14733 2011-11-08 20:02:27 +0000 self-closing tag in <link rel="..." /> causes also error "end tag for head which is not close" in html 4.0 2011-11-11 21:02:34 +0000 1 1 1 Unclassified Validator Parser HEAD PC Linux RESOLVED INVALID P2 blocker --- 1 matteosistisette dave.null www-validator-cvs oldest_to_newest 59759 0 matteosistisette 2011-11-08 20:02:27 +0000 Consider this code: <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> <html> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <title>bla bla </title> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="includes/style.css" /> <script type="text/javascript" src="includes/jquery162.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="includes/xxx.js"></script> <script src="http://maps.google.com/maps?file=api" type="text/javascript"></script> <script src="includes/general.js" type="text/javascript"></script> <script src="includes/qtobject.js" type="text/javascript"></script> </head>  <body> .... This causes the following validation errors (the first is a warning): Line 6, Column 68: NET-enabling start-tag requires SHORTTAG YES <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="includes/style.css" /> Line 13, Column 7: end tag for element "HEAD" which is not open </head> Line 15, Column 6: document type does not allow element "BODY" here <body> The first warning is OK, but the other two errors don't make any sense. Removing the "/" in the link tag makes the errors disappear. The use of a self closing tag ended in /> shouldn't cause these errors. Otherwise, the first warning should be an error instead of a warning. 59845 1 ville.skytta 2011-11-10 20:24:35 +0000 Self-closing tags like that don't exist in SGML (HTML) in the sense they do in XML. The / in /> closes the link tag, and the > ends up as text content. Because text content can't exist in document head, the document body implicitly starts before >, thus the remaining (correct) errors. 59892 2 matteosistisette 2011-11-11 01:48:40 +0000 Then I think the warning indicating the /> should be an error instead of a warning, at least when in the head section. 59944 3 ville.skytta 2011-11-11 20:24:17 +0000 It is not actually an error; it just doesn't mean what people tend to think it means so in my opinion a warning rather than an error is appropriate. 59953 4 matteosistisette 2011-11-11 20:34:25 +0000 but if encountered within the head, it will cause everything else to break 59970 5 ville.skytta 2011-11-11 21:02:34 +0000 Not always. For example this is a valid HTML 4.01 Transitional document: <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> <html> <head> <title>bla bla</title> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="includes/style.css" /> Hello World!