Feature Proposals

This document contains a list of the problems for which feature requests have been made. Linked problem pages contain the document of the problem and their relevant solutions. Obviously, we want to keep HTML as simple as possible. That means not everyone will get what they want. Having good documentation for the problems at hand will help all of us work out what is most important.

Guidelines

Before proposing a feature, please read Proposing features. If you want to add a feature request, start by copying the Problem Solving template page onto a new page and fill out as much information as you can.

You don't have to provide detailed answers for everything straight away. The most important information to provide at first is the problem description. Once we have detailed descriptions, use cases and an understanding of the limitations with existing markup, we can then begin to discuss the best way in which to address the problems and work out more of the more technical details.

Document Markup

• Dialogue
• Annotation
• Footnotes
• Sidenotes
• Image Caption
• Inline Math

DOM Scripting

• Text in Canvas

Security

• Link Hashes
• Digital Signatures

Other

This list of features needs to be sorted out. They've come from all the feedback provided on blogs over the past few weeks.

• Don't render quotation marks around q elements.
• Make form validation easier
  • required attribute
  • maxlength attribute for textarea
  • pattern attribute
  • min
  • max
• New Form Controls
  • Search fields
  • Combo boxes
  • Date/Time
  • E-mail
  • Int
  • Long
  • Unsigned
  • Float
  • Number
  • Currency
  • URL
• WYSIWIG Editor (contentEditable)
• Placeholder attribute
• Captions for images
• Bring back the start and value attributes for ordered lists.
• Bring back the menu element
• Require XHTML-link syntax for HTML
• Caption/label/list header for lists
• Include the role attribute.
• Allow href on all elements
• Make it easier to mark up blocks of code
• Allow block level elements inside paragraphs
• “a tag that could hold "bad grammar" and not have any effect on the validation (sort of like a document.write from JavaScript) and would terminate all unclosed items at the end of the element (like TDs tend to do).”
• blink!
• Fix the object element.
• Unify img, object, embed and iframe into a single element
• Headers and footers
• A mechanism to include content from an external source (e.g. include, perhaps like XInclude)
• A corner element (presumably for making rounded corners)
• Markup for advertisements
• Easier column layouts
• A foot element for containing scripts at the bottom of the page, or something to help deal with cross-browser load events.
• Key Generation/Certificate management (The keygen element)