Re: HTML tags in org, name, etc

[Kenneth Albanowski <kjahds@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 11 Jul 1997, Jeremy Gaither wrote:

> My main argument is not that vCard should be described in HTML, but that 
> the content either be meta-content that can be displayed in other forms 
> defined by the user.  Perhaps it is more of a question of application, 
> but the vCard should not be made to seem as a seperate entity, as it 
> seems now.

In which case it should support multiple alternative forms of text, much
as it does for graphics. As it does _not_ currently support multiple
alternative forms of text, this can only be addresed in a future version.

> I have not seen many paper business cards that come in a braile 
> alternative,

I don't actually know whether Braille business cards exist, but they
certainly wouldn't need to be an alternative. Braille letters and printed
text can easily coexist on a single piece of paper.

vCard is actually a far improvement over the traditional business card, as
it _is_ implicitly usable by the blind. Assuming it doesn't get overloaded
with formatting, as you suggest.

> or many braile magazines on the magazine rack in stores.  

Wrong market. Braille versions of many magazines exist, though they
usually aren't produced by the original publisher. This is a problem which
computers should aleviate, not exacerbate. 

> It seems that the digital would could be more friendly to those with the 
> inability to see.  This is what the ALT tags are for. 

The former is correct. The latter is only very slightly correct. ALT tags
usually don't go far enough, given that many people are (ab)using HTML in
a manner that eschews markup for layout and presentation.

> HTML has evolved far beyond what it was intended for.  Business cards of 
> any sort are not good canidates to be encoded purely in HTML as it was 
> intended.  HTML, however, can be used to either augment or beautify a 
> business card now, with the expanded use of the IMG and FONT tags...

_Precisely_, and this is precisely what should not be done. HTML is
free-form, extensible, and constantly in flux. vCard is a data-interchange
format, which has exactly the opposite goals.

> I definitely agree that HTML within the content of a vCard field needs 
> to be defined, or at least limited.  There would be no need for a TABLE 
> or FRAME tag within a NAME field.

But given some of the things that have happened with IE and Netscape,
would you care to bet that it would not be done? Look at the feature war
between browsers. No standard interchange format can afford to be caught
up in this system.

> Breaking older implementations is a problem, but with the rate of
> software upgrades coming about, most individuals using the vCard would
> upgrade to new versions of supporting software rather quickly.

Again, this is precisely the wrong perspective. vCard is an interchange
format, and that means past, present, and future, just as much as it means
different software, computers, or countries.

> Not all of the burden of decoding the vCard should fall on the decoder, 
> but it should not all be held by the standard either, unless the 
> standard is to define the implementation of processing certian tags.

If the burden is not taken up by the standard and the encoder, then the
burden _does_ fall on the decoder. Everything from HTML to RFC-822 mail
demonstrates this. 

-- 
Kenneth Albanowski (kjahds@xxxxxxxxxx, CIS: 70705,126)