LYNX-DEV Re: HTML version support under Lynx

[Al Gilman]

  From: "Greg Chapman" <address@hidden>
  Subject: HTML version support under Lynx
  
  I wanted to find an answer rather quickly and am failing at it. In my
  crusade to make webmasters aware of the difficulties some browsers have
  with images and the needs of some users, I ask them to write text only
  pages. The uniform request from these webmasters is what version of HTML is
  fully supported by Lynx. Are there any other de facto standards supported?
  Special tags?
  
The NewsPost quoted at the end, here, gives a pretty good summary
of what the webmasters should pay attention to.  There is no HTML
version, DTD, or tag-type list that will guarantee that a page
looks tolerable in Lynx, any more than there is for Netscape or
InternetExplorer.

I would suggest that you not ask for text-only pages; IMHO it is
more win-win for the page authors to ensure that the text-only
display of the page tell a coherent story, and the right story.

One problem is that there is plenty of documentation giving good
advice in this department, but it is primarily honored in the
breach.  In the SMOP category, WebMasters can do something
about ensuring appropriate use of

        - USEMAP
        - ALT strings

independent of the original author.  In fact, if you really
want to do something for information accessibility, you would
write or cite example scripts that 

        - Generate USEMAPs from ISMAP data.
        - Generate ALT strings from the <TITLE> strings of
        the pages pointed to by hrefs where images are used 
        for link buttons.

In the areas of

        - Frames
        - Tables

One really has to get the original author, with the content
knowledge, involved in the test-and-fix cycle working through
the LynxMe viewer or some similar test facility.

--
Al Gilman
---------------------quote-----------------------------------
From: address@hidden (Ken Riley)
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.www.authoring.html
Subject: Bad HTML Okay for Lynx?
Date: 4 Jan 1997 05:30:35 GMT
Message-ID: <address@hidden>

There's been much, much discussion about writing HTML that renders
readably for Lynx browsers, and while I don't want to start the Lynx war
again, I just can't resist this one.

For an example of HTML that obviously wasn't checked with a graphical
browser (or a validator), have a look at "Al's Picks from Lynx Mail" at:

    http://www.access.digex.net/~asgilman/lynx/FAQ/

I would guess that this page displays just fine with Lynx; at least it
does with the Lynx viewers at:

    http://www.ccs.org/validate/  (a suite of validators)
    http://www.miranova.com/~steve/Lynx-View.html

But the author forgot a few </Hn> tags, so with a graphical browser, the
result is a mess.

It just goes to show that some authors who use Lynx don't check their
HTML with graphical browsers, just like some authors who use graphical
browsers don't check their HTML with Lynx.

But, graphical browsers users, we have less excuse than do users with
access to only a Lynx browser. We can use a viewer/simulator such as
those I listed above. It's a tad harder (impossible?) to simulate
graphical output with a Lynx browser.

Now please don't flame me, because if you read this post carefully,
you'll see that I'm not trying to take sides, just trying to reinforce
some of the good advice of the regulars, which I've summarized below:

1. Validate your pages. You can use the validation suite above to get to
the Kinder, Gentler Validator and WebTech's validator.

2. View your pages with more than one browser, if at all possible. For
graphical browser users with no access to Lynx, you can use the Lynx-Me
viewer available with the validation suite above, and/or the other Lynx
viewer referenced above.

3. Check your pages for backward compatibility issues. If you don't have
access to older browsers, you can use the compatibility viewer at:

    http://www.delorie.com/web/wpbcv.html

This viewer gives a graphical display, but lets you disable features. It
can be a real eye-opener. I had checked my tables with the Lynx viewers
and they weren't pretty, but were readable. They were a mess when I
viewed them with tables turned off with the backward compatibility
viewer.

If you do all of the above, you may find some problems that are easy to
fix, and others that you don't think warrant the effort. But if you
don't check your pages, you'll never even know you have a problem.

KLR (as Lynx-Friendly as I'll probably ever get)

-- 
Larry W. Virden                 INET: address@hidden
<URL:http://www.teraform.com/%7Elvirden/> <*> O- "We are all Kosh."
Unless explicitly stated to the contrary, nothing in this posting should 
be construed as representing my employer's opinions.
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