<blockquote> help, please

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Turtle91

That's just like people who use
.italic {font-style:italic}
<span class="italic">yadda yadda yadda</span>

instead of
em {font-style:italic}
<em>yadda yadda yadda</em>

Although I wouldn't call it laziness as much as "industrious bloat lovers that might not fully understand the code"...

Turtle:

Nah, it's neither bloat nor laziness. Let's not forget, gang: it's not about what something LOOKS LIKE; it's about what something IS. (I learned this lesson from Capidamonte, you guys may remember him, who I met here on MR. He is completely OCD, mind you, but he was right about this, and I never forgot it).

Using a paragraph class styled as a blockquote isn't really "wrong" (or a div, span, etc.), but it's not as precise as using a blockquote tag, which tells the device/reader that this is something structural. It's not simply another paragraph; it's something different. It's like the error we see here on the Sigil forums all the time--people using paragraph classes with styles instead of headers, or the other way around--using header classes to make something big and bold, instead of using CSS to style what is, after all, simply text.

When you pay attention to the structure, and code accordingly, it's more likely that the resulting file will render properly, or at least in some way that conveys the idea to the reader (much like nj's Courier-styled "blockquote" paragraph. Courier ain't beautiful, but it clearly conveys to his readers that what they are reading is set apart from the regular narrative flow). With so many reading apps out there that don't obey some CSS (Aldiko and the imaginatively-named ePUBReader for Droid come to mind, vis-a-vis some image-sizing issues), using the correct html for the correct elements may make the difference in getting the essence of the effect you want, in my humble opinion.

Hitch

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Hitch

using the correct html for the correct elements may make the difference in getting the essence of the effect you want, in my humble opinion.

Hitch

I do agree with your opinion 100%.

If you really want to see a mess, take a look at the code in the ePub edition of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. It's <div>ed all over the place when it should be using <blockquote>s.