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From: dorayme <dora...@optusnet.com.au>
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.www.authoring.html
Subject: Re: Is </OPTION> optional?
Date: Thu, 03 May 2012 08:32:42 +1000
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In article <jnrmsj$n4...@dont-email.me>,
 "Jonathan N. Little" <lws4...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Swifty wrote:
> > I can't remember where I learned HTML, but I remember that there is no
> > </OPTION>  tag in HTML (but browsers don't care if you have them)
> >

I think it was optional even in 3.2 days but I am not surprised at 
your memory because the typical examples (you could see them pasted 
inside the cabins of horse drawn buggies) are as in

<http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html32#select>

> > I've discovered that I sometimes get blank entries in my<SELECT>
> > controls, even though none of the<OPTION>'s are blank. This happens
> > with the current Opera browser (and back quite a few releases).
> >
> > The workaround is to add the un-necessary, and possible illegal
> > </OPTION>  tags.
> 
> It is not illegal, it is optional in HTML 4.01, but required in XHTML. I 
> typically put in all optional closing tabs because it fined it makes it 
> easier to debug and see my errors...
> 
> When in doubt, why not look it up?
> 
> http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/index/elements.html
> 
> >
> > Presumably this is a problem that I should report to Opera, but I
> > thought I'd check my facts first.
> >
> 
> With out the code in question, it is hard to say if there is a bug in 
> Opera or *your* markup.

Odd things can happen in quirks mode where browsers make out however. 
In such mode, a browser can fail to trigger an implicit close of a 
prior element and maybe all sort of other things can happen. So it 
would be interesting to see the markup that gives Swifty this problem.

-- 
dorayme