Summary element
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The <summary> element is a new element in HTML5, a child of the new <details> element.
summary naming or flexibility
Currently the <summary> element is a special element specifically for use for the label inside the <details> element.
The name of the <summary> element however is too generic sounding of an element name for this special usage.
It is inevitable that people will begin using the <summary> element when they simply mean a semantic "summary", perhaps of a <section> or <article>.
I say inevitable due to the broad evidence presented by the known existing problem with the <address> element (special use - for contact information for the document, but used and often errantly taught as a generic "address" for street addresses).
Thus we should either:
- Rename the details
<summary>to something more specific (suggestions welcome), OR: - Alternatively make the
<summary>element generic. Make it an actual summary inside<article>or<body>, as well as inside<details>. Allow<summary>anywhere<header>is allowed (basically, make it a part of the new section related elements). - Add a generic summary element,
<abstract>for instance.
I prefer the second solution, make the <summary> element more generic/flexible. — Tantek 20:38, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
summary flexibility advantages
Advantages of making the <summary> element more generic and flexible:
- This is close to the semantic of the Atom "summary" element, and the hAtom microformat 'entry-summary' property.
- This would allow an enhancement of the algorithm for converting HTML5 to Atom: take the first HTML5
<summary>inside an<article>being converted to an entry, and use that HTML5<summary>as the Atom entry<summary>.
Opinions / discussion:
- +1 Tantek - I think web authors would make good use of a new generic
<summary>element. - Bruce Lawson: I don't think there's a need for a generic summary element. But I'd support renaming the summary attribute of details (because it doesn't really summarise). Perhaps "rubric" could replace details>summary and figure>figcaption ?
- +1 Dion Almaer: <figcaption> or just reuse <summary> in more places. I am with @t on that one :)
- -0 EdwardOConnor - I'm OK with the status quo; barring that, I'd prefer renaming <summary> to more specifically describe its use in <details>.
- +0 Päper – I like general purpose, context-aware elements, but maybe the alleged confusion is better solved by a dedicated, intuitively named element: I added a third,
<abstract>, option above - ...
