[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

There is a scheme which defines a file format. As soon as you know what book part is being represented by the XML element, you can apply any formatting on your own, not being in complete dependance on faithful representation of the HTML author's CSS/physical format.

I can already do that with custom CSS.

Are you saying you don't want authors to be allowed to define CSS?

I have yet to see EPUB which have no semantically absurd elements like '<p>&nbsp</p>'. This is physical formatting which can be easily ridden off with a specific semantic markup.

I strongly disagree with your opinion that &nbsp; is absurd.
I agree that there are some formatters that use it in the wrong way.

I vehemently disagree with the conclusions you have drawn.
Speaking of absurd, I don't see why using an XML tag to describe a non-breaking-space is any better than using a unicode character.

Consider that many libraries of any size use their own formats for their digitized funds, as EPUB cannot represent the document structure which is needed for digital processing. Many of this formats are exactly this: semantic XML-based formats.

You mean they use XSLT processing to produce EPUBs? Or are you going to actually give us an example of what you claim to be talking about? (Base on your track record in this thread, I can only assume everything is yet another outrageous claim.)