Content Management Matters ™

The W3C, like, OWNS the Web, man.
Work continues there on drafting specifications for the next version of HTML, and the working group charged with this task has just released a new editor's draft detailing progress. While the process is far from finished, the new browsers are already recognizing some new elements of the updated standard, so we thought we'd take a look at how HTML 5 is shaping up.

Whether it's the Web API Working Group publishing a Working Draft of “Progress Events 1.0 or the CSS Working Group defining the syntax for using namespaces in CSS, have no doubt that the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has been hard at work trying to keep our dear web world in line.

About a month ago in an attempt to finalize the standards for the features of CSS 3 -- the third version of Cascading Style Sheets -- Jason Cranford Teague, a member of the W3C CSS Working Group and perhaps most notably the Director of Web Design for AOL Global Programming, posted an article on his blog covering the specifications for CSS Fonts and CSS Web Fonts and in the same quill stroke called for input from the design community.

Oh how we love the W3C. Such an exciting summer for all their working groups and recommendations, it's hard to believe that there is still work to do.

The W3C launched a new Web Applications (WebApps) Working Group, co-Chaired by Art Barstow (Nokia) and Charles McCathieNevile (Opera Software). The group combines the former Web APIs and Web Application Formats Working Groups and is focused on developing standard APIs for client-side Web Application development, including both documenting existing APIs such as XMLHttpRequest and developing new APIs in order to enable richer web applications. The group is a part of the Rich Client Activity.

Standards, standards and more standards...This time we bring you news from the W3C Web API Working Group. They have published their Working Draft of "Progress Events 1.0".

Progress Events are event types used to monitor the progress of an operation. If you develop applications using XMLHTTPRequest or Media Access Events, then you need to understand how the progress events are being defined.

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) Working Group has published the Candidate Recommendation of “CSS Namespaces Module.” This module defines the syntax for using namespaces in CSS and may have wide spread implications in the design world.

If you like to review W3C standards before they become official, here's one you need to take a close look at. The W3C Web API Working Group has published the Last Call Working Draft of "The XMLHttpRequest Object" specification.

It was about mid-December, just after Opera Software filed an antitrust lawsuit against Microsoft -- partly focused on Internet Explorer not following web standards -- that Microsoft finally came out and publicly announced their support for key web standards in version 8 of their prolific web browser.

With the recent release of IE8's first Beta the public can now finally find out for themselves just how well they have done that. What is even more interesting -- and perhaps a matter of debate -- is that they have done it in such a way as to not "Break the Web." Or in other words, they plan to deliver IE8 with backwards compatibility by introducing a controversial third operating mode.

The W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) realizes that the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 1.0) discouragement of Javascript does not work for developing accessible Rich Internet Applications. They do recognize the need to provide technologies to map controls, AJAX live regions, and events to accessibility APIs.

As a result, the Protocols and Formats Working Group has released the first set of Working Drafts of the ARIA - Accessible Rich Internet Applications suite.

Oh the semantic web. Such romantic and lofty notions are conjured up at even its mere mention. And now, how it sparkles so. I refer, of course, to SPARQL (pronounced "sparkle") the new query technology released by the World Wide Web Consortium (WC3).

Forrester has released a list of 10 reasons why Apple's iPhone is no friend to IT.

You can probably think of a few already: the prohibitive cost, the first-gen factor, and fidelity to AT&T.

Defining and reaching consensus on web standards is a daunting task indeed. Trying to get the entire internet community to concur on new standards may be best compared to the time honored cliche of “trying to herd cats”.

Every developer has their own ideas on the “right” way to do things, compounded by how the customer wants them done. Not to be ignored, is how the site visitors want the site to work. Everybody has their own vested interest.

Squiz is forever telling us what we should do and what we should think: about CMS, about SEO, doing business on the web, about the Four Noble Truths of the Buddha (it's a WIP). Which is quite irritating, because they're invariably just about right.

Spending a lot of time away from the office lately? Planning to impress with yer spanking new iPhone?

Well there’s good news for you dear reader. The W3C established Mobile Web Initiative has got you and all the standards you can swallow in mind. And they aim to lay plans both for bridging and filling the gaps between our disparate devices.

The boffins at the W3C, locked in their dank MIT dungeon, have nothing better to do with their time than rattle off paper after paper on new development protocols.

The more they put out, so it is said, the less Tim Berners-Lee flogs them.

The shift from linear storage of user input data to much more useful XML based storage (like DITA) is a trend which is becoming increasingly pronounced. Information written to an XML standard offers increased automation potential, reuse, and is altogether a far better bet than regularly formatted text.