Any comments?
----- Forwarded message from "Mahesh T. Pai" paivakil@vsnl.net -----
Date: Wed, 9 Jun 2004 23:46:31 +0530 From: "Mahesh T. Pai" paivakil@vsnl.net Subject: please comply with standards To: contmngr-sfio@sb.nic.in Message-ID: 20040609181631.GA5348@nandini.home
Dear Sir(s),
This has reference to the home page of th Serious Fraud Investigation Office, (http://www.sfio.nic.in/).
The bottom of your page mentions that ``Site optimised for 800 X 600 monitor resolution, java enabled, IE 4.0 or above.''
I feel that as an institution which has to interact with the public it is most improper of you to `optimise' your pages for a browser for a particular operating system. Firstly, it is in no way, `optimisation'. You are simply using public funds for carrying advertisement for a particular company.
You ought be aware that the users of the world wide web use diverse operating systems and browsers. In order to make things easier for both developers and users of the internet, the W3C consortium (World Wide Web Consortium) has laid down certain standards for web pages; and it would have been appropriate for you to conform to those standards.
Also, you will appreciate that the Internet is a useful medium for people with disabilities to communicate with the outside world, and compliance with the W3C standards automatically ensures that people with disabilities can access your site (for example, using a screen reader). You will appreciate that as an organ of the government, and an organisation discharging Sovereign functions, you have to adhere to certain standards of fairness and propriety.
In fact, on verification of your site, except for minor variations which affect accessibility for the visually disabled, the pages are by and large compliant to the W3C standard. What, then, is the objective of recommending use of a specific browser?
I hope that you will understand the issue in its proper perspective, and ensure that your pages fully conform to W3C standards and further, remove references to specific brands of browsers.
Hoping early compliance with this request,
Thanking You, Sincerely Yours,
Mahesh T. Pai, Advocate, `Nandini', SRM Road, Cochin - 682018. Kerala State.
----- End forwarded message -----
Mahesh T. Pai wrote:
The bottom of your page mentions that ``Site optimised for 800 X 600 monitor resolution, java enabled, IE 4.0 or above.''
Probably they meant, "has been tested using" where they said "optimized for". Because I don't run my monitor on 800x600, have java, or use IE, but I can get around the site quite comfortably.
particular operating system. Firstly, it is in no way, `optimisation'. You are simply using public funds for carrying advertisement for a particular company.
Yes, they are being quite evil, considering the technologies they are advertising.
You ought be aware that the users of the world wide web use diverse operating systems and browsers. In order to make things easier for both developers and users of the internet, the W3C consortium (World Wide Web Consortium) has laid down certain standards for web pages; and it would have been appropriate for you to conform to those standards.
Also, you will appreciate that the Internet is a useful medium for people with disabilities to communicate with the outside world, and compliance with the W3C standards automatically ensures that people with disabilities can access your site (for example, using a screen reader). You will appreciate that as an organ of the government, and an organisation discharging Sovereign functions, you have to adhere to certain standards of fairness and propriety.
This is where I have a problem. W3C standards compliance does not necessarily imply ease of use, accessibility or anything like that. You can find plenty of well formed markup, fully standards compliant websites that are absolutely horrendous to use. And no, I am not going to give an example.
Not like any of the sites I am responsible for fail to comply to W3C style and markup specifications, but there are a great deal of websites that don't validate, but still look and work just fine across a wide spectrum of browsers on varying platforms. Google, for instance. There are equally competent groups that work outside the realm of the W3C [ http://whatwg.org/ ] involved in coming up with standards themselves that work at a (hopefully higher) different pace than the W3C and more in tune with rate of evolution of browser technology. There is no real point to any of this, except, compliance with W3C doesn't automatically make it "good" and lack of compliance doesn't make it "bad".
I hope that you will understand the issue in its proper perspective, and ensure that your pages fully conform to W3C standards and further, remove references to specific brands of browsers.
Of course. Ads for specific proprietary technology are totally unacceptable. It's just, for what it's worth, some slightly offset css positioning (when not viewed in IE) and the evil ad apart, this site is quite clean and navigable.
Harish
Harish Narayanan said on Wed, Jun 09, 2004 at 06:29:28PM -0400,:
Probably they meant, "has been tested using" where they said
We lawyers have a saying to the effect that we cannot go about breaking open peoples' heads to find that what they intend. We need to gather intentions from words acts and deeds.
for". Because I don't run my monitor on 800x600, have java, or use IE, but I can get around the site quite comfortably.
My mail has nothing to do with resolution. It has every thing to do with following sensible standards.
And I use larger fonts here, so that I can read from a distance of three feet from the monitor. At that size this page, and almost every page hosted by nic, looks ugly.
And javascript removes control from my hands. I want only one window open at a time; and have twenty or thirty tabs open in Mozilla firefox at a time. It is irritating when a page opens in a new window. I have disabled permission for pages to open new windows.
This is where I have a problem. W3C standards compliance does not necessarily imply ease of use, accessibility or anything like that.
W3C standards is not merely HTML 4.01. It goes much beyond that. W3C has standards for CSS. CSS prescribes standards for visual and aural styles.
can find plenty of well formed markup, fully standards compliant websites that are absolutely horrendous to use.
That is a human error. For example, look at the fsf.org.in pages. They are W3C html compliant. But use tables to control layout. That is deprecated by the W3C. W3C recommends that people use stylesheets to control layout, and suggests that tables be used to display data. FSF's pages pass the html 4.01 `strict' dtd when run through W3C's HTMLtidy; but, the trouble comes when people with disabilities try to use them.
are equally competent groups that work outside the realm of the W3C [ http://whatwg.org/ ] involved in coming up with standards themselves
Thanks for this info. I need to look into that organisation.
that work at a (hopefully higher) different pace than the W3C and
But would this lead to multiplicity of standards?
in tune with rate of evolution of browser technology. There is no real point to any of this, except, compliance with W3C doesn't automatically make it "good" and lack of compliance doesn't make it "bad".
Of course. Ads for specific proprietary technology are totally unacceptable. It's just, for what it's worth, some slightly offset css positioning (when not viewed in IE) and the evil ad apart, this site is quite clean and navigable.
My _main_ issue is that the NIC's pages carry a message which either deliberately or unwittingly misleading; and the layman will think that other browsers are not supported.
With footers like this, when you try _selling_ non-M$ software; the first question you will face is `whether it will display foo.gov.in or bar.nic.in pages, because NIC says that their pages are optimised for eyeeee browsers'.
Got the point?
Mahesh T. Pai wrote:
We lawyers have a saying to the effect that we cannot go about breaking open peoples' heads to find that what they intend. We need to gather intentions from words acts and deeds.
And technologists _needn't_ be the most articulate. Unfortunately, that's just the way it can be. The rest of the world will have to deal with it.
And javascript removes control from my hands. I want only one window open at a time; and have twenty or thirty tabs open in Mozilla firefox at a time. It is irritating when a page opens in a new window. I have disabled permission for pages to open new windows.
Java and JavaScript are in no way related. Java is an object oriented programming language created at Sun Microsystems. JavaScript is an object oriented scripting language commonly used in websites. It was originally developed by Netscape.
This is where I have a problem. W3C standards compliance does not necessarily imply ease of use, accessibility or anything like that.
W3C standards is not merely HTML 4.01. It goes much beyond that. W3C has standards for CSS. CSS prescribes standards for visual and aural styles.
I didn't say HTML or any other specific standard. I said "standards compliance". I repeat, you can find W3C and other standards compliant ((X)HTML, CSS, 508, aaa ...) sites that are absolutely horrendous to use.
That is a human error. For example, look at the fsf.org.in pages. They are W3C html compliant. But use tables to control layout. That is deprecated by the W3C. W3C recommends that people use stylesheets to control layout, and suggests that tables be used to display data. FSF's pages pass the html 4.01 `strict' dtd when run through W3C's HTMLtidy; but, the trouble comes when people with disabilities try to use them.
Explain to me how css based positioning is easier on people with disabilities than table based positioning. Unless you're suggesting everyone (with vision or other problems) strip every site of all its design, and replace it with a custom stylesheet with huge fonts and extremely contrasted colours. Overriding the site intended aesthetics is the only place where I can see relative positioning and relative font sizes winning over hard coded tables. But technically, there is nothing preventing something similar being done for tables also.
But would this lead to multiplicity of standards?
Standards are good and important and we all know that. And yes, multiplicity is not good. It's just, when the people who are really responsible for the technology have needs not always met by the standards or when the standards body fails to keep up with current technology I fail to see the point of those standards. Eventually, through a survival of the fittest scheme, the relevant one will survive.
A tidbit related the whatwg site I linked in the last reply.
"Another reason for working outside the W3C could be the rift between Mozilla/Opera and other W3C members over what technologies Web applications solutions such be based on: Mozilla/Opera favour a backwards-compatible HTML-based standard, others are looking towards to XForms and SVG. It will be interesting to see if any other browser developers jump on board WHATWG."
Got the point?
Of course I did. All I was trying to say is, chide them for the obnoxious ad, or how inconsiderate they seemingly are to people with disabilities (or those that run much larger font sizes than they originally intended). Don't make this about "standards compliant". Because they can very well be (W3C) standards compliant and still be "evil" in all those respects you seem to find wrong with them.
My point in all of this being, a good site is a good site, and a bad one's bad. A fully standards compliant one has a better probability of being good, that's all. Breaking something small (for instance XHTML fails to validate on <br> but is fine with <br />) is not always a horrendous crime, considering the standards and current technology (and the people behind them) needn't always be in sync.
Harish
On Wed, 2004-06-09 at 23:47, Mahesh T. Pai wrote:
Any comments?
This is one important activity that can be carried out by us. Several public websites that are doing otherwise good work otherwise falter here. It is our duty to inform them and get it corrected. This can be an explicit scouting agenda for our volunteers.
Nagarjuna
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Harish Narayanan -
Mahesh T. Pai -
Nagarjuna G.