Gabriel Wicke wrote: I'd like to be able to specify a specific large font size via something like <span style="font-size:36px"> &#643; </span> on the page about that character (in the example, the esh character, which is part of IPA), or to set one of the other font properties on a page about say, font properties in CSS, like <span style="color:red"> this is red text </span> <span style="color:blue"> and this is blue text </span> which is the "correct" way to do it, as <font> tags have been deprecated in HTML since 1997 (7 years!), as are things like <big> and <center>, and yet these deprecated tags seem to be how such formatting is done on Wikipedia right now. http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-html40-970708/appendix/changes.html (note this is the oldest spec in which <font> and <center> are deprecated, not the most recent version) In fact, I would argue that Wikipedia policy should be towards compliance with standards, and <font> and <center> tags should NOT be allowed, as they are deprecated from the HTML spec (and not permitted at all in XHTML). Furthermore, we can already do stuff like this using <div> tags, but each time the style changes it makes a new paragraph. While I wholeheartedly agree that we need more robust system-wide stylesheets, but when we do, the correct way to apply such styles would be via a <span> tag, as in <span class="styleXYZ"> Text in that style </span> or whatever. Perhaps there should be a wiki markup for <span> tags, but there isn't one yet. We already allow non-wiki formatting via <div> and <center> and <font>, and since <span> tags are the correct way to do things that we now do via <font> tags, I don't see the harm in allowing <span> tags. - David [[User:Nohat]]

Whoops: <rend tipa "c\'atura\.nga"/> Peter

Kelly Anderson wrote: <snip> This is not entirely true. It is perfectly legitimate and idiomatic HTML to have a SPAN tag with style="<<<CSS>>>", especially if you don't have access to the style sheet (which we Wikipedia contributors don't). FONT tags, however, are deprecated from HTML, and we should not encourage their use. Until there are style sheets with styles for everything, the only _correct_ way to sepcify styles is in DIV and SPAN tags. I'm not entirely sure why I'm getting so much resistance. It is true that in an ideal world, all HTML tags would be generated from the Wiki syntax. But the Wiki syntax isn't sufficient in its current form. Accordingly, we already allow <font> tags, they're all over the Wikipedia, AND they're deprecated from HTML. At least <span> tags aren't deprecated. What exactly is the problem with changing from the status quo to the status quo plus allowing <span> tags? - David

Timwi wrote: Well, on the pages that have statistics tables, like the countries, languages, etc, there are portions where the font size is enlarged or decreased or the font color is changed using a FONT tag. See: * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Countries * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Language_Template * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Elements * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_U.S._States * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Universities etc. Now I'd be the first to argue that there need to be a consistent set of styles for styling tables like these. However, such styles aren't available and each WikiProject has devised its own method for styling tables attractively, generally using FONT tags. But I have run into FONT tags all over the place, probably inserted by well-meaning contributors who didn't know how to do the wiki-styling they wanted. Either FONT tags should be banned, or SPAN tags should be permitted. (Or all FONT tags should be changed to SPAN tags). -- David

Kelly Anderson wrote: You know what the "C" stands for in "CSS"? The whole purpose of CSS is that the user can override, with his own stylesheet, the style sheet supplied by the site.... How that is done in practice is a different matter.... Rob -- Rob W.W. Hooft || rob(a)hooft.net || http://www.hooft.net/people/rob/

On Sunday 01 February 2004 22:12, David Friedland wrote: Why is that important? These tags are easier to use. If major browsers drop support for them, we could easily convert them to respective span tags. I think that Wikipedia policy should be towards ease of use. Font and center tags are de facto standard. This is an interesting feature, and I don't see why should span tags not be added to the whitelist, though I think that there should be declared a policy of consistence and that span tags must not be used instead font and center. Perhaps a third type of Wiki markup (after [[]] and {{}}) could be introduced for such purposes: <<color=red>> <<size=24>> (or, even better, <<size=huge>>) <<left>>, <<right>>, <<center>> <<style=definition>> Perhaps all tags could close with simple <</>>, I haven't seen it elsewhere but don't see why it would be a problem.