Graphics, Visualization, and Usability Center

HTML Comments

Comment 0: The hardest part was figuring out how to get the "gn" server to present inline images. after that, the rest was easy.

Comment 1: I have tried to use forms, and the forms are the easy part. I have not yet found where to put my support programs. I can not get a submit to cause any action.

Comment 2: What's HTML stand for? ;->

Comment 3: I would like a beginner user's manual and an advanced user manual both with more examples.

Comment 4: Its my job to know :)

Comment 5: I like HTML. I can't wait to get clients that support HTML+.

Comment 6: Forms : Have not tried yet, but principle looks easy.

Comment 7: Getting the server to execute scripts was the hard part for FORMS and even more for ISMAP. The NCSA httpd docs are as difficult to find anything in as are Mosaic's

Comment 8: I'm still not sure what HTML I should be using - HTML, HTML+, etc. and which browsers support what. I want my pages to be readable by a variety of browsers. However I only have Mosaic, and I'm not even sure I'm aware of all the things _that_ supports!

Comment 9: is difficult since it implies writing a server capable of understanding co-ordinates. I haven't done this, my estimate is based on how difficult it looks compared to other services which I have implemented. I have written plexus modules which generate HTML, as well as static HTML docs.

Comment 10: Learning html is easiest in the traditional manner - find a page with the desired feature and look at the html that generated it. Virtually all my pages were written mostly by example; more recently I have studied the documentation in more detail and learnt a few new things,

Comment 11: Whether HTML is an ISO standard or not is a sneaky question. It's an SGML DTD and of course SGML is an ISO standard, but as HTML seems to be competing (very successfully) against HyTime, I wouldn't class it as an ISO standard in it's own right.

Comment 12: I do know that HTML is loosely based on SGML which is an ISO standard as I understand it, but HTML does not completely map to SGML.

Comment 13: As with any WWW doc - it gets harder to find thing every day. News and hours of Web'ing is the only way.

Comment 14: No questions asked about "fitness", "stability", "evident shortcomings", etc. of HTML?

Comment 15: so, is it an iso standard?

Comment 16: would have done some forms by now if I had a better grasp of C and some more time!

Comment 17: Would be interesting to know user's previous exposure to SGML from this form.

Comment 18: Getting HTML to really be an SGML has been difficult. HTML is not really an ISO standard, because it isn't mentioned specifically in any standard, but SGML is a standard, and HTML sure pretends to be SGML, even though there are problems.

Comment 19: HTML+.doc is hard to find :-)

Comment 20: HTML is very easy to use. An editor might be nice, but I find typing in the code a LOT quicker than point-and-click when it comes to typing things.

Comment 21: You could have asked: what other text markup languages have you used? e.g. troff, tex, wordstar, etc.

Comment 22: I really wouldn't call HTML a language, even if SGML and HTML have "language" in their names. Do people who use word processors have to learn a language in order to understand italics, boldface, and such? Probably not, and the only real difference between HTML and those word processors is styling and a few extra tags that are unique to WWW (so far as I know), such as , hyperlinks, and so on.

Comment 23: I don't know if HTML is an approved standard, but I sure hope not! While simple, it is not what you would call elegant. Then again, I don't agree w/ SGML's goal of total seperation of content and format (markup).

Comment 24: HTML usage is still too uncoordinated. I'm pursuing multiple vendors with SGML products to provide a complete HTML solution. So far, this has met with limited success.

Comment 25: HTMLis a bit, but not so much kludgy

Comment 26: The central "info.cern.ch" is a bit difficult to reach from my site. When I am ready to do some more work in WWW, I have to wait until info.cern.ch is ready to give me the documents I need. I usually have to wait until night-time to get to the documents.

Comment 27: While I've indicated learning HTML was easy, learning the subtleties of it's use was not. The relations between what is in the spec and what is currently implemented is often unclearly documented, as are things such as the role of white space and paragraph breaks. On the whole, though, I am pleased with the bulk of CERN's documentation.

Comment 28: The most frustrating part of learning HTML was trying to edit it by hand - I would prefer a WYSIWYG interface, but the closest thing to that I have found is Framemaker to HTML and I don't want the overhead of that.

Comment 29: As a formatting language, it sucks. It would be really nice if it extended an existing language like TeX. I see too many people re-inventing the wheel by making ad-hoc extensions to html. I'd flush it if I could.

Comment 30: HTML tools are evolving... a really good Mac based HTML editor would solve all of My problems with the environment. I plan to learn the forms support at some future date when MacMosaic supports forms

Comment 31: 4-6 languages, although I don't know any of them *well.* :-) And lots of years of experience that don't really count, since it's just a hobby for me, although I started at age 9 or 10. I've only taken a few formal CS classes.

Comment 32: Examples needed of all HTML features

Comment 33: After looking over the HTML+ specs, I think there will probably be demand for an HTML++ to be even more flexible layout-wise. The tradeoff against simplicity would be steep, so the new tags ought only to add things, not break older HTML and HTML+ documents. Besides it should be possible to write simple HTML++ documents without being familiar with all HTML++ tags, specs, etc.

Comment 34: I'm more interested now in translators and tools to make HTML document *maintenance* easy.

Comment 35: I knew SGML very well when I learned about the Web.

Comment 36: Haven't had a chance to generate an HTML document. Planning on it though!

Comment 37: An HTML editor would be nice, and would make a great "literate programming" environment.

Comment 38: ISO Standard indeed! It is not clear what documentation one should evaluate. I have read three, an informal page that was trivial to understand but very incomplete, some doc at either cern or ncsa (hey, who remember that kind of trivialities) which easy, and a complete incompehansible SGML document type defintion.

Comment 39: Understanding ISmap is not difficult - but building a detailed map is a pain in the butt. Form filled in using a Lynx client

Comment 40: hsdasdjkfhdfjkhfdjkhdfjhsdfjsdfhjdshjfhjhdfdhdhdfhdfhjdfhjdfhjdfhjdhjdfhhjfdhjfdhjkdfshjkfdkhjdfdfhjfdshjdhjk

Comment 41: Boy do I want a "toolkit" based HTML layout tool for X. :-)

Comment 42: The HTML Primer, URL Primer, and Forms tutorial at NCSA are about all I've needed. I also grabbed the (dow defunct) HTML RFC from CERN.

Comment 43: I did have trouble finding info on commenting. Mosaic's implementation of the sgml comments seems to be broken. the only sgml spec I could find says comments start with . However Mosaic is ending them with just >, which prevents commenting out html tags.

Comment 44: HTML Documentation: Wouldn't mind having an index to search through to answer any questions I have, though, admittedly I haven't searched for one thoroughly.

Comment 45: The HTML links in lynx's help menu are VERY convenient

Comment 46: It would be nice to have canonical lists of what HTML is supported by each browser. I stumbled across this summer with EXPO, and
and
certainly aren't well publicized. Of course everyone is waiting for the other guy to write a WYSIWYG HTML editor.... -benJ

Comment 47: I am eagerly looking forward to HTML+ particularly for tables.

Comment 48: Where did you get-question: Difficult to answer with such an excellent worldwide system :-)

Comment 49: Eagerly awaiting an HTML descended language with a DTD for full SGML compatability ... (what do you expect from a technical author? ;-)

Comment 50: I did'nt do much of HTML programming

Comment 51: I don't really program in HTML for real. I just decided to pick up a little to be able to understand what was going on with all this Hypertext stuff. I may think it easier than it really is.

Comment 52: the essential point is FILE VIEW SOURCE ... ....

Comment 53: Having written a number of programs to parse formatted text into HTML I find HTML extremely easy to use - however I think this is so because of it's small number of functions. It is important not to overextend it, cluttering up what is at the moment a particularly easy `language'.

Comment 54: NCSA's "How to" docs were just what I needed to get started with Forms and ISMAP. Many of us learn by example, and these docs were/are great. HTML is not too hard, and the easy part is that I can "steal" the "source" for any document by using Mosaic or other WWW browser (Viola, etc.). It is surprising how many people have begun writing HTML(+), even though the specs are not 100% finished, and that there are surprisingly few HTML editors at this point.

Comment 55: I don't know forms or ismap (YET). I have not yet needed them. In the future however, I anticipate that it is not going to be a problem.

Comment 56: I am answering the questions for retrieving HTML information based on what I did a year ago. There is much better information available now. The key shortcoming is that there is no WYSIWIG HTML editor available for UNIX or the PC. I offered to write one for NCSA, but they said no.

Comment 57: I am answering the questions for retrieving HTML information based on what I did a year ago. There is much better information available now. The key shortcoming is that there is no WYSIWIG HTML editor available for UNIX or the PC. I offered to write one for NCSA, but they said no.

Comment 58: So far I have only copied other peoples' html to create my own.

Comment 59: There is a great need for a good html multimedia editor to compose documents. Something along the lines of Andrew Message System ez editing system...

Comment 60: I have a strong SGML background, so HTML was trivial for me.

Comment 61: Mainly write simple html documents, so learning html was simple as I only required to do simple things !

Comment 62: This may not be entirely appropriate for this survey, but, I feel that HTML is missing the ability to format text with tabs! ie:have tabulated data in a pleasing font.

Comment 63: Would like better user interaction (.html specified control character actions, etc.) Would like better page layout capabilities

Comment 64: I intend on using HTML but haven't gotten the time yet. Now, I wonder if I should fill out this survey again after I've tried HTML. (Sure would be nice if this field auto wrapped!)

Comment 65: I'm anxious to see HTML expanded to support in-line mathematical symbols and broken-out equations.

Comment 66: HTML is too limited. I would like to use it for displaying equations without embedding them as images. a TeX-like approach to equations would be ideal. Also, the formatting options are too limited for many of my uses! Is the HTML documentation on the mosaic menu bar up-to the minute?

Comment 67: HTML was easy to pick up since I had been an SGML user. And there's plenty of documentation around, but it's unclear about status and versions.

Comment 68: I'm not sure I KNOW HTML as much as I know what I use!

Comment 69: Questions above are not the best. What does it mean to know html? I am pretty good at writing html, but there are still things I don't know how to do. Also, while learning ismaps was not extremely difficult. I hate the way it was done. There are too many files to keep track of. I would like to see the map data (definition of rectangles, etc) in the html file itself and document determination done on the client side. The ismap idea is good, but I really dislike the implementation.

Comment 70: You seem to have already found the big problem. Current documentation is VERY difficult to find. I need more than just the "beginners guide" but more is hard to find.

Comment 71: Haven't done too much yet, and let others find most of the documentation for me. But after working with TeX and the like, HTML isn't too difficult.

Comment 72: Not obvious who is controlling the HTML specification or how to influence it. Otherwise, HTML is very easy to handle (I'm very familiar with both TeX and troff though so my opinion may be very skewed!)

Comment 73: HTML has limited value for me (a technical publisher): I need a hypertext markup language that runs under Mosaic on the WWW and that can deal with the extended ASCII set (i.e. math and symbol characters).

Comment 74: Tutorial HTML documentation is good. The only reference document seems to be the DTD, which is opaque for people who don't have an intimate knowledge of SGML. (For instance, I know what SGML is and does and was able to figure out certain HTML features from the DTD, but others to whom I've shown the DTD and don't know SGML have a hard time first trying to understand the point of SGML and then how to use this DTD document to determine what a correct HTML format is. A good document which details all the possible sections and tags with what the options are and what they do is needed.

Comment 75: I have not been able to find HTML+ documentation, which I would like to have. Also, more info on standard HTML (e.g. required tags that I have heard of)

Comment 76: A comment (already submitted survey answers & so don't want to duplicate) --- it would have been nice to see questions about which of the extensions to HTML in the current HTML+ draft are most important to the community (i.e., which of typed fields in forms, figures, tables, and proper head fields with LINKs is actually most important to the community at large). Good data on this would give browser authors desperately needed guidance. As it is, this is basically just a survey on the available tutorial material (and specifically, the quality thereof), which is much less useful.

Comment 77: Is implementing a WYSIWYG editor that hard?

Comment 78: hmmm...SGML is an ISO standard so I guess that does make HTML an ISO standard.... I guess it depends on ISO. It's an INTERNET standard, though....

Comment 79: Documentation always lags, although NCSA has done a much better job than CERN in my opinion.

Comment 80: Now, finding a complete list of special characters (and not just those with accents) is harder...

Comment 81: please make more forms style examples available, also those interfaces which access things like `xclock' remotely.

Comment 82: Finding the Up-to-date stuff was the tricky stuff. An list of all tags mosaic understand would be very handy.

Comment 83: I use the cut-and-paste model for writing HTML docs. Sure would prefer a WYSIWYG editor, though.

Comment 84: Haven't got that much practical experience. Not an advanced user of HTML. It seems easy to learn.

Comment 85: The question about how many hours it took to learn HTML doesn't have clear answers. Do you want a number of hours or a easy/hardess rating?

Comment 86: Don't know where there is a full html command summary - don't known how freq. the language gets extended, but haven't hunted for such info recently.

Comment 87: I found that the best way to learn HTML was to look at the source for pages that I found particularly interesting.

Comment 88: Any individual aspect of html is trivial. Finding out all of the options and getting decent performance, layout and appearance is harder. Forms are harder still since they have been changing and they interact more with the local system organization.

Comment 89: For me, the best way to learn HTML was to browse the source of many documents that had the structure that I wanted. I didn't care that much about the documentation.

Comment 90: Mostly I used the ability to view others documents sources as a guide to doing what I wanted to do

Comment 91: Some of the docs are easy. The ISMap docs are very hard to find and use, as are the htaccess docs

Comment 92: HTML isn't specifically an ISO standard, but SGML, which HTML is based upon, is an ISO standard, so it's hard to say...;-)

Comment 93: Access control was hardest - need to get round http stuff too.

Comment 94: Re: HTML & learning curve; I really think highly of SETEXT as the way to generate html. It should be enhanced for forms, etc. I feel like I am alone in this, but it sure makes html more extensible because documents can be "hyper-ized" on the fly but remain readable in their primary form. Re: up-to-date documentation; in Tim B-L's seminal paper on the Web, he mentions future use of RCS-like provisions not only for sending deltas of updated documents, but also so the user is assisted in aware- ness of updates to important (to them) documents. E.g. can see what the diffs are and don't have to figure it out the hard way -- retrieving dynamic document several times a week just to see if there were any changes & if so, try to figure out what and when they occurred.

Comment 95: I wouldn't classify HTML as a programming language. It's not 'hard' to learn how to use, it just takes time to remember all the styles. It's much harder to use a programming language to development HTML tools.

Comment 96: I have not been able to find current documentation for all markups, e.g.
is not in the draft rfc or ncsa intro docs

Comment 97: Hypertext is great, but it would be nice to have a paper document you can sit down and read as well. I really learned by copying others' pages and making changes. That, plus the interactive queries to the other users at my university.

Comment 98: HTML needs more support for mixed font styles (or maybe the problem is Mosaic) I want to be able to have fonts be big, bold, and italic at the same time. It also needs better support for text justification than having to use
    until I get my text centered.

    Comment 99: html is a good start - it lacks many directives

    Comment 100: ... running out of ideas for comments...

    Comment 101: If you use emacs' html mode, there's no need to learn the syntax of html.

    Comment 102: usenet groups are were a large source of info.

    Comment 103: I only have done one very simple toy example for myself. If my department sets up a server, I will do more.

    Comment 104: The organiztion of the HTML docs was not the most obvious. But then again a good way to organize such information is not immediately clear Being able to access individual directives commands is good, but there should also exist a page dedicated what people are going to use often with links to the full explanations of commands. Also some of the explanations left me wanting of fuller specification Again, writing documentation is difficult.

    Comment 105: We also have local people who have been using HTML for months. They have given tutorials, which have helped a lot.

    Comment 106: Actually, I don't know that I have seen the up to the minute HTML documentation, but the beauty of HTML is that it is not neccessary to. Excepting the possibility of sweeping changes in the framework of HTML, only a very basic understanding of the language is needed to produce any document that 99% of the WWW users will ever need to make. Bravo!

    Comment 107: HTML docs are not up-to-date, nor do all browsers understand all tags.

    Comment 108: I would prefer a Postscript version of the HTML documentation which I could consult off line. I would permit me to write HTML documents at home. Now I have to print all the on-line screens etc!!

    Comment 109: It was a very good idea if someone will develop a graphic-based editor for user who don't understand HTML syntax. Just like a word processor but that generate HTML documents. Sorry for my pitty english...

    Comment 110: The documentation at CERN is divided into chapters placed into a tree-like structure of menus. A flat document with a table of contents referencing #name's would be more usable.

    Comment 111: I did ismap with httpd. Just when I got it running a new version of http came out and the reading of the coordiates was different. rather than do the whole thing again for the new version I have not bothered to upgrade. I don't want the hassle of making changes then discovering they might not work.

    Comment 112: Html is easy, BUT lot of stuffs on the doc is "not yet implemented", so you try and fail ... Html must be a subclass of Sgml. Translators html2sgml and vice-versa must exist. I need a real editor : incorporated in Mosaic ? Thanks a lot again for that tool.

    Comment 113: There would be an explosive growth in the capabilities and usefulness of HTML if A) There were a mechanism similar to TeX's \special or MIDI's device specific escapes and 2) Someone coordinated a place for people to publish what they have done with the specials. The truly impressive things that developed could be added as "common extensions" if they could not be resolved against the SGML standard. If such a thing already exists in HTML, I have not run accross it. I have seen several sites "break" HTML in order to customize their local webbing. RjS

    Comment 114: HTML was quite natural to pick up, though I would have preferred the example documents and documentation in general to be more consistent on capitalization and tag position (

    on new line, at end of para, etc.). Consistency would make it quicker to recognize and learn.

    Comment 115: Seems like the HTML documentation could use a better index. My general complaint about the documentation is that, unlike a good reference book, you can't just flip to a table of contents or index to look up specific topics quickly. I ended up writing an HTML page of my own with pointers to the better documentation pages as a sort of impromptu table of contents.

    Comment 116: The quality of the current HTML descriptor set is not very high. A major overhaul is needed in my strong opinion to make it more of a mark-up LANGuage rather than a Mock-Up set.

    Comment 117: basic html is surprisingly easy. I haven't tried the forms, but will in near future. Reading the source code to anothers document helps in learning new features.

    Comment 118: What do you mean by 'minute HTML' ? Never used SGML, but I have read about it.

    Comment 119: Should as whether people use these features as well as whether they understand them.

    Comment 120: I was familiar with IBM's DCF/GML.

    Comment 121: I interpret the last question as "Had I used SGML before HTML"? I have not, nor have I used any SGML languages other than HTML.

    Comment 122: I was able to pick up on HTML quite rapidly because I was using an Emacs package which automatically inserted various constructs for me. A big plus.

    Comment 123: Since we don't have HTTP I haven't explored ISMAP. Forms, I'd like to learn, though

    Comment 124: Learning HTML is not too difficult - I have not yet got to grips with ISMAP or FORMS as I am still trying to come to terms with installing the NCSA server. (to be honest, part of the difficulty is in getting the time to sit down and go through it and the other part is in understanding the installation documentation

    Comment 125: I hope to use HTML in the near future, but it's a mystery to me right now.

    Comment 126: I want COLORS, formatted TABLES and the ability to switch to other fonts, especially SYMBOL & ZAPF DINGBATS (which are usualy available on every X11R5, Win3.1 and Mac). (most missed things - there are more :-)

    Comment 127: HTML seems to have a lot of redundant SGML vestiges. In Mosaic, many of the tags seem to give the same end result: address, blockquote, pre, etc, -JMax

    Comment 128: As you can tell, I've only worked on a token HTML page with the basics.

    Comment 129: I learned html from looking at the physics server at Brown University. A professor in the physics department helped me get started and then I set up a site for the Geology Department. My programming background is weak since I stopped after getting a macintosh in the eight grade. Prior to that I used basic and pascal. I started using html and latex around the same time when we bought an SGI for our lab. The only thing that I find difficult about html is getting a few lines of text to appear to the right of a picture.

    Comment 130: Here's my guess: SGML is an ISO standard, but HTML per se is not. Perhaps since it's a subset of SGML it would be by inheritance. I wonder what the answer is to this question.

    Comment 131: Basic HTML is very simple and easy to use. ISMAP, and FORMS have been a problem mostly because of lack of communication with the sysadmin (and no direct access to the httpd).

    Comment 132: HTML is too oriented towards scientific/professional papers, with all those headers and subheaders etc.... I'd love to be able to use more general formatting, text along side images, multi-columns, etc... I know it's work, it's quite usable...

    Comment 133: It would be nice to have an "Advanced Users/Authors guide". Also tables would be very good to include.

    Comment 134: I am disappointed that some features, such as support for columns, and wrap of text around imbedded images, are not present. The linkage to externals was the most difficult part to understand/find details about.

    Comment 135: The found that the biggest help in learning HTML has been to save a page to disk when I come across a page on the Web with interesting formatting and then study the HTML code in the documents.

    Comment 136: I'm just starting to write my own HTML stuff. I hope to have a server going soon.

    Comment 137: HTML is an SGML, so I have used SGML before obviously. However, before HTML, I never usewd an SGML.

    Comment 138: In typical style, the HTML pages I have written have been largely the skeletons of other pages hacked to bits. I have spent very little (shamefully little ;) time with the docs. Intend to though.

    Comment 139: Still needs alot of work in some areas of formatting and functionality, but standardization is a bitch, eh?

    Comment 140: The hardest part I found with HTML was when I wanted to do something (like tables) which HTML couldn't do. The most time was spent finding out that HTML couldn't do that, then finding out an alternative method.

    Comment 141: There always seems to be some "latest feature" that is not documented anywhere. But I guess that is to be expected at this stage of the game.

    Comment 142: HTML is based on SGML, an ISO standard. HTML online documentation is poorly organized. NCSA's is an improvement over Cern's.

    Comment 143: The availability of html-mode.el and the "View Source" made it easy. e.g. I will use the source of these forms as guides for survey-style forms of my own

    Comment 144: Only very basic use of HTML so-far.

    Comment 145: I *really* need an interactive, cut+paste, WYSIWYG HTML editor. Ideally embedded within Mosaic, and allowing me to cut+paste from the visual representation of other HTML documents. I *can* write in HTML, but I don't want to *have* to.

    Comment 146: I am not yet an experienced HTML user, so my ease of learning may not reflect my eventual experiences.

    Comment 147: HTML is a remarkable step backwards given what SGML already offers. HTML should have been a true subset of SGML, not some intermediate between SGML and text which compromises expandability and features. I'm sorry HTML is so damn popular these days. It will take years to get past the limitations of HTML, which really didn't need to be there with some foresight. Sigh...

    Comment 148: It is easy to simple things with HTML, but there doesn't seem to be much information on how to do more complicated formatting, such as dealing with issues of alignment of text/images, adjusting the font size and font type, etc. A list of "these features aren't available under html" would be quite useful

    Comment 149: HTML is severely lacking a tables facility. Most effort has been spent trying to figure out a way of doing them.

    Comment 150: Have looked at document source to discover how to use.

    Comment 151: need WYSIWIG authoring tools

    Comment 152: But I have used Digital's SDML

    Comment 153: I KNOW ismap, but I've never used it yet.

    Comment 154: would be nice to have some kind of table layout

    Comment 155: Howdy James!

    Comment 156: Know some basics about SGML, and markup languages (e.g. trof user); therefore HTML was not much of a hurdle, though I don't claim to know it well, and have not as yet learned forms capability.

    Comment 157: I don't know FORMS and ismap *yet*.

    Comment 158: maybe should ask about future capabilities; HTML+ etc.?

    Comment 159: Spent many hours learning IBM's SCRIPT/VS; so html was an easy extension; otherwise it would have been harder. Would prefer to do most authoring in WYSIWYG; use html only for automatically generated materials.

    Comment 160: Almost transparent!

    Comment 161: It's impossible to format nice tables. I often wish for this or that feature from TeX (i.e.: \mbox)

    Comment 162: test - sorry see mail from

    Comment 163: HTML is wonderful. However I would like some additional simple tools which would allow me to create HTML documents more easily that using vi. It should be relatively str4aightfoprward to do. I heard that tkWWW could do it but cannot get it to run!

    Comment 164: I have been amazed to find how easy this stuff is to pick up. I guess I should try a form. I am curious about the form the feedback takes. Caching and charging...

    Comment 165: where can i find more information on html and writing html docs?

    Comment 166: I'm not sure what the difference is between HTML docs from NCSA and Mosaic is :-) HTML docs give the syntax but don't seem to cover things like , etc very well

    Comment 167: Finding an HTML definition that looks complete and up to date is pretty much impossible; I just go with what works with Mosaic in the hope that that will mean a fair percentage of my hypothetical readers will be able to make sense of it all... The HTML specs I last read doesn't even say how to treat multiple spaces (Mosaic does the right thing, www didn't last time I bothered to try it). Given that Knuth managed to come up with the right solution several decades ago, this is kind of annoying.

    Comment 168: I found HTML a very forgiving 'language', It generally works with any garbage you give it! It would have helped to have the resource documents for the language in the same directory at NCSA Ie, the spec doc should have been with, or told where to get, the reference doc.

    Comment 169: HTML needs expanding to be really usefull. IBM Bookmaster/Bookmanager is a good example of how far GML type systems can be taken - I find the range of tags in HTML somewhat limited by comparison.

    Comment 170: I found it very similar to LaTeX (which I've used a lot) and Scribe. So it was easy to pick up. I began by copying existing docs.

    Comment 171: I would be interested in learning more on how to create various FORMS/documents.

    Comment 172: I would be interested in learning more on how to create various FORMS/documents.

    Comment 173: asking people how many computer languages they know doesn't really tell you anything. a long time ago, people used all kinds of languages, assemblers, etc. now, that's not true anymore.

    Comment 174: FYI, I've written an SGML to HTML conversion routine in C. I like both the spirit and the implementation of HTML for Mosaic. I'd like to see more formatting capability though.

    Comment 175: Needs a WSIWYG editor

    Comment 176: Forms and ISMAP are on my List Of Things To Do. (Forms more than ISMAP -- I don't have an immediate use for ISMAP yet)

    Comment 177: Most of the pain of learning HTML and FORMS was due to the difficulty of finding documentation. Wish O'Reilly would bring out a book!

    Comment 178: I didn't realise that the things missing in html docs. were stuff to do with sgml.

    Comment 179: html is really ugly. dammit.

    Comment 180: I had difficulty finding information on FORMs from Mosaic.

    Comment 181: Using HTML with a plain text editor is a step back into "ancient" times. Therefore a wysiwyg editor is necessary. The gathering of all tools assembling a full mosaic/html/http environment needs expertise. You won't find many people or organistations which can afford to install and maintain all this stuff. HTML is no progress (same applies to SGML), it only reflects a minimal consensus between word processing applications. This layer shall be hidden to the end-user. Even if I'm a moderate experienced expert with skills in programming and software design I don't like to go into details which have been solved by my favorite PC (MAC) since 1986. Therefore: - build an easy to install and maintain Mosaic - provide an easy way to convert from textprocessors to html (without installing lisp etc.) I like mosaic and I appreciate all the work done , we have to ensure that this effort will result in a wide use.

    Comment 182: Some features are not explained very well. For instance how do you setup an HTML anchor for a finger request.

    Comment 183: Getting the same version of Mosaic on all platforms (UNIX, DOS/WINDOWS and Mac, is very important!

    Comment 184: You don't ask, but it's also immensely helpful that there are a large number of good examples out there that you can easily inspect.

    Comment 185: Of course, the main reason that the HTML info was so easy to find is that xmosaic's Help window points to the relevant pages. Nice work, folks!

    Comment 186: There are many HTML commands that are not documented in Web resources (example BR,HR,etc). It seems to me that there should be a well-known definitive resource for HTML.

    Comment 187: What is SGML?

    Comment 188: The information at curia.ucc.ie is probably the most up to date.

    Comment 189: I wish I could do columns, i.e., icon(text) so that more choices can appear in the initial window (without scrolling). The only way I have found is to use preformatted symbology and lining things up is a problem.

    Comment 190: There is a desperate need for a better word-processor for HTML.

    Comment 191: The HTML dopcumentation I found was ok, but it was into SMGL. I did not really care about the differences fo the two. All I wanted was a quick reference to HTML so I could get something up and running.

    Comment 192: Some tags defined in HTML+ (not in HTML) is supported only by NCSA Mosaic. Should I use such tags in documents on our server?

    Comment 193: Heard the lan. was cake to learn. Will try it this summer

    Comment 194: When will there be an HTML editor for X/UNIX? :-{)

    Comment 195: Finding the docs was too hard and there was not enough detail. I feel like there must be better docs out there but I can't find them.

    Comment 196: I am a very rude beginner at HTML but plan to use the simlpler implimentations in coursework. Someday may like to use the graphics mapping functions .

    Comment 197: While I have not used SGML I have used other markup languages, and since HTML is pretty minimal it was easy to pick up. That would probably be my complaint against HTML, however; it needs to be more powerful, with standard methods for some presentation control, for instance.

    Comment 198: I'd like to see some more formatting constructs

    Comment 199: Disclaimer: I use Mosaic frequently, but I haven't written any HTML docs in a while. I know about HTML+, but I have no experience using the new features.

    Comment 200: As I checked the help pages out, I foudn that they hade changed significantly since last time.... To the better I might add...

    Comment 201: As I checked the help pages out, I foudn that they hade changed significantly since last time.... To the better I might add...

    Comment 202: The hard part was learning to create "search engines" to work with forms.

    Comment 203: SGML is the devil's work, as far as conventional text processing is concerned!

    Comment 204: I'm answering the FORMS and ISMAP questions assuming you mean "how hard is it to write HTML+ with a form in it", not "how hard is it to set up a server to actually understand and do something useful with a form".

    Comment 205: Hopefully, HTML can become a standard like SGML.

    Comment 206: I am eagerly awaiting HTML+ I really want a CONCISE and COMPLETE HTML reference. I've had to look at two or three documents to find everything I wanted.

    Comment 207: I'm still looking for the documentation on extended html (forms, pointing in pictures).

    Comment 208: Question two is ambiguous. It asks "how many hours did it take," but it also contains easy/moderate/hard labels (which don't necessarily correspond to the number of hours it took to learn html). Are the extra labels there by mistake?

    Comment 209: Quaestions are too vague - for example, I have "learned" HTML well enough to create docs very quickly, but I have barely begun to learn HTML in a fuller sense of forms and image maps. So my response is based on my current learning level and might be quite different once I get more advanced.

    Comment 210:

    Comment 211: Need some more advanced documentation, and documentation in bigger chunks -- often takes too many clicks to get answer

    Comment 212: The world, moving fast, use to be beyond your front door. Now the net is in your home... sigh

    Comment 213: Need more formatting extensiions! Give us centering. Give us the ability to put paragraphe NEXT to in-line GIFs so we can caption them. Keep doing the fantastic job you're doing!

    Comment 214: What documentation there is, is OK, but not comprehensive. One can start using HTML quickly, but I expect I've just scratched the surface of the capabilities and find the lack of a definitive and complete documenation unfortunate. It is particually unfortunate that so much HTML document exists only in hypertext form. A linearized (printed and indexed) reference would be invaluable.

    Comment 215: With some additional features to HTML and at least fastening FORMS-output one could use this in a much more general framework, e.g. in developing user-interfaces for almost all kinds of software systems.

    Comment 216: The View Source funcion in Mosaic is wonderful! - I only uses the NCSA help to complement this...

    Comment 217: I never used HTML, where to get documantation about it? still to Mosaic: It is very annoying when you have to use the mouse all the time for deleting characters.

    Comment 218: I wanna see 'Whole description of HTML'... NCSA httpd's document and internet-drafts document helps little to me.... Should I learn SGML ?

    Comment 219: Hey, what's this survey for?

    Comment 220: I'd like more features with html...

    Comment 221: Using LaTeX HTML was not too hard too learn.