I'm with Paul on this, it makes me very nervous too, but
not because it's HTML only.
My reason is that having CSS information in the
content means that you can never redesign the HTML style completely
or use CSS that don't have that class defined. I wonder if
the proposal should not be to remove this attribute from topics instead of
adding it to maps.
I'm aware this could cause issues with backward
compatibity, but it could prevent other issues for users down the
road.
Moreover, shouldn't most writers be completely ignorant of
the CSS definitions?
France
Baril
Documentation
Architect/Architecte documentaire
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Let's Talk XML
From: Erik Hennum [mailto:]
Sent: June 7, 2006 1:57 PM
To: Grosso, Paul
Cc:
Subject: RE: [dita] outputclass on map
elements
Hi, Paul:
To clarify, the outputclass attribute is available on the
topic elements in DITA 1.0. The attribute should have been provided on the DITA
map elements as well -- hence the bug fix.
The outputclass attribute
really fills a role similar to the DocBook role attribute. Where the output
format has a concept of class or role (as with HTML), the outputclass can be
copied into the output, but its primary purpose is to provide informal semantic
extension rather than stuff names into the HTML class attribute.
The
attribute could have a better name.
Erik
Hennum
'
src="gif00020.gif" width=16>"Grosso, Paul"
<>
"Grosso, Paul"
<>
06/07/2006 07:24 AM
To
<>
cc
Subject
RE: [dita] outputclass on map
elements
It makes me nervous to embed HTML-only stuff in the
DITA model.
How
do you propose to treat this attribute for print/pdf output? How do you propose
to write up this attribute in the spec in an output-independent fashion that
still remains useful?
paul
From: Erik Hennum [mailto:]
Sent: Tuesday, 2006 June 06
17:01
To:
Subject: [dita] outputclass on map
elements
Hi, Esteemed Technical Committee:
The 1.1 bug list
(http://wiki.oasis-open.org/dita/Bug_fixes_for_DITA_1%2e1#preview) has an item that never received final disposition -- adding the
outputclass attribute to the map elements (<map>, <topicref>,
<navref>, <anchor>, and <reltable>):
http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/dita/200602/msg00082.html
To recap, the outputclass attribute assigns an informal role to
an element. As such, outputclass is quite useful for extending the semantic
without formal specialization. For instance, you can use outputclass to mock up
a specialization in the base document type or to create handles for custom
processing. Typical output processing for HTML copies the outputclass into the
class attribute so users can create custom CSS styling.
Currently,
outputclass is only available on topic elements and not on map elements. As a
result, you can't easily mock up a map specialization or provide handles for
custom map processing.
The main implication of map outputclass for the
base output processing would seem to be to collect the outputclass values for
the topicref and provide them on the outermost wrapper of the HTML content for
the topic. The latter enhancement would let users style a topic in CSS based on
the role played by a topic within a map.
The outputclass attribute is
close to being a universal attribute -- it applies to a similarly large list of
elements and merits similar treatment. I'd like to request that we finalize this
bug fix at the next meeting.
Thanks,
Erik
Hennum
