Doctype quickie!

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  • CJM
    #1

    Doctype quickie!

    Are DOCTYPE statements case sensitive?

    I cant remember where, but I'm sure I read that case *does* matter...

    eg.
    <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"
    "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd>

    ....will work [ie trigger 'Standards mode'], but...

    <!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.01//en"
    "http://www.w3.org/tr/html4/strict.dtd>

    ...won't.

    Cheers

    Chris


    Tags: None
    • Steve Pugh
      #2
      Re: Doctype quickie!

      "CJM" <cjmwork@yahoo. co.uk> wrote:
      [color=blue]
      >Are DOCTYPE statements case sensitive?[/color]

      Parts of them are...

      The root element (i.e. the HTML) is case senstive in so far as the
      root element itself might be case sensitive. i.e. in XHTML the root
      element must be html because all element names in XHTML are lower
      case; but in HTML it makes no difference.

      The Formal Public Identifier (the part in quotes) is also case
      sensitive.

      If you include the URL then that's as case sensitive or insensitive as
      any other URL.

      As far as I'm aware the rest is not case sensitive.
      [color=blue]
      >I cant remember where, but I'm sure I read that case *does* matter...
      >
      >eg.
      ><!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"
      >"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd>
      >
      >...will work [ie trigger 'Standards mode'], but...
      >
      ><!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.01//en"
      >"http://www.w3.org/tr/html4/strict.dtd>
      >
      >..won't.[/color]

      That second one is wrong as the FPI should be uppercase as in the
      first example.

      Doctype sniffing is another matter as their we're dealing with
      browsers and their peculiarities rather than SGML/XML rules.

      Steve

      --
      "My theories appal you, my heresies outrage you,
      I never answer letters and you don't like my tie." - The Doctor

      Steve Pugh <steve@pugh.net > <http://steve.pugh.net/>

        Comment

        • Jukka K. Korpela
          #3
          Re: Doctype quickie!

          "CJM" <cjmwork@yahoo. co.uk> wrote:
          [color=blue]
          > Are DOCTYPE statements case sensitive?[/color]

          The part that is in quotation marks is case sensitive. The rest isn't.
          [color=blue]
          > I cant remember where, but I'm sure I read that case *does* matter...[/color]

          Well, I'm afraid the HTML specification doesn't tell you this, and various
          tutorials are even less informative. In principle, you are supposed to know
          this from SGML.
          [color=blue]
          > eg.
          > <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"
          > "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd>[/color]

          There's a missing quotation mark near the end. Otherwise, the incantation is
          correct.
          [color=blue]
          > ...will work [ie trigger 'Standards mode'], but...[/color]

          Umm... will be mishandled by browsers, which abuse it and make (wrong)
          guesses on author's intentions, completely missing the point of document
          type definitions.

          If they take SGML seriously, they do that just by accident, so what is
          _right_ by international standards is of little consequence here. But
          apparently wowsers accidentally treat the quoted strings as case sensitive -
          probably just because it's a little easier, or because nobody gave the issue
          a thought.
          [color=blue]
          > <!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.01//en"
          > "http://www.w3.org/tr/html4/strict.dtd>
          >
          > ..won't.[/color]

          It is malformed, since there is no catalogued DTD under the name
          "-//w3c//dtd html 4.01//en".

          --
          Yucca, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/
          Pages about Web authoring: http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/www.html

            Comment

            • CJM
              #4
              Re: Doctype quickie!

              Thanks for that...

              The problem is made worse for me because I'm developing in VS.NET; it has a
              hand feature, which asks you whether you want HTML tags and attributes in
              Uppercase/Lowercase/As Typed - I chose Lowercase to be forward-looking to
              XHTML.

              Unfortunately when I cut & paste my DOCTYPEs, it renders it ALL as
              lowercase...whi ch made for a bit of head-scratching when my pages were
              render in an unexpected way!

              Cheers

              CJM


                Comment

                • Anne van Kesteren
                  #5
                  Re: Doctype quickie!

                  CJM wrote:[color=blue]
                  > Thanks for that...
                  >
                  > The problem is made worse for me because I'm developing in VS.NET; it has a
                  > hand feature, which asks you whether you want HTML tags and attributes in
                  > Uppercase/Lowercase/As Typed - I chose Lowercase to be forward-looking to
                  > XHTML.[/color]

                  Are empty tags also rendered correctly: <br/>? Otherwise it doesn't make
                  much sense I think.
                  [color=blue]
                  > Unfortunately when I cut & paste my DOCTYPEs, it renders it ALL as
                  > lowercase...whi ch made for a bit of head-scratching when my pages were
                  > render in an unexpected way![/color]

                  E-mail the developers of that programm. The only thing I know about it,
                  is that it comes from MS, but maybe there is some option to add that
                  doctype later?
                  [color=blue]
                  > Cheers
                  >
                  > CJM
                  >
                  >[/color]


                  --
                  Anne van Kesteren
                  <http://www.annevankest eren.nl/>

                    Comment

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