12384 2011-03-27 11:38:54 +0000 Validator rejects a link href with an ampersand in the query string 2015-08-23 07:42:10 +0000 1 1 1 Unclassified HTML Checker General unspecified PC All REOPENED P2 normal --- 1 robert.w.fletcher mike+validator elimerl jukka.k.korpela julian.reschke mike www-validator-cvs oldest_to_newest 46999 0 robert.w.fletcher 2011-03-27 11:38:54 +0000 If a document has a link element in the head with a query string the validator will reject it if the query string contains '&'. For example: <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/css/main.css?_debugResources=y&n=1301223807152"> When I validate a document containing this I get: "& did not start a character reference. (& probably should have been escaped as &amp;.)" 55703 1 elimerl 2011-08-23 18:28:45 +0000 This is the correct behavior. Literal '&' must be escaped as '&amp;' EVEN INSIDE URLS. 108216 2 jukka.k.korpela 2014-06-23 12:48:19 +0000 In HTML5, when HTML syntax is used, the construct is valid, because the syntax rules forbid only “ambiguous ampersands”: http://www.w3.org/TR/html5/syntax.html#attributes-0 The ampersand is not ambiguous in this case, or in other common cases where a query part of a URL contains fields separated by ampersands. An “ambiguous ampersand” is by definition “a U+0026 AMPERSAND character (&) that is followed by one or more alphanumeric ASCII characters, followed by a ";" (U+003B) character, where these characters do not match any of the names given in the named character references section”. There is no semicolon here. 122731 3 mike 2015-08-23 07:42:10 +0000 known issue