Quote:
Originally Posted by kovidgoyal
By semantic, I mean that information in the source document is marked up by type rather than by position/appearance. See for example the new tags in HTML 5 (the next iteration of HTML). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML_5
Note that semanticity does not preclude fixed size layouts. My point is simply that the more important aspect of information distribution is making the distribution more semantic, rather than better laid out. The advantages to making the information moe semantic far outweigh the advantages to making it better laid out. Given that, a format that is designed primarily to facilitate layout is unlikely to be the future of digital information. |
If I could add to this, I think by semantic Kovid means markup language. In other words, similar to metadata. Semantic in his usage is defining blocks of text in categories.
So, one may define x-block of text as "header", y-block of text as "body text", a z-block of text as "caption", or even finer gradations you have a-block of text marked in category "font: Times New Roman" and so forth.
This is how I understand what is meant by semantic.