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http://www.w3.org/ -- 26 January 1999 -- Following its mission to lead the evolution of the Web, the World Wide Web Consortium today released a test suite for its Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) language. CSS is a widely supported style sheet language that describes how Web documents (e.g., written in HTML or XML) are presented on screen, paper, in speech, etc. The CSS1 Test Suite will help implementors improve CSS1 support in their products and will enable Web page designers to verify the quality of CSS1 support in their browsers. Solid CSS support across a variety of browsers will encourage authors to use style sheets. The benefits of using style sheets include shorter documents, faster downloads, more attractive Web pages, more accessible Web pages, and much easier site management.
As the first Test Suite to accompany a W3C Recommendation, this release is also a milestone for W3C, demonstrating that W3C is not only developing specifications, but also creating tools for developers so as to encourage interoperable implementations of these specifications.
Today's release of the Test Suite covers CSS1, which is the first level of CSS. The Test Suite was crafted by Eric Meyer of Case Western Reserve University, Tim Boland of NIST, Håkon Lie of W3C, and numerous volunteers in the style sheet community. W3C's CSS and FP Working Group members contributed significant vendor experience to the Test Suite so that it would be a helpful and real-world guide for browser developers.
"Because of significant vendor input, we are expecting to see the effects of the test suite in the upcoming generation of browsers. The test suite will result in increased interoperability between CSS implementations," predicted Håkon Lie, W3C Style Sheets Activity Lead.
The test suite consists of nearly 100 pages, each of which documents a section from the CSS specification. Using words and images, the pages describe how the various CSS features should be rendered.
Other CSS support tools produced by W3C include:
Through these tools, as well as the HTML Validator, W3C demonstrates its commitment to supporting the deployment of technologies defined by its Recommendations. As a next step in this direction, work has begun on a test suite for CSS2, the latest level of CSS.
The W3C was created to lead the Web to its full potential by developing common protocols that promote its evolution and ensure its interoperability. It is an international industry consortium jointly run by the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science (MIT LCS) in the USA, the National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control (INRIA) in France and Keio University in Japan. Services provided by the Consortium include: a repository of information about the World Wide Web for developers and users, reference code implementations to embody and promote standards, and various prototype and sample applications to demonstrate use of new technology. To date, over 300 organizations are Members of the Consortium.
For more information about the World Wide Web Consortium, see http://www.w3.org/
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