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Copied from http://bugzilla.validator.nu/show_bug.cgi?id=742 : "I see error messages such as this one for HTML5 code: Error: Table column 4 established by element col has no cells beginning in it. I think that this should raise a warning, not an error message." Reply by Michael(tm) Smith: "In the 'Forming a table' section of the HTML5 spec, see step 20: 'If there exists a row or column in the table containing only slots that do not have a cell anchored to them, then this is a table model error.'" Error message "element col has no cells beginning in it" http://bugzilla.validator.nu/show_bug.cgi?id=742 This in some cases makes it very difficult to migrate old applications to HTML5. In HTML4 one could output a grid using <col>-tags and then generate and output the table rows one by one without. According to the current step 20 one now has to walk thru all rows before the <col>-grid can be generated and output. Is there any *compelling* need for step 20 ("table model error") in the 'Forming a table' section ?
A corresponding problem is described here: Help with HTML validation error: Table column has no cells beginning in it http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2292947/help-with-html-validation-error-table-column-has-no-cells-beginning-in-it
It's supposed to catch cases where the author has created a table with too many columns (a somewhat common problem that can be hard to debug). I don't understand your use case. Can you describe it in more detail? EDITOR'S RESPONSE: This is an Editor's Response to your comment. If you are satisfied with this response, please change the state of this bug to CLOSED. If you have additional information and would like the editor to reconsider, please reopen this bug. If you would like to escalate the issue to the full HTML Working Group, please add the TrackerRequest keyword to this bug, and suggest title and text for the tracker issue; or you may create a tracker issue yourself, if you are able to do so. For more details, see this document: http://dev.w3.org/html5/decision-policy/decision-policy.html Status: Did Not Understand Request Change Description: no spec change Rationale: Need more details on the use case before determining whether it's worth removing the step or not.