Re: <FIG> implies <P>?

Daniel W. Connolly (connolly@beach.w3.org)
Wed, 12 Jul 1995 18:31:40 -0400


In message <Pine.3.87.9507121444.A26501-0100000@novice.uwaterloo.ca>, Ka-Ping Y
ee writes:
>
>It doesn't make sense to me that figures should break paragraphs. This
>behaviour is disagreeable to me, and also makes <FIG> operate distinctly
>differently from <IMG> which it was supposed to replace.
>
>But i might just be missing the obvious.
>Is there a solid rationale for this?

I just had a discussion with Dave Raggett about this... <FIG> is
meant to compliment, not replace, <IMG>. There's a lot of history
behind the current spec. Some of it is technical, but some of it
is political stuff that I won't go into.

Suffice it to say that HTML 3.0, like many other markup languages,
includes two idioms for graphics: the <img> element for phrase-level
stuff, like little funny characters or inline icons (or inline
math formulas or ...) and <fig> for "displayed formulas" or graphic
callouts or ... .

The fact that the functionality of <img> doesn't include things
like client-side image maps and other consequences of using an ALT
attribute rather than content (e.g.

<image src="xxx">alternative <em>nifty</em>stuff</image>

) is an unfortunate consequence of some historical decisions.

Dan