Developing Web Applications
With XHTML:
Problems and Benefits
Ian GRAHAM
Senior Manager, eSolutions Group
Emfisys, Bank of Montreal
E: ian.graham@bmo.com or utoronto.ca}
W: http://www.utoronto.ca/ian/talks/
T: 416.513.5656 / F: 416.513.5590
Talk Outline
Introduction
Technical and process issues
Browsers and XHTML
Server-side data management
Dynamic content generation
Conclusions
Browsers and XHTML
Data delivered to browsers as one of two
MIME types
text/html
text/xml
(HTML data)
(XML data)
Two types handled in very different ways
Browsers and XHTML
HTML Channel Support
Navigator 1--6
Opera 3--6
Lynx
IE 3--5.5
...
Basically every
browser
XML Channel Support
Navigator 6
IE 5/5.5
Opera 4
Fewer browsers, with
caveats (rendering /
processing problems)
HTML vs. XML Channels
HTML channel
XML channel
Large set of defined internal general entities for
common non-ASCII characters and symbols
Default formatting properties for all standard
HTML elements
CSS support for id- and class-based CSS
selectors (e.g., div.special, pre#note)
Hard-wired support for functional elements
(links, replaced elements [img, object/applet],
map etc.)
No internal DTD subsets: some browsers
supports DOCTYPE declarations with no
internal subset (for rendering mode switching)
No validation
Only 5 XML-standard predefined general
entities (lt, gt, amp, apos, and quot)
No default XHTML formatting properties
(exception: Mozilla/Navigator 6)
No support
must omit CDATA sections
N/A
No namespace support
No support (some support in Mozilla)
Supports internal DTD subsets and
arbitrary entity declarations, both internal
and (sometimes) external
Supports DTD-based (and sometimes
schema-based) validation
Supports CDATA sections
Supports an XML declaration
Supports namespaces
XHTML via XML Channel
Mozilla/NN6
“namespace” support
for XHTML
namespace
– default formatting
properties
Restricted CSS
support
No support (yet) for
style, link elements
– <?xml-stylesheet .... ?>
IE 5/5.5
No special support for
XHTML (use
CSS+XML)
No standardized
support for functional
markup
Transform XML into
HTML:
XML+XSLT HTML
Browser Conclusions:
Deliver data as text/html
Must avoid many XML features
CDATA sections
DTD internal subsets (and DTD functionality)
Not supported by HTML processors
XHTML as text/html
Be aware of some XHTML features
xml:lang vs. lang attributes (use both)
XML declarations (avoid them)
empty element tag notation (add space
before trailing “/” character)
non-minimized attribute assignments (some
bugs with Opera 3.6)
DTD declaration (rendering concerns)
“Safe” XHTML example
<?xml version= "1.0" encoding= "utf-8" ?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
"DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" >
<html xmlns= "http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml1"
xml:lang= "en-ca" lang= "en-ca" >
<head>
<title> ... </title>
<meta http-equiv= "content-type"
content= "text/html;charset=utf-8" />
</head>
<body>
.....
whitespace
</body>
before slash
</html>
DOCTYPE Switching
New HTML processors render differently
depending on DOCTYPE value:
“quirks” mode -- (reproduces various CSS
and other layout “errors” of older browsers)
“standards” mode -- (correct behavior, no
quirks [supposedly!] )
DOCTYPE Switching
All XHTML DTDs get “standard” mode.
Thus the following rule:
quirks mode:
strict mode:
omit DOCTYPE
include an XHTML
DOCTYPE declaration
Summary
Seems like a lot of problems....
Not so bad ...
Have to deal with most anyway (e.g., quirky
vs. strict)
“patching” often easy to automate
Benefits
Reduced markup errors (well-formedness)
Migration path to future delivery channels
Markup Guidelines
Use external scripts and CSS style sheets
Avoid CDATA sections
External script, style sheet files
On output, auto-adjust syntax:
insert space at end of empty-element tags
duplicate lang-related attributes
strip/insert appropriate DOCTYPE declaration
strip XML declaration
Talk Outline
Introduction
Browsers and XHTML
Server-side data management
Dynamic content generation
Conclusions
Server-Side Management
XHTML reduces errors in composition and
rendering phases
Well-formedness ensures unambiguous
processing by an HTML or XML processor
Barring CSS errors, this means fewer
browser formatting problems
Problems
support by content generation tools
Issues:
Limited pool of XHTML authoring tools
Most popular page authoring tools designed
for HTML (DreamWeaver, FrontPage etc.)
XHTML conversion adds process steps to
authoring
– Too complex for most Web authors/designers
Not an issue for organizations with
existing XML/SGML processes
Processing Content
Problem detected
A)
Author /
edit
View &
verify
Publish
content
Problem detected
B)
Author /
edit
Convert
to
XHTML
View &
verify
Publish
content
Alternatives
Use XML-aware authoring tools
Create tightly controlled page “templates”
and limit authoring responsibilities
Issues: Cost, non-WYSIWYG nature
Reduces likelihood of markup error
Dynamic content generation
Fragment authoring only -- with validation
Talk Outline
Introduction
Browsers and XHTML
Server-side data management
Dynamic content generation
Conclusions
Dynamic Content
Content from databases
SQL, XML, files (plain text or XML fragments)
Can enforce well-formedness in software
Either via structured markup generating
functions or true XML-based tools
Server-Side Management
text strings
XHTML
Fragment
Page generation
engine
XHTML
Fragment
XHTML
Fragment
HTML /
XHTML
page
template
HTML /
XHTML
to
browser
Reduced number
of markup/formatting
errors
XHTML Fragments
XHTML helps reduce errors in
composition of pages from fragments:
Checking fragment well-formedness ensures
well-formedness of composed content
Even if template is not well-formed, wellformedness of fragments increases rendering
reliability of composed product
Easier to control fragment authoring
Roles & Responsibilities
Fragment creation
Many individual writers; requires little markup
knowledge; WYSIWYG often not as important
Template creation / Management
Fewer, more technically skilled people; can
enforce well-formedness
Fragment Creation
Common use case in content creation
e.g., Newspaper articles, weblogs
Subset of XHTML (e.g., p, a, br, h3, b, i,
img, em)
few attributes
Easy to write
Easy to dynamically “correct” markup
Example Web Interface
Advantages
• Centralized code
• Single interface
Disadvantages
• Crappy editor
• Need to know
markup to write
content
Future Alternatives
Editable Web content (IE 5.5, Mozilla)
Accessing DOM tree to build an editor
http://standardbrains.editthispage.com/
DOM ensures validity / well-formedness of
markup
With Mozilla, will work with XML
Content Assembly
Many tools (JSP, php, ASP, zope ...)
Not many that guarantee well-formed XML
output
Obvious choice: XSLT
Guarantees well-formedness of output
HTML output mode allows for most issues
described earlier
Server-Side Management
XSLT processor
XHTML
Fragment
text
strings
XSLT
fragment
template
XHTML
Fragment
XHTML
Fragment
XHTML
to
browser
XSLT
page
template
Zero markup /
formatting errors
XSLT Advantages
XSLT
(2)
Always well-formed!
Abstraction layer
between content and
output
Easier adjustment for
future delivery
channels
Output
(2)
XSLT
XSLT
(1)
Output
(1)
XSLT Caveats
Non-trivial language
(well, at least to page developers/designers)
Unclean separation between designer and
programmer
Lack of easy integration to common
editing tools
Alternative Approach
“Procedural” page template designs
XHTML-compliant design tools
Escape to XSLT for content “components”
“Prototype-based” transformations
Markup Model
...regular markup ....
<xsl:prototype>
<table>
... Example table content goes here ...
</table>
</xsl:prototype>
... More XHTML markup ....
Talk Outline
Introduction
Browsers and XHTML
Server-side data management
Dynamic content generation
Conclusions
Conclusions
XHTML provides pragmatic advantages
Improved content reliability, at several layers;
migration path to XML-centric world
Several disadvantages in near-term
Poor integration with authoring tools; no easy
XSLT-design separation
Developing Web Applications
With XHTML:
Problems and Benefits
Ian GRAHAM
Senior Manager, eSolutions Group
Emfisys, Bank of Montreal
E: ian.graham@{bmo.com or utoronto.ca}
W: http://www.utoronto.ca/ian/talks/
T: 416.513.5656 / F: 416.513.5590
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