Last modified: 2013-08-06 00:36:52 UTC
The 1.4beta & later Parser.php doQuotes() function currently changes wiki "''" and "'''" markup output from "em" and "strong" to "i" and "b". While this was presumably done to reduce the size of the output, the average reduction would be small, and this is the reverse of the W3C.org anti-presentation trend reflected in the draft XHTML v2 spec.
Created attachment 166 [details] Parser.php.patch for HEAD
'' and ''' *are* presentational markup. They don't carry specific semantic meaning, but are used for many purposes. Italics ('') are used for emphasis, to mark foreign words, to mark titles of literary and artistic works, to set off captions, etc. Bold (''') is used for emphasis, to mark section titles typographically, etc. Use of <strong> and <em> for these is thus ABUSE of semantic markup. Semantic markup must have a specific meaning, or it is worthless. Telling everybody to turn all their <b>s into <strong>s and <i>s into <em>s is not only unhelpful, it's counterproductive and does great violence to the adoption of semantic markup. We produce output in XHTML 1.0, which *does* include <b> and <i> elements. XHTML 1.0 will always include <b> and <i> elements. If some day we want to produce output in some version of XHTML that does not include <b> and <i> elements, then we'll see about more appropriate markup. Perhaps if <strong> and <em> are redefined to be non-semantic elements, they will be appropriate.
See bug 369 & bug 370
