WEB STANDARDS PROJECT PRAISES IE5/MAC,
URGES MICROSOFT TO "FINISH THE JOB"

Mar 27, 2000: The Web Standards Project (WaSP) today praised
Microsoft's thorough implementation of HTML 4 and CSS 1 in the
Macintosh version of Internet Explorer 5. However, the WaSP
cautioned that no browser can be considered fully
standards-compliant until it supports XML and the DOM, and the
group urged Microsoft to take IE5/Mac to the next level.

"IE5/Mac offers the highest real-world standards compliance of
any browser yet shipped," said group leader Jeffrey Zeldman, who
also praised the browser for focusing on accessibility. "An
innovative Text Zoom feature allows the visually impaired to
increase the size of type on a Web page," Zeldman noted. "Web
users will no longer be penalized for the poor authoring
practices of some developers."

The WaSP had further praise for the browser's novel
"DOCTYPE"-sensitive rendering strategy, which  delivers
outstanding HTML4/CSS1 compliance or emulation of many  older,
nonstandard behaviors at the Web designer's discretion. But along
with the applause, the group reminded Microsoft that meaningfully
complete standards compliance must include support for XML and
the DOM.

"XML 1.0 has been stable since  February 1998; it is long past
time for browser makers to finish the job of supporting it," said
WaSP steering committee member Tim Bray, co-editor of XML 1.0. 
Noting that full XML support will enable a new generation of Web
applications to offload interactive application logic to the
browser, making the whole Web faster, cheaper to build, and more
productive for users, Bray added: "Today's browsers, however
sophisticated, are still more or less FTP with pictures.  The way
to change that is to implement XML and the DOM (neither by itself
is sufficient), and we're still waiting for that to happen."

The Web Standards Project is a grassroots coalition of Web
developers and users fighting for standards on the WWW. More
information is available at http://www.webstandards.org/.