b and i

Jelks Cabaniss jelks at jelks.nu
Sat May 15 02:09:35 EDT 2004


John Gruber wrote:
>> As to whether bold and italics are inherently presentational and have
>> no place in semantic XHTML, I'll submit the example of <br />.  By a
>> certain logic, <br /> is purely presentational as well, and doesn't
>> do anything that styled paragraphs can't.  Until you want to write
>> poetry. 
> 
> I'd argue that `br` is not merely presentational. It can be used
> for purely presentational purposes, but it can also be used as a
> sort of punctuation.

Agreed.  While `<line>` (or `<l>`) might be better for, well, lines, `<br/>`
is what we have to work with now.  And lines of poetry or addresses, while
obviously presentational, are IMO primarily *semantic* lines.   The
presentational comes from the semantic, not the other way around.  (Well,
except when it doesn't.  Like with ransom notes and Joe's First Homepage...
:)


/Jelks



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