Since I’ve participated in the development of HTML5 for a decade now (since before it was commonly called “HTML5”), I’ve been asked for my thoughts about HTML5 becoming a W3C Recommendation. Hence, I figured I’d post something here:
I think the W3C HTML5 Recommendation is important in the sense that some very big companies have committed (or are about to commit) to exclude the important Web functionality described by the W3C HTML5 Recommendation (which is a modified snapshot of WHATWG HTML) from patent aggression. However, I think the W3C HTML5 Recommendation should not be oversold as being useful for purposes other than a reference point under the W3C Patent Policy. In particular, the “Plan 2014” process arrangement that allowed HTML5 to proceed to Recommendation with relatively sparse test coverage means that it’s quite possible that there are areas of the specification that developers shouldn’t be relying on in case those areas of the specification turn out to be wrong due to inadequate test coverage.
In general, it’s a bad idea for both browser developers and Web developers to read old specification snapshots. Browser developers should generally read Editor’s Drafts instead of Recommendation snapshots and test suites should also track the most recent spec edits instead of reflecting snapshots whose bugs may already have been fixed in more recent edits. For Web developers it often makes sense to refer to Web developer-targeted documentation such as Mozilla Developer Network or Can I Use and, when those fail, also refer to Editor’s Drafts of the relevant specifications.
The cost of getting to this snapshot has been very high, unfortunately. It’s very sad that the HTML WG ended up driving away many of the people who had contributed to the HTML5 effort at the WHATWG and had come over to the HTML WG when the new HTML WG was established in 2007 to bring the WHATWG’s work on HTML5 into the W3C. I hope the divergence between WHATWG HTML and W3C HTML won’t be permanent.