Comments on: The Web Standards Project is wrong on SWFObject

By: LEE

LEE — Fri, 18 Aug 2006 16:34:08 +0000

I think MS is behind this in their secret subversive attempt to destroy the future of Flash…okay maybe not but seriously, I love SWF Object, and so do all my clients and users…I only wish I had more clients and users, sigh.

THX for the heads up, aral! Geoff’s article is the truth.

By: JD on EP

JD on EP — Fri, 18 Aug 2006 06:47:31 +0000

That ol’ EMBED tag…

That ol’ EMBED tag: I’ve been reading the standardista/flashista debate [[1], [2], [3], [4]]… I’m really uncomfortable, I like and respect both groups of people, even though we may not agree precisely on all issues. (Core issue: HTML 4.0 spec outl…

By: Olly

Olly — Thu, 17 Aug 2006 14:21:03 +0000

IIRC, embed wasn’t included because it doesn’t allow for fallback content (unlike object).

Of course it’s all a moot point, because IE cocked up their implementation of object and now everybody has to stay compatible with that…

By: aral

aral — Thu, 17 Aug 2006 11:01:54 +0000

Brandon, I couldn’t agree with you more and I’ll go one further: It seems like the Embed vs. Object matter has become something of a pissing contest for The Web Standards Project, reality be damned. Object is their darling but is *not* a standard. You can yell till you’re blue in the face but if something doesn’t work across the board, I wouldn’t call it a standard. On the other hand, there’s the perfectly valid Embed tag which, for some reason (The Web Standards history page doesn’t mention why) is the black sheep in the family even though it works in every browser. Hmm… so let’s see, Embed works the same way in every browser. Wow! Sounds pretty *standard* to me! So why, apart from ego, isn’t Embed written into the standard? Web standards and practicality should not be polar opposites if the movement is to have relevance.

By: Brandon Ellis

Brandon Ellis — Thu, 17 Aug 2006 03:02:56 +0000

“I’ve been through every line of SWFObject’s code and can state with confidence that while it obeys the letter of the W3C Recommendations, it totally disregards their spirit”

That is one lame sentence.

I’ve always been a huge voice for Web Standards because they work. But I think that using Javascript solutions to common web problems is perfectly acceptable. By writing code that renders mark up to that standard is completely in the spirit of WASP’s goals. Some of these WASP folks are the same people that wrote about ghetto css hacks a few years back but I didn’t hear anyone from WASP complaining about THAT disregarding the spirit. Truly amazing.