> the browser wouldn't have to waste valuable time downloading
>the image.
That depends on how you represent the pie graph on disk. Nothing stops
you from putting the HTML and the pie graph in the same disk file.
Many web servers store ALL their content in one big database.
CGM could be a _very_ compact representation of a pie graph. GIF
isn't the only option.
> and with the appopriate tags, could
>offer almost as much flexibility.
But HTML is a language of common communications idioms. Here's an
idea: encode a pie chart data as an HTML table:
<table class="chart.pie">
<caption>MIT Employee Age Breakdown
<tr><th>age<th>percent
<tr><td>0-15<td>5
<tr><td>15-18<td>5
<tr><td>18-22<td>42
<tr><td>22-30<td>38
<tr><td>30-75<td>10
</table>
> Besides, if it was built into the HTML
>standard,
The above could be widely deployed as a convention among "smart browsers"
without wieghing down the standard.
Dan