Re: An Anchor attribute question:

Daniel W. Connolly ([email protected])
Thu, 02 Jun 1994 09:02:03 -0500

In message <[email protected]>, Michael Mealling writes:
>
>My example would be more like this:
>
>See <A URN="URN:IANA:IETF:rfc/822"> The Format for Internet Messages</A>
>for more information.
>
>
>I guess my question would be more along the lines of: is the HREF
>in your example required or optional?

According to the DTD, HREF is optional -- mostly because there's
no way to express in SGML the sentiment "either the NAME attribute
or the HREF attribute must be present."

>From the HTML spec:
http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/MarkUp/Elements/A.html
All attributes are optional, although one of NAME and HREF is necessary
for the anchor to be useful.

It's reasonable to change that to say:

All attributes are optional, although one of NAME, HREF, or URN is necessary
for the anchor to be useful.

Whereas in the near term, an A tag with a URN attribute
but no HREF attribute is useless to most of the community,
I suggest that you use the URN for the lasting name, but for the
benefit of existing clients, you include a redundant
HREF.

Dan