Re: An open challenge: HTML 4.0 tables

Subject: Re: An open challenge: HTML 4.0 tables
From: Paul Prescod <papresco@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 1997 12:48:29 -0400
Stephen J. Tinney wrote:
> This raises a question that has been on my mind for a while.  When I
> first heard about DSSSL I (naively) assumed that here was a tool that
> would allow one to make many different kinds of output with a single
> style sheet, perhaps just by specifying a different output type on
> the command line.

That's what Jade does.

> It seems that most people do not use it this way; does anybody?  Are there
> any evolving best strategies for making a style sheet that can generate
> html or rtf or tex with no changes to source or style sheet?

The last two, yes. The former, no. HTML does not support the concepts of
the other DSSSL back-ends -- things like page-number, math, proper
margins and so forth do not translate properly into HTML as interpreted
by today's browsers. Even ignoring SGML and DSSSL, getting Netscape and
Internet Explorer to consistently indent something properly is a
challenge!

 Paul Prescod

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