On Tue, Jun 3, 2008 at 7:34 PM, Platonides Platonides@gmail.com wrote:
No. Don't use html to set the difference, use a dedicated style. Should we use <font color="red" class="new"> for new links just in case they don't support CSS??
No, but where a semantic tag exists, it should be used rather than (or at least in addition to) the generic <div> or <span> or a class. This helps to ensure graceful fallback in non-CSS clients. When setting off text to convey additional information, a tag such as <em> or <strong> should be used.
Note that a significant part of the issue with non-CSS clients is clients like screen readers or text-only browsers, which would probably not support <font> any better.
New links are different for three reasons (in descending order of importance):
1) There's no appropriate semantic tag to use to distinguish them.
2) Fallback in the case of new links is more graceful. Users who can't see the coloring simply lose the added functionality without ever having to know about it. In the case of the current special pages setup, on the other hand, you lose the functionality but also get a nonsensical usage note which will only serve to confuse you.
3) There's an option to use a different display format that appends a question mark, which any client will be able to read.