Sorry, call me dense but I don't see how this is any more difficult to deal
with than the way that LI (for example) is used. Yes, A is specifically
excluded from appearing inside an anchor, while LI can appear inside a list
which is inside an LI, but that seems to me to be of no consequence.
>That was: regarding _SGML parsers_. A WWW client would either use a simpler
>method (deviating from them SGML standard), or clients would have to be
>SGML-aware. Both are undesirable consequences.
>
>Finally, not only WWW clients would have to figure out where the A element
>ends, but authors of HTML documents would have to do that, too.
Within the limits of my understanding, that would seem to be the case already
with LI and similar tags. I'm not so sure that having clients be SGML-aware
is undesirable, either.
A convention could be established that end-tag omission on an anchor is only
used when the anchor is defining a name, never when the anchor is defining a
hypertext link. Authors who violate this convention would get what they
deserve.
As it happens, this appears to be the de-facto state of affairs, at least so
far as WebMaker is concerned. If this is not to be the standard, then WebMaker
needs to be changed and any documents using this technique need to be cleaned
up.
Michael Johnson
Relay Technology, Inc.