Coding with Jesse

This site is valid XHTML 1.1

That's right, I've updated this site so it is now valid XHTML 1.1. It was previously XHTML 1.0 Strict. So what did I have to change?

  1. I changed the DOCTYPE tag to:
    <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN"
    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/DTD/xhtml11.dtd">
  2. I had to remove the "lang" attribute from the <html> tag. Now, only the xml:lang attribute is allowed.

That's it! Not too bad at all. I was also looking at what's coming in XHTML 2.0. I really like what I see. The downside is that XHTML 2.0 will not be backwards-compatible. The upside is, from what I can tell, it won't be very difficult to port an XHTML 1.x page to XHTML 2.0.

It looks like most web pages will only need to worry about a few things like the elimination of the <img> tag (this won't matter to those using CSS to add images), and the replacement of h1-h6 tags with a single <h> tag. However, it seems that pages with lots of JavaScript forms will need to have a major rework: HTML forms are replaced with XForms, JavaScript Events with XML Events. I guess we'll need to wait and see what the final specification has to say.

Published on April 21st, 2005. © Jesse Skinner

About the author

Jesse Skinner Hi, I'm Jesse Skinner. I'm a web development coach focused on reducing developer burnout. I work with web development teams to reduce stress through automated testing and deployment, scalable infrastructure, and the modernization of painful legacy systems.

Through customized training and coaching, I empower teams to adopt new technologies to improve their workflows and make work more enjoyable. Feel free to email me. I'm eager to hear about your challenges and see how I can make your life easier.