Posted by Neredbojias on 12/30/49 11:51

To further the education of mankind, Joel Shepherd
<joelshep@ix.netcom.com> vouchsafed:

>> Joel Shepherd wrote:
>> > The benefit (assuming the doctype is correct: it looks plausible)
>> > is that you can now pass the page source through a validator, which
>> > in turn will tell you whether your HTML is valid (i.e.,
>> > well-formed).
>>
>> Please don't confuse validity and well-formedness.
>
> Uh ... Yeah, that's a good point. I don't have a strict definition in
> front of me, but I believe it's reasonable to say that well-formedness
> includes points such as elements that require end tags, having end
> tags, proper nesting of elements, and proper key-value-separator
> syntax for attributes. It wouldn't include points such as specific
> element and attribute names, logical nesting rules (e.g., p can
> include span but not vice-versa), order and frequency of certain
> elements such as html, head and body, and so on. The latter go beyond
> well-formedness and are the province of the validator.
>
> Clearer?

Let me analogize. Well-formedness is a quality of body-shape and validity
is if she's married or not. However, when the former is more obviated than
the latter, some people just don't care.

--
Neredbojias
Infinity has its limits.

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