good job of supporting them
risks leading us into a vicious circle.  On the other hand, supporting and
evangelising standards can have the opposite effect.  I do not
think that IE7's greatly improved support for CSS would have come without
pressure being applied from the user community.

 > and, pragmatically, there is nothing in XHTML 1.1 what
 > couldn't be done in XHTML 1.0/HTML 4.01 except Ruby which is neither
 > supported by DocBook.

True enough, perhaps, if a little harsh on the XHTML developers, given
that the purpose of XHTML 1.1 is to modularise XHTML rather than add
user-visible features :-)

Personally speaking, I am grateful for the easier validation of XHTML,
which allows me to have more confidence in the quality of the finished
pages.

More generally, I am all in favour of the direction expressed by
the developers of XHTML in the various specs.  For example:

http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/#why
http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml-modularization/introduction.html#s_intro_xhtml_mods
http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml2/introduction.html#aims

Regards
Kevin