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Re: LYNX-DEV lynx on www.microsoft.com


From: Foteos Macrides
Subject: Re: LYNX-DEV lynx on www.microsoft.com
Date: Fri, 02 May 1997 22:04:46 -0500 (EST)

Laura Eaves <address@hidden> wrote:
>> Date: Fri, 2 May 1997 17:28:33 -0500 (CDT)
>> From: Klaus Weide <address@hidden>
>>...
>> By the way (not related to comment parsing) that page is a good example of
                                               ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> why I decided not to enable Fote's mods for suppressing numbering of links
   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> that cannot be selected because there is not anchor text.  Without those
   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> numbers shown, there is no indication that the user is missing something
>> even after he/she has managed to overcome the comment problem.  When the
>> numbers are shown (of course this requires that "Links are numbered" is
>> set), there is a hint and the user can then try to follow a link by number
>> or invoke the LIST screen.
>
>I agree these links should be numbered.  I've actually seen several pages
 ^^^^^^^
>with unselectable links (links with no highlighted text).  The only way I
>know they are there is by the [numer] -- and the only way to select them is
>ty typing the number.
>
>Since the parsing error recovery went in, some of these "invisible links"
>have gone away.  (Either this is due to the error recovery,  or the page
>owners have updatead their pages...)  In any case, I think these links
>should still be numbered.

        If an Anchor with an HREF is opened, it can only have empty
content if the Anchor was closed, and there are two situations when
that happens.

        One is that the content has an IMG with ALT="", because the author
does not consider that link suitable for browsers with image loading turned
off.  If the IMG has a client-side image map indicated, Lynx will force a
pseudo-ALT so you can use it.  Otherwise, if you toggle on image links (*),
Lynx will create *two* links, e.g.:  [LINK]-[IMAGE], so that an intelligent
user can realize that the link for the image goes with an anchor, which now
is most likely appropriate to follow as well.  That's the behavior which
presumeably was behind Hiram's suggestion about the -ismap fote mods, though
inappropriate in the latter situation, as I explained.

        The other case is when a site is creating links for mindless
robots to follow, and they should not be displayed for human begans
who use neurons instead of just transistors.  That's what's being done
at the bottom of the www.microsoft.com page:

[...]
<!--FOOTER_END--><!-- Links for search engines/web crawlers to follow -->
    ^^^^^^^^^^        ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
<A HREF="/" TARGET="_top"></A>
<A HREF="/products/default.htm" TARGET="_top"></A>
[... many more content-less anchors for mindless robots ...]
<!-- End links for search engines/web crawlers to follow -->
</BODY>

</HTML>


        Wow, am I glad I'm no longer the de-facto coordinator, nor even
an active developer, so I can just do mods and enhancements properly in
my personal code that I personally use, and make it available to others,
in compliance with the GNU GPL, but expecting them to bring human
intellingence to it's use (instead of my needing to keep debating about
whether Lynx should cater to mindless robots :) :):) :) :) :) :) :) :)
:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

        ;( Ugh!  More run-on smileys! );
        
        (Sure hope Larry will wake up smiling tomorrow, and work harder
         on retaining a sense of humor, or I'll have to get off his case. :)

                                Fote

=========================================================================
 Foteos Macrides            Worcester Foundation for Biomedical Research
 address@hidden         222 Maple Avenue, Shrewsbury, MA 01545
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