Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> In article <3d7209c5@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:
> 
> 
>>  So how many % of people are seeing "unreadable layout"? 
> 
> 
> More than 10% of all POV-Ray 3.5 users who turn to your page.  All Mac users
> that would be.

I'm on a Mac, and Mozilla loads his site just fine.

-Xplo

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"Pandora" <pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote in message
news:3d72948e$1@news.povray.org...
> "Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in message
> news:3d721dc2$1@news.povray.org...
> > Most important, I yet i have to figure out where IE stores its bookmark
> file on Windows.
>
>     They're in your Favourites folder - they're just stored as shortcuts,
> rather than a list of URLs in a file - if you want to export them to a
file
> go to File->Import/Export (for I.E 6 at least, previous version may be
> different (though, not in terms of the Favourites folder))...

For XP it's in Documents and Settings\username, used to be under Windows
folder if 98/ME. Just checked about it and W2K or NT is a bit different
being within a profiles folder. If you have user profiles then same for
98/ME. Aside from a typographical error, tells so here:
http://www.9three.com/tutorials/Jan-23-2002-fetch_your_favorites.htm

Post a reply to this message

Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> 
>>  Firstly, if you don't want to upgrade your browser to a newer version,
>>that's your problem, not mine. If you want to use an old browser, then
>>fine, use it, but don't complain to me because it's not my problem.
> 
> Remind me to vote for  only providing Pentium 4 and PowerPC G4 versions of
> POV-Ray next time.  After all, if you are using old and broken processors
> that lack some important instructions you don't deserve to use POV-Ray!
> 
> Does this mirror help your attitude?

It's a poor analogy, for two reasons.

First, computer hardware is fairly expensive to upgrade. You would be 
asking me to spend hundreds of dollars to run what's supposed to be 
"free" software. In comparison, a browser is much cheaper to upgrade 
(free with a flat-rate net connection, and certainly less expensive than 
a hardware upgrade if you're some unfortunate person who still pays by 
the minute).

Second, there's really no reason why there shouldn't be versions of 
POV-Ray for earlier hardware, as that hardware supports POV-Ray. There's 
no feature in POV-Ray which requires a G4 or P4. Browsers are not the 
same, as older ones don't support features present in the current 
version of the web, and therefore there's a legitimate reason to upgrade 
them to use the web.

I'd like to note one other thing in passing: that this whole argument 
seems to be centered around the need for web interoperability, but the 
entire point of having web standards (or "recommendations" if you must) 
is to provide for that. However, they can't do so if people persist in 
using browsers that don't comply with the standards.. so by refusing to 
upgrade and forcing web authors to cater to you or else, you are 
actually HURTING the cause you claim to support.

-Xplo

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In article <3d730406@news.povray.org> , Xplo Eristotle <xpl### [at] infomagicnet>
wrote:

> is to provide for that. However, they can't do so if people persist in
> using browsers that don't comply with the standards.. so by refusing to
> upgrade and forcing web authors to cater to you or else, you are
> actually HURTING the cause you claim to support.

I do not support the W3C.  I do not support industry self-interest groups.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> I do not support the W3C.  I do not support industry self-interest groups.

  It seems to be more a question of principle than logic. I still don't
recall you explaining what is so bad about CSS. I can't see what is so bad
about it; it makes maintaining big sets of HTML documents easier and helps
separating content from layout, which is a good thing. It also makes it easy
to make available several alternative layouts for the same content.

-- 
#macro N(D)#if(D>99)cylinder{M()#local D=div(D,104);M().5,2pigment{rgb M()}}
N(D)#end#end#macro M()<mod(D,13)-6mod(div(D,13)8)-3,10>#end blob{
N(11117333955)N(4254934330)N(3900569407)N(7382340)N(3358)N(970)}//  - Warp -

Post a reply to this message

In article <3d7349c6@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   It seems to be more a question of principle than logic. I still don't
> recall you explaining what is so bad about CSS. I can't see what is so bad
> about it; it makes maintaining big sets of HTML documents easier and helps
> separating content from layout, which is a good thing. It also makes it easy
> to make available several alternative layouts for the same content.

I am against the layout being provided by the site.  I want full control
over the layout like I had in HTML originally.  No visual clutter, just
plain information (be it text or pictures) quick and easy to access.  Just
like in paper books rather than commercial advertisements leaflets.

In essence, what does the added layout provide me with that I don't already
have? -- Nothing but problems that I then have to waste my time solving!

On the other hand, has the added layout feature solved any of the
shortcoming of the original HTML like the inability to display formulas
well? -- No, and it still does not.  And why?  Because nobody supports those
"recommendations".

The problem is that rather than focusing on _solutions_, the W3C focuses on
_features_.  This is a typical situation for industry organisations.  They
never did and never will deliver something that is useful, because once it
exists they have nothing new to sell next year (and they don't crea what
they could sell in five years) and thus can't drive their business further.
So there is no reason for them to provide solutions, only features when they
define so-called "standards" or "recommendations" :-(

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

Post a reply to this message

Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> I am against the layout being provided by the site.  I want full control
> over the layout like I had in HTML originally.  No visual clutter, just
> plain information (be it text or pictures) quick and easy to access.  Just
> like in paper books rather than commercial advertisements leaflets.

  Eh, I don't think you have too much control about the layout of a book...

  Besides, in many modern browsers you can turn a default page style (ie no
styles at all). For example if you are using Mozilla, try
View -> Use Style -> Basic Page Style
  That will turn off the CSS providen by the page.

> In essence, what does the added layout provide me with that I don't already
> have? -- Nothing but problems that I then have to waste my time solving!

  IMHO the Q&T pages are a lot nicer to read with their current style than
with the default styles. For example it's a lot easier to see where there are
SDL code segments, and in the text it's easier to see what is a keyword and
what is regular text.

> On the other hand, has the added layout feature solved any of the
> shortcoming of the original HTML like the inability to display formulas
> well? -- No, and it still does not.  And why?  Because nobody supports those
> "recommendations".

  Mozilla supports MathML quite well, so you can't say "nobody".

  And anyways, the correct claim would be "nobody supports those
recommendations *now*". Support for those will certainly be implemented
in browsers in the near future.

> The problem is that rather than focusing on _solutions_, the W3C focuses on
> _features_.

  How can you have a solution without features?

  "Ok, this is a solution to this problem." "How is it used?" "There's no
way of using it because there exists no feature to use it." "Oh..."

  Sorry, but I still fail to see what is so bad and useless about CSS.

-- 
#macro M(A,N,D,L)plane{-z,-9pigment{mandel L*9translate N color_map{[0rgb x]
[1rgb 9]}scale<D,D*3D>*1e3}rotate y*A*8}#end M(-3<1.206434.28623>70,7)M(
-1<.7438.1795>1,20)M(1<.77595.13699>30,20)M(3<.75923.07145>80,99)// - Warp -

Post a reply to this message

Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> I am against the layout being provided by the site.  I want full control
> over the layout like I had in HTML originally.  No visual clutter, just
> plain information (be it text or pictures) quick and easy to access.  Just
> like in paper books rather than commercial advertisements leaflets.

You're arguing for a return to text-only websites.  That ain't gonna
happen, any more than people will give up P2P clients to the RIAA. If
you're dead set on text, use lynx, and leave people who DO want to have
layout a specific way on their site alone.

-- 
Tim Cook
http://empyrean.scifi-fantasy.com
mirror: http://personal.lig.bellsouth.net/lig/z/9/z993126

-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version: 3.12
GFA dpu- s: a?-- C++(++++) U P? L E--- W++(+++)>$
N++ o? K- w(+) O? M-(--) V? PS+(+++) PE(--) Y(--)
PGP-(--) t* 5++>+++++ X+ R* tv+ b++(+++) DI
D++(---) G(++) e*>++ h+ !r--- !y--
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------

Post a reply to this message

In article <3D7### [at] scifi-fantasycom> , "Timothy R. Cook" 
<tim### [at] scifi-fantasycom> wrote:

> Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
>> I am against the layout being provided by the site.  I want full control
>> over the layout like I had in HTML originally.  No visual clutter, just
>> plain information (be it text or pictures) quick and easy to access.  Just
   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> like in paper books rather than commercial advertisements leaflets.
>
> You're arguing for a return to text-only websites.

You did not even read what I wrote.  It is impossible to misunderstand.  You
even quoted what I said yet you claim I said the opposite.  Next time please
read first at least what you quote, and then reply!

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

Post a reply to this message

Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> 
> I am against the layout being provided by the site.  I want full control
> over the layout like I had in HTML originally.

HTML never gave you full control over the layout. It gave page authors 
control over layout with TABLE and invisible GIFs and things like that. 
And before that, it didn't give anybody control over layout.

> No visual clutter, just
> plain information (be it text or pictures) quick and easy to access.  Just
> like in paper books rather than commercial advertisements leaflets.

Try Lynx.. or set your browser to ignore CSS. (Or even create a user 
stylesheet, use that by default, and see every page with the fonts, 
colors, links styles, and so on that YOU want.. something which HTML 
never provided, incidentally. Sadly, not many browsers support user 
stylesheets yet, even though it's part of the "recommendation".)

> On the other hand, has the added layout feature solved any of the
> shortcoming of the original HTML like the inability to display formulas
> well? -- No, and it still does not.  And why?  Because nobody supports those
> "recommendations".

But the "recommendations" are there, and if someone did support them, 
and if people would upgrade to a browser that supported them - because 
they can't very well expect an unsupported old browser to magically 
learn new tricks - then those shortcomings would be solved.

> The problem is that rather than focusing on _solutions_, the W3C focuses on
> _features_.  This is a typical situation for industry organisations.  They
> never did and never will deliver something that is useful...

Your problem here is that you're naively assuming that you're the 
biggest smarty ever and that everyone should design the web to YOUR 
specifications. If I were you, I would abandon this line of reasoning 
immediately. Some people want fancy colors and fonts and layouts and 
things that blink and flash and jump around.. and almost anyone would 
prefer an attractive (but still simple) page to one that looks like it 
was written in 1992 and uses the functional but extremely boring browser 
defaults.

CSS isn't designed for web users, because they don't use CSS. They use 
web pages. CSS is designed for web authors. It lets us change the look 
of a web page or even an entire site much more easily than we could with 
HTML (and using far less code, which helps those poor dialups users who 
don't want to download a new browser).. and in that sense, it is a 
solution. It makes those pages easier to maintain later, and that's a 
solution. It lets us do things with pages that we couldn't do in HTML.. 
and since people wanted to do them, that is a solution. It lets us adapt 
pages to different browsing environments instead of having to abandon 
style altogether or create several versions of pages, and that is a 
solution. And by forming a standard for page styling that all future 
browsers will hopefully follow, we'll be able to make pages that don't 
look like crap without resorting to the sort of design tricks we had to 
use back during the days of "browser wars" and proprietary 
functionality. And as anyone who was making pages back then knows, THAT 
is most definitely a solution.

It's a hell of a lot better than your solution.

-Xplo

Post a reply to this message

In article <3d73588a@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   Besides, in many modern browsers you can turn a default page style (ie no
> styles at all). For example if you are using Mozilla, try
> View -> Use Style -> Basic Page Style

IE on Mac has had this feature for a very long time now, btw.

>   That will turn off the CSS providen by the page.

Oh yes, to end up with all those sites designed by idiots assuming the
layout they try to force upon me looks exactly like on _their_ browser
everywhere.  Usually the site breaks badly if it does not.  So these options
are absolutely useless.

>   IMHO the Q&T pages are a lot nicer to read with their current style than
> with the default styles.

Well, if your browser ships with a bad default stylesheet that is a problem
of your browser developer...

>   And anyways, the correct claim would be "nobody supports those
> recommendations *now*". Support for those will certainly be implemented
> in browsers in the near future.

Oh sure.  In 20 years it will work then...

Besides, did you notice that Mozialla has to be loaded at startup to appear
it loads quickly?  In reality it is a slow fat memory hog.

On the other hand, plain HTML renders on a 486 without problems (only
decompressing the images will be a bit slower), and browsers won't need half
a gigabyte of memory to run either!

>   How can you have a solution without features?

By making it a native _function_ of the proggram, not something patched on
like a feature ;-)

>   Sorry, but I still fail to see what is so bad and useless about CSS.

They allow designers to destroy web pages with tons of bandwidth wasting
clutter.  Try the current www.sun.com for example.  It is much better than
the old one and works perfectly without stylesheets.  The only thing that
looks not so nice is the graphics some stupid designer added assuming
stylesheets are available everywhere.  So it is very possible to design a
page that looks good without stylesheets, one just has to remove access to
it from stupid designers who have no clue about information presentation.

And did you notice how quickly the new Sun site loads compared to the old
one?

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

Post a reply to this message

Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> You did not even read what I wrote.  It is impossible to misunderstand.  You
> even quoted what I said yet you claim I said the opposite.  Next time please
> read first at least what you quote, and then reply!

I did read what you wrote, but understand this: a website with no layout
information has no way of placing images, so the images would be linked
to separately by web designers.  Hence, the webpage itself would be text
only.

-- 
Tim Cook
http://empyrean.scifi-fantasy.com
mirror: http://personal.lig.bellsouth.net/lig/z/9/z993126

-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version: 3.12
GFA dpu- s: a?-- C++(++++) U P? L E--- W++(+++)>$
N++ o? K- w(+) O? M-(--) V? PS+(+++) PE(--) Y(--)
PGP-(--) t* 5++>+++++ X+ R* tv+ b++(+++) DI
D++(---) G(++) e*>++ h+ !r--- !y--
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------

Post a reply to this message

In article <3d73ab1d@news.povray.org> , Xplo Eristotle <xpl### [at] infomagicnet>
wrote:
>> I am against the layout being provided by the site.  I want full control
>> over the layout like I had in HTML originally.
>
> HTML never gave you full control over the layout. It gave page authors
> control over layout with TABLE and invisible GIFs and things like that.
> And before that, it didn't give anybody control over layout.

but this was not a problem with HTML!  It was a problem with badly design
web sites by designers nopt understanding the concept of HTML and the web
media (not their fault, all they had ever seen was DTP programs).  So they
abused HTMl and then W3C came up with a technical cure for a desease by
killing the patient (being layout less content description).  Note that
tables do represent layout, but content if used what they are supposed to be
for (like in a spreadsheet)...

> (Or even create a user
> stylesheet, use that by default, and see every page with the fonts,
> colors, links styles, and so on that YOU want.. something which HTML
> never provided

Of course HTML "never provided" it.  One just could control the layout like
fonts and font sizes more easily by nice buttons and menus rather than a
stupid text file.  Back to the future this is supposed to be, I assume...

> Your problem here is that you're naively assuming that you're the
> biggest smarty ever and that everyone should design the web to YOUR
> specifications. If I were you, I would abandon this line of reasoning
> immediately.

Using cheap personal attacks will not exactly help your point :-(

> CSS isn't designed for web users, because they don't use CSS. They use
> web pages. CSS is designed for web authors. It lets us change the look
> of a web page or even an entire site much more easily than we could with
> HTML (and using far less code, which helps those poor dialups users who
> don't want to download a new browser)..

Nonsense!  The page gets bloated like hell if you use CSS or any layout for
that matter!  I am suggesting to _remove_ it, not _replace_ it with
something I claim to be better!

> and in that sense, it is a
> solution. It makes those pages easier to maintain later, and that's a
> solution. It lets us do things with pages that we couldn't do in HTML..

But that is my point!  If I want pages that look like printed, I get a
printed leaflet, not some web page!  Right now HTML and inparticular CSS
allow things that never were HTML in the first place.  Just expand the
acronym "HTML" to see my point!  In order to use CSS "properly" I have to
clutter up what once was HTML with endless references to styles.  What a
great separtation of layout and content that is!  It is a feature added like
a hack, like so many other HTML additions the W3C companies made!

> and since people wanted to do them, that is a solution.

Who wanted them?  The designers or the users?  Designers who were great a
print media design were suddenly supposed to be web designers but inseatd of
using the new medium invatively they demanded the features they always had
when designing for print media: Full control.  So this argument support my
point, not yours.  Sorry!

> It lets us adapt
> pages to different browsing environments instead of having to abandon
> style altogether or create several versions of pages, and that is a
> solution.

You are still missing the point because you did not read what I wrote!  To
repeat myself:  I am saying that layout should not be specified at all!

> And by forming a standard for page styling that all future
> browsers will hopefully follow, we'll be able to make pages that don't
> look like crap without resorting to the sort of design tricks we had to
> use back during the days of "browser wars" and proprietary
> functionality.

Design tricks to get web pages look like printed pages, an idea by designers
incapable to understanding that a web browser is not meant for WYSIWYG DTP,
and never was.

> It's a hell of a lot better than your solution.

You did not even undstand what I said, so your conclusion just misses the
point.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

Post a reply to this message

In article <3D7### [at] scifi-fantasycom> , "Timothy R. Cook" 
<tim### [at] scifi-fantasycom> wrote:

> I did read what you wrote, but understand this: a website with no layout
> information has no way of placing images, so the images would be linked
> to separately by web designers.  Hence, the webpage itself would be text
> only.

This reply is supposed to be a joke, right???  Otherwise you obviously know
nothing about HTML :-(

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

Post a reply to this message

Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> Besides, did you notice that Mozialla has to be loaded at startup to appear
> it loads quickly?  In reality it is a slow fat memory hog.

  I don't have that option turned on, and it starts in about 5 seconds.
I can live with that.

> On the other hand, plain HTML renders on a 486 without problems (only
> decompressing the images will be a bit slower), and browsers won't need half
> a gigabyte of memory to run either!

  I just checked and Mozilla, with several pages loaded in browsing tabs,
uses 20 MB of memory. I have 256 Megs. I can live with that.

  By the way, how many people use a 486 to browse the web nowadays?
Mozilla might need something like a P-II 400MHz in order to run smoothly.
Well, I have a 1.2GHz Athlon. I can live with that.

> They allow designers to destroy web pages with tons of bandwidth wasting
> clutter.

  I'm sorry, but I don't see how the clutter "destroys" the page.
Pehaps you need to download a couple of kilobytes more than without the CSS,
but so what? I can live with that.

> So it is very possible to design a
> page that looks good without stylesheets

  Of course it is possible. You can clutter your pages with <font> tags and
other similar things, which make the pages larger (ie. slower to load) and
a lot more difficult to update (if you want to change some font property,
you have to do it in a million of places).
  I can't believe that you can't see the main reason for the existence
of CSS: To modularize the definition of a group of webpages. That is, define
common things in one place only, and avoid copy-pasting. As a coder you
should know very well how important modularity is.
  From what I see you are claiming that using explicit formatting tags for
everything is better than defining one modular CSS definition which is used
then everywhere.

> And did you notice how quickly the new Sun site loads compared to the old
> one?

  CSS doesn't make pages load slower. If anything, they make it load faster
because there's less copy-paste.
  Things that make a page load slower are quite independent of CSS.

  You have still failed to give any *reasonable* argument about why CSS is
bad. I'm not talking about who created it and why, or who is using it and
how and making what assumptions. I'm talking about the CSS format itself,
as a format, a definition, a standard.

-- 
#macro N(D)#if(D>99)cylinder{M()#local D=div(D,104);M().5,2pigment{rgb M()}}
N(D)#end#end#macro M()<mod(D,13)-6mod(div(D,13)8)-3,10>#end blob{
N(11117333955)N(4254934330)N(3900569407)N(7382340)N(3358)N(970)}//  - Warp -

Post a reply to this message

In article <3d73cb4a@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   Of course it is possible. You can clutter your pages with <font> tags and
> other similar things, which make the pages larger (ie. slower to load) and
> a lot more difficult to update (if you want to change some font property,
> you have to do it in a million of places).

You still miss my point:  ***No*** layout in the page!  No stupid font tags!

Apart from that, usually you exchange font tags by div tags or other ways to
specify styles in a CSS.  So it is not exactly like the data transmitted is
only the CSS.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

Post a reply to this message

Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> I am against the layout being provided by the site.

  I apologize for my rude language, but the claim that text is better read
with no layout is just plain bullshit.

  There are lots of pages out there, where there are literally hundreds
of kilobytes of plain text in one enormous page. If I'm searching information
about something, those pages usually don't help too much. It simply takes
too much time and it's simply too tedious to try to find the information
I want among the thousands and thousands of lines of text.
  It has happened to me more than once that eg. searching something in
Google ends up in this kind of page. After I try to find something useful
for a couple of minutes I just give up and try the next Google hit; there
are usually a lot better layouted sites with the same information and it's
a lot easier to find there.

  A clear hierarchy, with sections, subsections etc. is the main way of
starting making a big page more clear. A large hierarchy needs a contents
or index page, or a site map in order to be easy to navigate. If there is
a lot of content, it should be divided into several logical pages. If a
page consists of several separated parts, eg. sections, there should be
a way to very easily see where does a new part start (a section name with
larger font is the main tool for this, but other additional features, such
as colors can make it even more clear).
  Hierarchy, sections, subsections, index, site map, visually marking
starting of different parts... All that is layout.

  You claim that the layout should be left to the browser, not the site.
However, the browser simply can't do most of those things because it has
no notion of the content. The site has to tell the browser information in
order to separate different items of the page.

-- 
#macro N(D)#if(D>99)cylinder{M()#local D=div(D,104);M().5,2pigment{rgb M()}}
N(D)#end#end#macro M()<mod(D,13)-6mod(div(D,13)8)-3,10>#end blob{
N(11117333955)N(4254934330)N(3900569407)N(7382340)N(3358)N(970)}//  - Warp -

Post a reply to this message

In article <3d73cb4a@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   You have still failed to give any *reasonable* argument about why CSS is
> bad. I'm not talking about who created it and why, or who is using it and
> how and making what assumptions. I'm talking about the CSS format itself,
> as a format, a definition, a standard.

The definition of the CSS _format_ itself to specify layout is not bad.  It
would be a great way to specify layout in DTP programs in a portable manner.
Just for HTML is it unsuitable.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> You still miss my point:  ***No*** layout in the page!  No stupid font tags!

  You do realize that tags like <H1>, <P>, <HR>, <I> etc are layout formatting
tags?
  No layout means that the whole page would be one contiguous line of text.

-- 
#macro N(D)#if(D>99)cylinder{M()#local D=div(D,104);M().5,2pigment{rgb M()}}
N(D)#end#end#macro M()<mod(D,13)-6mod(div(D,13)8)-3,10>#end blob{
N(11117333955)N(4254934330)N(3900569407)N(7382340)N(3358)N(970)}//  - Warp -

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In article <3d73cb4a@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   From what I see you are claiming that using explicit formatting tags for
> everything is better than defining one modular CSS definition which is used
> then everywhere.

Hell, do you really intentionally ignore what I keep saying?  Damn it, how
can one be sooooooo ignorant?!?!?   I said now a few hundred times that I do
not want *************any************** layout.   How can one construct from
the simple idea "no layout" that I keep repeating and repeating that I want
"font tag based layout"?????????????

Either you enter an argument and actually pay attention to the other person
or you don't argue!!!!!!!!!!!!

What I keep saying is:  No font tags, no div tags, no single pixel images in
tables, no layout!

Or don't you know what layout means?  If so, please look it up!


    Thorsten


____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

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Thorsten Froehlich wrote:

>>Your problem here is that you're naively assuming that you're the
>>biggest smarty ever and that everyone should design the web to YOUR
>>specifications. If I were you, I would abandon this line of reasoning
>>immediately.
> 
> Using cheap personal attacks will not exactly help your point :-(

It's not a cheap personal attack, it's an observation. You certainly 
SEEM to think that the web should be designed to your specification, and 
that's a naive attitude to have. It's also a rather arrogant one.

What I posted in my reply to Ken was a cheap personal attack. If I were 
to call you a kook - which I'm getting very close to doing - that would 
be a cheap personal attack.

> Nonsense!  The page gets bloated like hell if you use CSS or any layout for
> that matter!

The main CSS file for my site, which is used by the vast majority of the 
pages on it, is about 3200 bytes. It should logically only be downloaded 
by a browser which supports and displays CSS, and then only once as it 
would be cached thereafter. Each HTML file contains no more than a 
couple hundred characters devoted to CSS (for the link tag, classes and 
IDs), and often as few as 50 or so. That's as many as it takes just to 
add a proper DOCTYPE to the top of the file.

I don't feel that this constitutes "bloating like hell".

If you expect anyone to take you seriously, you must make more 
reasonable statements.

> Who wanted them?  The designers or the users?

Both.

The designers wanted specific control over layout and style, and they 
got it. The users wanted pretty pages that load quickly, which the 
designers were better able to give to them with CSS.

> I am saying that layout should not be specified at all!

No you're not.

When you put words on a page, they go in a certain order. That is 
layout. The sentences and paragraphs also go in a certain order. That is 
layout. Lines must break somewhere (or not). That is layout. There must 
be space between paragraphs (or not); that is layout.

If you have a table - even if it's filled with ordinary tabular data - 
it's still layout. If you put an image on a web page, where does it go? 
In the horizontal center of the page? On the side? At the bottom, after 
all the text? Maybe at the top? Should it be rendered inline or block? 
Should text flow around it? If so, how much room should there be between 
the image and the text? This is all layout.

Even the typographic controls that CSS gives designers, which you put 
down as an attempt to make the web work more like print media, exist IN 
TYPOGRAPHY for a reason. There are centuries of development in print 
with regards to fonts, font weight, spacing, leading, column width, and 
so forth.. things which apply to ALL text, everywhere.. things which do 
not fail to apply to text on the web simply because it's on the web.

What you're doing is making an artificial distinction between what kinds 
of layout are okay and which are not. Unfortunately, you're not doing a 
good job of defining the dividing line, let alone justifying its 
existence. I'll say it again: if you want every web page to look the way 
you want, turn off your browser's handling of designer-specified 
styling, or use a browser that supports user stylesheets and create a 
stylesheet that suits you. There's really no reason to throw away 
something that millions of people want just because you can't be 
bothered to turn it off, AND IT'S NOT GOING TO HAPPEN.

-Xplo

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Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> I said now a few hundred times that I do 
> not want *************any************** layout.

  Ok, I made a version of one of the pages with absolutely no layout:

http://www.students.tut.fi/~warp/povQandT/languageQandT_nolayout.html

  Now I see what you mean. It's a lot cleaner this way! A lot nicer to read.
  Perhaps I should make all the pages like that.

-- 
#macro M(A,N,D,L)plane{-z,-9pigment{mandel L*9translate N color_map{[0rgb x]
[1rgb 9]}scale<D,D*3D>*1e3}rotate y*A*8}#end M(-3<1.206434.28623>70,7)M(
-1<.7438.1795>1,20)M(1<.77595.13699>30,20)M(3<.75923.07145>80,99)// - Warp -

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Warp wrote:
> Ok, I made a version of one of the pages with absolutely no layout:
> http://www.students.tut.fi/~warp/povQandT/languageQandT_nolayout.html

*grin*
you forgot a layout element: spaces, periods, and commas...

-- 
Tim Cook
http://empyrean.scifi-fantasy.com
mirror: http://personal.lig.bellsouth.net/lig/z/9/z993126

-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version: 3.12
GFA dpu- s: a?-- C++(++++) U P? L E--- W++(+++)>$
N++ o? K- w(+) O? M-(--) V? PS+(+++) PE(--) Y(--)
PGP-(--) t* 5++>+++++ X+ R* tv+ b++(+++) DI
D++(---) G(++) e*>++ h+ !r--- !y--
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------

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In article <3d73ce94@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   Hierarchy, sections, subsections, index, site map, visually marking
> starting of different parts... All that is layout.

No, that is "structure".  See the various HTML specifications*.  So you
simply do not know the terminology and we were talking about completely
different things.  Oh well...

    Thorsten


* The HTML 4.0 recommendation for example (because I happen to have it at
hand, no other reason to mention it here) explains it in section 7.  It is
titled "The global structure of an HTML document".

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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In article <3d73d046@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   You do realize that tags like <H1>, <P>, <HR>, <I> etc are layout formatting
> tags?
>   No layout means that the whole page would be one contiguous line of text.

No, you are wrong.  See my other post.  They are not "layout", they are
"structure".  I had assumed you know at least the basic terminology, but
people not reading the manual seems to be a problem outside POV-Ray.  So I
would recommend to RTFM now, the continue arguing ;-)


    Thorsten


____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

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Sorry to blow your arguments about HTML = content over structure out of the
water, Thorsten, but :

"HTML has its roots in SGML which has always been a language for the
specification of structural markup." - W3C HTML 4.01 Specification, section
2.4.1.

*runs and hides*

--
Pandora/Scott Hill/[::O:M:C::]Scorpion
Software Engineer.
http://www.pandora-software.com

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In article <3d73d225@news.povray.org> , Xplo Eristotle <xpl### [at] infomagicnet>
wrote:

See, that is the problem in this discussion.  You claim you know what you
are arguing about but in fact it turns out you don't :-(  This causes a lot
of confusion simply because you never actually read the specification you
are defending.  If you had, you would not be making such mistakes.  let me
gives you a few quotes from the HTML 4.0 recommendation:

> If you have a table - even if it's filled with ordinary tabular data -
> it's still layout.

11.1 "To minimize these problems, authors should use style sheets to control
layout rather than tables."

> If you put an image on a web page, where does it go?

This is determined in one part by the structure of the document.  A
paragraph ends and a new one starts.  That is structure.  If the new
paragraph starts and the first this is an image the the image will be part
of that paragraph.  Where does that paragraph go?  Well, that depends on the
layout and it not relevant for the person creating the document.  The user
has selected how he wants his layout.  Now, before you jump to nonsensical
conclusions before reading on, you have to be careful what exactly I am
saying:  I am against layout provided by the page.  It would be absolute
nonsense to prevent users from selecting layout as I detailed before.  users
are allowed as much control over layout as they like, but with the broser
providing defaults.  this is exactly how HTML used to work.  Even nowadays
you can still specify some layout yourslef:  Most browsers allow you to set
defatult standard font sizes and fonts, for example.

> If so, how much room should there be between
> the image and the text? This is all layout.

Yes, how much space is distributed on a page is layout.  I never said it was
not, did I?  My point still is in what why should content depend on the
space between an image and text?  Not at all, the user simply uses whatever
preference he/she likes.  In case you did not notice, you get a very
readable page if you use neither stylesheets nor font tags.  The image will
just be paced reasonably.  So why do you tell me what is layout if you don't
know?

> When you put words on a page, they go in a certain order. That is
> layout. The sentences and paragraphs also go in a certain order. That is
> layout.

See, you do not know the terms.  i replied to Warp about this including a
refernce explaining it.  It is "structure".

> Lines must break somewhere (or not). That is layout. There must
> be space between paragraphs (or not); that is layout.

Yes, but should it matter for the content creator is the space between two
paragraphs is two or twenty pixels?  No, the layout is up the the user
preference (see above).  Browsers could very well have been extended to
allow users to control this easily.  Instead any kind of control was taken
from users and they are now at the mercy of the page designer.  So users
lost control.


    Thorsten


____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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In article <3d73d2d3@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   Ok, I made a version of one of the pages with absolutely no layout:

No, you made a page without "structure".  I really expected you to know such
an important difference!  Maybe you should attend a course about the topic
or get a few good books.  You have a really big hole in your knowledge here!

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

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In article <3D7### [at] scifi-fantasycom> , "Timothy R. Cook" 
<tim### [at] scifi-fantasycom> wrote:

>> Ok, I made a version of one of the pages with absolutely no layout:
>> http://www.students.tut.fi/~warp/povQandT/languageQandT_nolayout.html
>
> *grin*
> you forgot a layout element: spaces, periods, and commas...

Again someone who does not know the difference between layout and structure.
See my other posts explaining it.  Really, I assume people know at least the
basics if they argue about something.  How wrong I was :-(

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

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"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in message
news:3d73e999@news.povray.org...
> In article <3d73d2d3@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:
>
> >   Ok, I made a version of one of the pages with absolutely no layout:
>
> No, you made a page without "structure".  I really expected you to know
such
> an important difference!  Maybe you should attend a course about the topic
> or get a few good books.  You have a really big hole in your knowledge
here!
>


    Enlighten us Thorston, what are *your* definitions of "layout",
"structure" and "content" ?

--
Pandora/Scott Hill/[::O:M:C::]Scorpion
Software Engineer.
http://www.pandora-software.com

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In article <3d73e88c@news.povray.org> , "Pandora" 
<pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:

> Sorry to blow your arguments about HTML = content over structure out of the
> water, Thorsten, but :
>
> "HTML has its roots in SGML which has always been a language for the
> specification of structural markup." - W3C HTML 4.01 Specification, section
> 2.4.1.

But in what way does it "blow [my] arguments"?  That is exactly what I am
saying!  I never said  "content over structure", I say and said "content
over layout".  And "layout" != "structure" as I explained a million times by
now.  So thanks for the quote, it is much better than the one I found and
straight to the point!

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

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In article <3d73eadf@news.povray.org> , "Pandora" 
<pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:

>     Enlighten us Thorston, what are *your* definitions of "layout",
> "structure" and "content" ?

Try the one you can find everywhere else?  I gave references already, and
you found another one.

But it seems you simply don't understand the definitions as you other post
clearly showed.  You supported my point and said it was supposed to show I
am wrong.  Really, the purpose of this argument was never to explain
terminology.  I assumed everybody knew the basic terminology.

If you still need more references that maybe explain it better, just search
google for the three terms.  I am sure it will illustrate the same basic
concepts found everywhere else (this of course assumes you pick credible
sources, as which I which I define peer-reviewed scientific explanations).

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

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Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> The user has selected how he wants his layout.

  By the way, that's one thing where you are wrong.
  Almost 100% of users do not select nor configure any layout-related things
in their browser, usually because they don't know how to do it even if they
wanted to do so (which they don't, almost without exception).
  If the page has nothing of what you define as layout, the user will simply
view it with the browser default interpretation. That's not a user-made
decision, it's what the browser offers him, whether or not the user would
want to see it in another way. Even if some browser allow the user to
modify the default layout, most of the users (almost 100% of them) simply
don't bother.
  Since most browsers have almost the same defaults for pages not containing
what you consider layout, it's not in fact a user-decision to view the page
as it is shown, but it's actually a decision of the maker of the page.

  So "the user has selected" is simply not true. The maker of the page
made the selection in behalf of the user (in almost 100% of the cases).

> See, you do not know the terms.  i replied to Warp about this including a
> refernce explaining it.  It is "structure".

  If I say something like <p class=indented>, that's structure as well,
according to your definition. It's a new structure element, and how it
should be interpreted is specified in the CSS file. You can specify that
this new structure element should work like the regular <p>, but the text
should be indented for example by 4 characters.

  The default set of "structure" elements in HTML are not always enough
for everything you would want to do. The great thing about CSS is that
you can define new structure elements and how they should be interpreted
by the browser.

  Now, you are probably against this as well (just by principle if nothing
else). However, it wouldn't make too much sense. If HTML would have
an "indented paragraph" element by default, you wouldn't complain about it.
However, now that we have a way to create this kind of element, you complain
about it.
  IMHO it's a great thing that instead of cluttering the HTML spec with
more and more new element tags, they made a way for the user to create new
element tags. I still can't see why this is a bad thing.

-- 
#macro N(D)#if(D>99)cylinder{M()#local D=div(D,104);M().5,2pigment{rgb M()}}
N(D)#end#end#macro M()<mod(D,13)-6mod(div(D,13)8)-3,10>#end blob{
N(11117333955)N(4254934330)N(3900569407)N(7382340)N(3358)N(970)}//  - Warp -

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"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in message
news:3d73ec38@news.povray.org...
> In article <3d73e88c@news.povray.org> , "Pandora"
> <pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:
>
> > Sorry to blow your arguments about HTML = content over structure out of
the
> > water, Thorsten, but :
> >
> > "HTML has its roots in SGML which has always been a language for the
> > specification of structural markup." - W3C HTML 4.01 Specification,
section
> > 2.4.1.
>
> But in what way does it "blow [my] arguments"?  That is exactly what I am
> saying!  I never said  "content over structure", I say and said "content
> over layout".  And "layout" != "structure" as I explained a million times
by
> now.  So thanks for the quote, it is much better than the one I found and
> straight to the point!
>


    In my book, and it seems Warps book and Tims book also,
structure=layout=structure.

    Dictionary.com seem to agree with us too :

      lay·out   Pronunciation Key  (lout)
      n.
        1.. The act or an instance of laying out.
        2.. An arrangement or a plan, especially the schematic arrangement
of parts or areas
      (http://www.dictionary.com/search?q=layout)


struc·ture   Pronunciation Key  (strkchr)
n.
  1.. Something made up of a number of parts that are held or put together
in a particular way
  2.. The way in which parts are arranged or put together to form a whole;
makeup
  3.. The interrelation or arrangement of parts in a complex entity
(http://www.dictionary.com/search?q=structure)

They look pretty similar to me - they both talk about an arrangement of
parts to make up a whole...

I'd post excerpts from thesaurus.com too, but all I'm getting, atm, is "The
server encountered an unexpected condition which prevented it from
fulfilling the request." :(

--
Pandora/Scott Hill/[::O:M:C::]Scorpion
Software Engineer.
http://www.pandora-software.com

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"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in message
news:3d73ed6d@news.povray.org...
> In article <3d73eadf@news.povray.org> , "Pandora"
> <pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:
>
> >     Enlighten us Thorston, what are *your* definitions of "layout",
> > "structure" and "content" ?
>
> Try the one you can find everywhere else?  I gave references already, and
> you found another one.
>


    See my reply to your reply to that quote post of mine...

--
Pandora/Scott Hill/[::O:M:C::]Scorpion
Software Engineer.
http://www.pandora-software.com

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In article <3d73eadf@news.povray.org> , "Pandora" 
<pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:

>     Enlighten us Thorston, what are *your* definitions of "layout",
> "structure" and "content" ?

For your futher reference from a source you seem to believe is always right:

Structure
    <http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/Structure.html>
    <http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/#content-structure>

Layout
    <http://www.w3.org/People/howcome/TEB/www/hwl_th_11.html>
    <http://www.w3.org/Printing/fmtext.html#Intro>

Content:
    <http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/#content-structure>
    <http://www.w3.org/Conferences/WWW4/Panels/coolorcontent.html>


____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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In article <3d73ee80@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   If I say something like <p class=indented>, that's structure as well,
> according to your definition. It's a new structure element, and how it
> should be interpreted is specified in the CSS file.

No, that is a structure element with attached layout.  You change the
default layout with this, you do not change the default structure.

> You can specify that
> this new structure element should work like the regular <p>, but the text
> should be indented for example by 4 characters.

But you again miss the difference between structre and layout here.  Or
maybe the term used in the CSS specification is less controversial:
"presentation".  If you are more comfortable with this term than with
"layout", please assume that whenever I say "layout", I mean most (but not
all) that is covered by the term "presentation".  However, presentation also
says for example a bit more about text than just its layout, and that is not
what I want to imply.

>   The default set of "structure" elements in HTML are not always enough
> for everything you would want to do.

They are.  Even your example focuses on layout.  You just called it
"structure" but then in the same sentence mention indentation, which - as
you surely agree with me - is layout.

> If HTML would have
> an "indented paragraph" element by default, you wouldn't complain about it.
> However, now that we have a way to create this kind of element, you complain
> about it.

But indentation is _layout_.  How you indent information assumes _you_ have
a certain preference as a designer to convey something with indentation.
But what?  A quote?  Then you could use the blockquote tag, for example.

>   IMHO it's a great thing that instead of cluttering the HTML spec with
> more and more new element tags, they made a way for the user to create new
> element tags. I still can't see why this is a bad thing.

But in HTML you do not create new tags and specify their layout.  You do
that in XML or XHTMl for that matter...

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> No, you made a page without "structure".  I really expected you to know such
> an important difference!  Maybe you should attend a course about the topic
> or get a few good books.  You have a really big hole in your knowledge here!

  Is the <i> tag structure or layout? And <u>? How about the <em> tag?
If some of them are layout definitions and others not, why?

  Where do you draw the line between structure and layout? If you use
an <i>...</i> block, you are defining a special block of text (structure)
which should have a special layout (italic).
  All the layout elements are structure elements. The tags delimit pieces
of text, forming a new structure, which should usually be layouted in a
special way.

  Also there's another thing I don't really understand:

  Why the author of a page should have no right to define how his page
should look like? If you buy a book, you are getting completely and 100%
what the author of the book intended. If the author of the book felt that
some parts of the text should have a specific font in order to differentiate
it better from the rest of the text, he has the right to do that. If he
feels that's how his creation should be viewed and that's the best way of
viewing it, why shouldn't he have the right to do so?
  If the author of a web page feels that some keywords should be colored
differently from the rest of the text so that they can be distinguished
from the rest of the text, why shouldn't he do it?

  According to you he should not do it and thus people will be seeing those
keywords with the same color/font as the rest of the text, thus making it
more illegible than what the author would have wanted.

  Now read the above paragraph carefully once again and please explain me why
the author should not be able to do as he sees best.
  After all, it's his piece of work, and he should have the freedom to
choose how it should be best viewed so that the viewers would get what
the author wanted. If the author feels that he should emphasize some
elements of the text in order for the text to be more legible, that's not
only his right, but it's a good thing that he can do it.

-- 
#macro N(D)#if(D>99)cylinder{M()#local D=div(D,104);M().5,2pigment{rgb M()}}
N(D)#end#end#macro M()<mod(D,13)-6mod(div(D,13)8)-3,10>#end blob{
N(11117333955)N(4254934330)N(3900569407)N(7382340)N(3358)N(970)}//  - Warp -

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"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in message
news:3d73f0a0@news.povray.org...
> In article <3d73eadf@news.povray.org> , "Pandora"
> <pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:
>
> >     Enlighten us Thorston, what are *your* definitions of "layout",
> > "structure" and "content" ?
>
> For your futher reference from a source you seem to believe is always
right:
>


    Okay, for me the difference between what you seem call "layout" and
"structure" is one of a level of abstraction. You may have a structure tree,
thus :

Contents.
Section 1.
Section 2.
    Subsection 1.
    Subsection 2.
Section 3.

But, if we then take the down a level of abstraction we may get, something
like :

Contents.
    Content line 1.
    Content line 2.
    Content line 3.
Section 1.
    Column 1.
        Paragraph 1.
        Paragraph 2.
        ....
    Column 2.
        Paragraph 1.
        Image 1.
        Paragraph 2.
        Table 1.
        ....
and so on...

    So just where does "structure" stop and "layout" begin ? Are columns
"layout" or "structure" ? What about paragraphs ? or sentences ? What about
tables ?

--
Pandora/Scott Hill/[::O:M:C::]Scorpion
Software Engineer.
http://www.pandora-software.com

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In article <3d73ef78@news.povray.org> , "Pandora" 
<pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:

>     In my book, and it seems Warps book and Tims book also,
> structure=layout=structure.

No, if you look in a dictionary you should know that a dictionary will list
it as "synonym".  Obviously "structue" is not a synonym for "layout".

> They look pretty similar to me - they both talk about an arrangement of
> parts to make up a whole...

If they look too similar maybe you have problems understanding them.
Whatever your native language, I am sure you have exactly the same works
there too.  I would recommend to look them up in your native dictionary, I
assume it will be easier to understand.

Besides, you "overlooked" the important definition of layout in context:

3. Printing
a. The art or process of arranging printed or graphic matter on a page.
b. The overall design of a page, spread, or book, including elements such
   as page and type size, typeface, and the arrangement of titles and page
   numbers.
c. A page or set of pages marked to indicate this design.


Really, "layout" and "structure" are not the same, not even close.  I hope
the above quote explaining "layout" helps you understand the difference
compared to "structure" as you quoted it.


    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in message
news:3d73f71a@news.povray.org...
> In article <3d73ef78@news.povray.org> , "Pandora"
> <pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:
>
> >     In my book, and it seems Warps book and Tims book also,
> > structure=layout=structure.
>
> No, if you look in a dictionary you should know that a dictionary will
list
> it as "synonym".  Obviously "structue" is not a synonym for "layout".
>

    That's why I was planning to post excerpts from thesaurus.com!

> > They look pretty similar to me - they both talk about an arrangement of
> > parts to make up a whole...
>
> If they look too similar maybe you have problems understanding them.
> Whatever your native language, I am sure you have exactly the same works
> there too.  I would recommend to look them up in your native dictionary, I
> assume it will be easier to understand.
>

    YOU MIGHT WANT TO CHECK YOUR _FACTS_ BEFORE IMPLYING THAT I DON'T HAVE A
GOOD GRASP OF _MY NATIVE LANGUAGE_ !

    I was born in Wales, have been living in England for all but the first
6mths of my life and English _IS_ my native language. I think I've got a
pretty good grasp of the language over the 30yrs I've been on this planet.

    What's your native language ? Thorsten Froehlich doesn't sound like an
English name to me - and I see you have a german email address, I assume
you're, therefor, German and German is _your_ native language - maybe _you_
should be the one looking words up in _your_ native language.

> Besides, you "overlooked" the important definition of layout in context:
>
> 3. Printing
> a. The art or process of arranging printed or graphic matter on a page.
> b. The overall design of a page, spread, or book, including elements such
>    as page and type size, typeface, and the arrangement of titles and page
>    numbers.
> c. A page or set of pages marked to indicate this design.
>

    This does not invalidate anything I said, I just felt the excerpts I
quoted more clearly showed the similarity between layout and structure.
    How does "The overall design of a... ...book" not include _structure_ ?

>
> Really, "layout" and "structure" are not the same, not even close.  I hope
> the above quote explaining "layout" helps you understand the difference
> compared to "structure" as you quoted it.
>

    Yes they are - they're merely differing degrees of the same concept.

--
Pandora/Scott Hill/[::O:M:C::]Scorpion
Software Engineer.
http://www.pandora-software.com

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Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> 
> 11.1 "To minimize these problems, authors should use style sheets to control
> layout rather than tables."

Which strongly implies that use of a table constitutes "layout". 
Therefore, since you claim to be against authors having or exerting any 
control over a document's layout, you must want to rid the world of 
tables as well.

> Structure, structure. Layout! Structure is not layout! Blah blah blah!

Six of one is half a dozen of the other. You haven't got much of an 
argument if it depends on defining one thing as two different things as 
it suits your purpose.

> It would be absolute
> nonsense to prevent users from selecting layout as I detailed before.

I have never argued against that.

> users
> are allowed as much control over layout as they like, but with the broser
> providing defaults.  this is exactly how HTML used to work.

On which planet, Thorsten? Surely you don't mean Earth.

I have used many old browsers (and by old, I mean Mosaic 1-era.. they 
don't get much older than that). None of them gave the user any control 
over layout whatsoever. Most of them didn't give the user the ability to 
choose colors, fonts, font sizes and so forth.

By contrast, however, user stylesheets provide users a means to control 
nearly everything about the appearance of web pages.. far more so than 
any browser's preferences EVER did. And user stylesheets are a part of 
CSS. Is there some reason you can't understand this?

I find something else interesting: in this entire argument, you have 
acted as though you have some kind of inalienable right to see web pages 
however you choose, and that page authors should be required to make 
this as convenient as possible.

I haven't even touched on the opposite argument, which is this:

As the content creator, it is MY right to decide how my content is to be 
presented. If you want to see what I make, then you'll damn well use the 
software you need to do it. And if you're not willing to do that, then 
you can either suffer with poor page rendering, or you can do without my 
pages. Frankly, I think backwards people like you are screwing up the 
web for everyone, and even if I found it convenient to support your 
older software, I would be tempted not to, simply out of principle.

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it.

-Xplo

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In article <3d73ee80@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

> Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
>> The user has selected how he wants his layout.
>
>   By the way, that's one thing where you are wrong.
>   Almost 100% of users do not select nor configure any layout-related things
> in their browser, usually because they don't know how to do it even if they
> wanted to do so (which they don't, almost without exception).

Oh, I completely agree.  the usuability of currentb browsers is so bad that
users cannot easily change it.  However, as you pointed out, if it is
missing, browsers can just be updated with the ability to change this, but
contraty to enforcing stylesheets the difference would be that the content
will still display on all current browsers, just that users do not ahve any
more control than they have now.


In article <3d73f42c@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:

>   Is the <i> tag structure or layout? And <u>? How about the <em> tag?
> If some of them are layout definitions and others not, why?

Yes, the original HTML specification contained some layout tags.  If you are
able to find a copy of the 1995 edition (there is 2nd edition out now) of
"HTML for Fun and Profit".  The ISBN for the first edition is 0-13-359290-1.

In section 2.4 it explains the difference between what the author calls
"logical" and "physical" formatting.  The tags b,i,strike,tt are listed a
"physical" and the tags cite, code, dfn, em, kbd, key, samp, strong and var
are defined as "logical".

You also find a clear separation of the tags in section 9.2.1 and 15.2.1 in
the HTML 4.0 specification.  The ones referred to as "logical" formatting
above are in the section 9.2.1 "Structured text", while the ones listed as
having "physical" formatting are listed in section 15.2.1 "Font style
elements [...]"

>   Why the author of a page should have no right to define how his page
> should look like? If you buy a book, you are getting completely and 100%
> what the author of the book intended. If the author of the book felt that
> some parts of the text should have a specific font in order to differentiate
> it better from the rest of the text, he has the right to do that. If he
> feels that's how his creation should be viewed and that's the best way of
> viewing it, why shouldn't he have the right to do so?

Well, for the author of the book there is no way to not make that decision.
There is no alternative possible.  For the web there is this choice.  So why
should the author enforce more on the read than absolutely necessary if
he/she does not have to?

And keep in mind that many of the layout decisions in a book are not
actually made by the author but my the publisher.  the publisher will
usually determine the size of the book (its width and height), which in turn
defines the number of pages implicitly, just as one example.

On the web on the other hand the user defines the width and height of the
page because it is possible to delegate this choice to the user.  And it is
just possible to delegate the other choices possibel to the user.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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"Xplo Eristotle" <xpl### [at] infomagicnet> wrote in message
news:3d73fb58@news.povray.org...
> As the content creator, it is MY right to decide how my content is to be
> presented. If you want to see what I make, then you'll damn well use the
> software you need to do it. And if you're not willing to do that, then
> you can either suffer with poor page rendering, or you can do without my
> pages. Frankly, I think backwards people like you are screwing up the
> web for everyone, and even if I found it convenient to support your
> older software, I would be tempted not to, simply out of principle.
>
> Stick that in your pipe and smoke it.
>


    You tell him!

--
Pandora/Scott Hill/[::O:M:C::]Scorpion
Software Engineer.
http://www.pandora-software.com

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Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> They allow designers to destroy web pages with tons of bandwidth wasting
> clutter.  Try the current www.sun.com for example.  It is much better than
> the old one and works perfectly without stylesheets.  The only thing that
> looks not so nice is the graphics some stupid designer added assuming
> stylesheets are available everywhere.  So it is very possible to design a
> page that looks good without stylesheets, one just has to remove access to
> it from stupid designers who have no clue about information presentation.

I just visited www.sun.com and looked at the source code. They are using
a stylesheet, it's just an embedded one.

-Roz

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Warp wrote:
> Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> 
>>I said now a few hundred times that I do 
>>not want *************any************** layout.
> 
> 
>   Ok, I made a version of one of the pages with absolutely no layout:
> 
> http://www.students.tut.fi/~warp/povQandT/languageQandT_nolayout.html
> 
>   Now I see what you mean. It's a lot cleaner this way! A lot nicer to read.
>   Perhaps I should make all the pages like that.
> 

ROFL!

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In article <3d73f4a4@news.povray.org> , "Pandora" 
<pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:

>     So just where does "structure" stop and "layout" begin ? Are columns
> "layout" or "structure" ? What about paragraphs ? or sentences ? What about
> tables ?

Take this scene for example:

sphere
{
    0, 1
}

box
{
    3, 4
}

Now lets change its layout:

sphere { 0, 1 }

box { 3, 4 }

Or lets change the layout like this:

sphere {
 0, 1
}

box {
 3, 4
}

Changing the structure on the other hand (also in POV-Ray it does not matter
in this particular example, but imagine it in a CSG difference for example)
would be:

box
{
    3, 4
}

sphere
{
    0, 1
}


I assume you agree that the formatting, which is a form of layout (the
layout would include more, such as the font being used) is a matter or
personal preference.  My point is that in HTML documents I would like to
have the same choice of as I have in POV-Ray when I am writing a scene and
determine how its layout will be most readable for me.

NOTE: I am up only for the layout of the scene description language, the
scene that will be render in the example is meaningless and not point of my
argument.  So in that sense my example is not the ideal, i have to admit...

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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In article <3d73fb53$1@news.povray.org> , "Pandora" 
<pan### [at] pandora-softwarecom> wrote:

>     YOU MIGHT WANT TO CHECK YOUR _FACTS_ BEFORE IMPLYING THAT I DON'T HAVE A
> GOOD GRASP OF _MY NATIVE LANGUAGE_ !

No offense, just making sure!

>     What's your native language ? Thorsten Froehlich doesn't sound like an
> English name to me

See my signature.

> - and I see you have a german email address, I assume
> you're, therefor, German and German is _your_ native language - maybe _you_
> should be the one looking words up in _your_ native language.

Oh, I did.

I even got out my Latin dictionary to check for the meaning of the
"structura".  The common root of the word "structure" in English and the
word "Struktur" in German.

And "layout" made its what into the German language through printing, so
there is the word "Layout" take from English...

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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In article <3d73fb58@news.povray.org> , Xplo Eristotle <xpl### [at] infomagicnet>
wrote:

> Which strongly implies that use of a table constitutes "layout".
> Therefore, since you claim to be against authors having or exerting any
> control over a document's layout, you must want to rid the world of
> tables as well.

No, you have to read the whole long paragraph in the HTML 4.0 specification
that sits before the little passage that I quoted.

> Structure, structure. Layout! Structure is not layout! Blah blah blah!
>
> Six of one is half a dozen of the other. You haven't got much of an
> argument if it depends on defining one thing as two different things as
> it suits your purpose.

Well, if you insist that structure and layout are the same for you it is
pointless to argue with you.  You have to be able to comprehend the meaning
of words and their differences to be able to participate in an argument.

I am not going to bother arguing on a level as low as your interpretation of
clearly different words.  If you prefer arguing over the obvious, go to
kindergarten, it is the right place to do so.

As far as I am concerned, killfiles are useful...

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> Well, for the author of the book there is no way to not make that decision.
> There is no alternative possible.  For the web there is this choice.  So why
> should the author enforce more on the read than absolutely necessary if
> he/she does not have to?

  It's not about enforcing, it's about helping. That's the whole point.

  The author can feel that his text is more readable and easier to understand
if he, for example, makes some things look more prominent than others (eg.
by defining a special font and/or color).
  For example, it could be easier to find pieces of example code in a longer
page if these parts can be seen with a quick look (eg. because they are
colored in some way or there's another easy-to-see layout which makes them
prominent). If the text uses special keywords, a special formatting for
them helps the reader to distinguish them from regular text (the author
could even have an introductory page explaining what do the different
fonts/colors mean).
  Thus all these things can be used by the author to help the viewer to
read his work better and easier. (Yes, of course these things can be
misused, but what couldn't? You could perfectly misuse the <h1> tag and
put the whole content of the page inside it. However, the point is not
how these features can be misused, but how they can be used to help the
author and the reader. The fact that something *can* be used in the
wrong way doesn't mean it can't be used in the right way.)

  What you basically want is to take these tools away from the author.
You don't want to give the author any way of defining things in his own
way in order to help the reader.
  I don't agree with this.
  What you are proposing is that the responsibility of deciding what is
important and what is not, and how important things should be viewed, is
transferred from the author to the reader. However, there's a big problem
here: The author knows what is important in his own work, but the reader
doesn't. The author knows that some specific thing should be emphasized
so that it can be seen more easily and make the text easier to read, but
the reader can't know this beforehand.

  Moreover, the text could have different types of things, which should be
distinguished from each other (by the reader). For example in HTML we
have the <code> block, but only one; what if we want different types
of <code> blocks which are clearly differentiated from each other?
Even if the reader would know this and would want to make the difference
apparent, he couldn't do it! However, the author can.
  As I said before, the author can help the reader to understand his text
more easily. Taking away the tools to achieve this is not a good thing
in my opinion.

-- 
#macro N(D)#if(D>99)cylinder{M()#local D=div(D,104);M().5,2pigment{rgb M()}}
N(D)#end#end#macro M()<mod(D,13)-6mod(div(D,13)8)-3,10>#end blob{
N(11117333955)N(4254934330)N(3900569407)N(7382340)N(3358)N(970)}//  - Warp -

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