LYNX-DEV Re: webwatch-l Question on HTML: http://www.ocnsignal.com

[gregory j. rosmaita]

aloha, kelly!

On Tue, 19 Nov 1996, Kelly Ford wrote:
> I wonder if someone who's more of an HTML expert can take a quick look at
> http://www.ocnsignal.com.  The site has many links that show up as just
> the word "link" but the HTML seems to have some specification for alt text
> to be shown, although it appears in a different format than I'm used to.
> I'd like a better understanding of what's happening before I write to them
> asking to correct things.

the problem is some seriously horrible HTML, not the least of which is
using table commands without first defining a table...

but to answer your question as to why the alt tags weren't being
generated by lynx, take a listen to the following:

        <TR><TD><FONT SIZE=+1><A HREF="amuse.shtml">
        <ALT="Fun 101">
        <IMG SRC="aimuse.jpg"></A></A></FONT></FONT>

which should be:

        <TR><TD><FONT SIZE=+1><A HREF="amuse.shtml">
        <IMG SRC="aimuse.jpg" ALT="Fun 101"></A></FONT></TD></TR>

in order to enable lynx to render the alt text...

the (main) problems?

1. the <ALT="Fun101"> is an invalid tag...  alt="" arguments belong in the
<img src=""> tag (or in the <APPLET > tag, but its too early in the
morning for _that_ kind of java!)

2. there is an extraneous </A>

3. either a table has to be defined or the <tr> and <td> tags need to be
removed...  and if you open a table row or table cell, you have to close
it, too...

so, if you move the alt="xxxx" arguments into the <IMG SRC="xxxx.jpg">
tags and remove the extra </A> tags, lynx renders the page intelligibly,
even if you don't fix the table structure...

if you want to take a look at an admittedly hurried and incomplete fix,
load:

        http://www.njin.net/caldwell/crap/ocnsignal.html

the document source for which you can use as the basis for your
suggestions... my suggestion is do not use the teleport PageEditor!

if you have any more questions or would like me to clean up my cleaned
page and write a note to ocnsignal, let me know, but you should be able to
do it using the comments and changes inserted into 
www.njin.net/caldwell/crap/ocnsignal.html

you can alos send them this excerpt from Doctor HTML's Report, 

--- begin text-image of DSR generated by http://www2.imagiware.com/RxHTML/
{snip}
                         Document Structure Report 
                                      
                                    Tag
                                 Name # of
                      Pairs Line # of Errors Comments
{snip}
     B 29 129 Found extra close B tags in this document. Please remove
                                   them.
   CENTER 8 157 157 157 157 157 157 157 Found extra close CENTER tags in
                     this document. Please remove them.
   FONT 22 159 Found extra open FONT tags in this document. Please remove
                                   them.
     156, 156, 156, 156, 156, 156, 156, 156, 158 Found extra close FONT
                 tags in this document. Please remove them.
                                    H1 1
                  Found only matching pairs of the H1 tag.
     H2 2 133 Found extra open H2 tags in this document. Please remove
                                   them.
     H3 3 129 Found extra close H3 tags in this document. Please remove
                                   them.
   I 4 97 Found extra close I tags in this document. Please remove them.
   P 1 152 Found extra open P tags in this document. Please remove them.
                                      
                                      
                         Table Structure Analysis 
                                      
             Table commands found outside of table structures!
     * Found TR commands on lines 30, 33, 36, 39, 42, 46, 133, 136, 139,
       142.
     * Found TD commands on lines 30, 33, 36, 39, 42, 46, 133, 136, 139,
       142.
{snip}       
--- end text-image of DSR generated by http://www2.imagiware.com/RxHTML/

or, better yet, tell them to run their page through a validator!
gregory.
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