HTML 5 : Some thoughts

It all started with HTML 2, for normal people like us. With HTML 2 we could make nice webpages (to the standards of that era). Lots of information could be packed along with lots of images. But no real fun aspects could be included. The old style pages were for engineers and marketeers.
Then HTML 3.2 came along. Now, new properties were offered and apart from information and images, the door was opened for some more playful properties. If you used frames and tables, the sky was the limit and you could make wonderful webpages.

But the internet evolved into the digital playground it is nowadays. With HTML 4, still newer properties were included that allowed for movies to be played and flash images and sound fragments and shockwaves and virusses and whatever.
But all this wonderful HTML was getting very big and very complicated. Commonly it was refered to as 'tag soup'. So the W3C decided that it was time to bring in some structure. There would be a separation between form and function. The form was to be determined by the HTML language and the function was set in the CSS (Cascading Style Sheet).

Well, the eggheads in the W3C succeeded. The tagsoup of HTML was eradicated. And now we have Style-soup, from the CSS files and the fact that CSS and HTML may live in the same house, but seem to be living in seperate rooms. One of the books I am reading says: 'Using CSS is more and art than technique'. And that's all you can say about it. CSS is a black art. You can get things done with it, but it's mostly trial and error and you still need to perform dirty tricks. And CSS files tend to grow and grow. If the CSS is the solar system as we know it, current policy is to use the CSS to accurately define every molecule in our little version of the universe. CSS supplies over-control. Like the european union, who made a definition of a banana. Everybody knows what a banana is. But after you read the definition, the taste was different. It tasted like red tape. The W3C is our red tape supplier. All of the web is cast in red tape.
The newer W3C standards have become completely unworkable. XHTML is so very complex and complicated that it seems to be intended to be generated by very huge programs. Humans cannot create it (for more than a single webpage). And CSS can do EVERYTHING, but in an uncontrolled way. In short, XHTML and CSS (the future, for as much as W3C is involved) are a total mess. In many cases you need to revert to forbidden constructs just because the css-soup is so thick and the xhtml teller so flat that things just will not work.

A subcommittee of the W3C came with a solution: HTML 5. It has the goodies from older HTML versions plus some strong points that were in XHTML. And it allows CSS. It is very workable and can be composed by humans. Yet, the W3C seems to be reluctant (a case of NIH [Not Invented Here] perhaps? Large organisations with attitude tend to be real knights of NIH. Anyway, it's over the head of the W3C. I'm not sure if they understand this, however. Take a look at their definition of the HTML 5 standard... A 900 page document, explaining into detail how even the simplest of things is spelled and treated.
The W3C is dead. And so are it's inventions (XHTML cum suis). They just still don't understand it. Instead of painstakingly strictly documented standards, the world and the web need overall guidelines and some open structures. When Niklaus Wirth described his programming language Modula-2, he needed 28 pages (size A5). Still, Modula-2 is much more potent than any version of HTML will ever be.
And that's what we need now: a web standard that fits in 20 pages A4 and that can be understood by all. Without any red tape. Sack the W3C. They had their chance and blew it.

Currently I am reading books about the new standards. The involved books are:

Head first HTML with CSS and XHTML	This is 660 pages of very low density knowledge (averaged, per page). Still, the book supplies quite a lot of information in a very structured and interesting way. Still, the Z80 CPU Technical User manual supplied more knowledge in just 32 pages.
CSS; the missing manual	These 450 pages of information are about getting your feet wet witth style sheets. The information density of this book is 'normal'. A lot of knowledge is passed along, yet the only thing that gets clear is: the CSS is a total mess that can be used for everything except the kitchen sink.

That's 1100 pages of information in just two books and after having read it, the only conclusion is, that you can do nice things with the CSS. As long as you keep CSS as an abbreviation without any concrete meaning, it can be useful. Only a minor CSS file will add some structure to HTML.

CSS is short for 'Cascading Style Sheet'. A 'Cascade' is a waterfall. And that's just the impression you get from seeing a big CSS file. And just like in real life, a cascade is hard to navigate, if possible at all. If you chose your path not optimally, you'll drown. For sure. Yet, for people who invented CSS and XHTML the waterfall is what they want. Just like C++ is the waterfall of C. And all of those guys just adore C++ (which is quite clear if you read their products).
What we need though is not a waterfall of styles in which it is hard to navigate. What we need is modularity in styles. The Modular Style Sheet (MSS). When the CSS was invented, this was what people had in mind: modular styles that could be reused by many other styles. But then the chaos kicked in (under the flag of 'freedom for all through a plethora of guidelines') because the modularity was sacrificed for the sake of freedom of control.
You must be a programmer in Modula-2, Pascal or Oberon to understand what this means. Freedom is good, but not at all costs. In the west we have learned to live in freedom. The iraqis still don't fully understand the concept, so a democracy is too far fetched for them for the time being.
By keeping your style sheet compact and by relying upon inheritance, we can get a Modular Style Sheet that works FOR us and not against us. A huge CSS will give you absolute freedom in your little kingdom but you will be the only person in it. A small CSS will give you limited freedom, power and control. You cannot live in a country where everyone has absolute freedom, power and control. Everything is balanced.

I'm not in control for the web. Nobody is. Especially not the W3C (although they think they are). The web needs to be free. Guidelines are needed. But only few. The MSS would be one of them. A lean set of guidelines for constructing a CSS file. No need to change that name, just the content would do fine.
We'll be back on this somewhere in time.

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