1<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" 2 "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> 3<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> 4<head> 5<meta name="generator" content= 6"HTML Tidy for Mac OS X (vers 1st June 2003), see www.w3.org" /> 7<link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" href="tidy.css" /> 8<title>HTML Tidy - Frequently Asked Questions</title> 9<style type="text/css"> 10code { font-weight: bold; } 11</style> 12</head> 13<body> 14<h1>HTML Tidy - Frequently Asked Questions</h1> 15 16<h2>Overview</h2> 17 18<p class="abstract">Certain questions about Tidy come up on a 19regular basis. These are some that have been culled from postings 20to the html-tidy@w3.org and tidy-develop@lists.sourceforge.net 21mailing lists. If you don't see your question addressed here, see 22<a href="#support">How To Get Support</a> below.</p> 23 24<ul> 25<li><a href="#what-now">What Now?</a></li> 26 27<li><a href="#support">How to Get Support?</a></li> 28 29<li><a href="#bug">How to Submit A Bug Report</a></li> 30 31<li><a href="#feature">How to Submit A Feature Request</a></li> 32 33<li><a href="#layout">How Do I Control the Output Layout?</a></li> 34 35<li><a href="#version">What Version of Tidy Should I Use?</a></li> 36 37<li><a href="#regression">How Do I Run A Regression Test?</a></li> 38</ul> 39 40<hr /> 41<dl> 42<dt><a name="what-now" id="what-now"></a>What Now?</dt> 43 44<dd><p>If you have a popup screen that reads as follows: 45<pre> 46HTML Tidy for Windows <vers 1st August 2002; built on Aug 8 2002, at 15:41:13> 47Parsing Console input <stdin> 48</pre> 49 50<p>and do not know what to do next, read on.</p> 51 52<p>Tidy is waiting for your HTML to come in, so it can parse it. 53 Tidy is fundamentally a tool that reads in HTML cleans it up and 54writes it out again. It was developed as a program you run from the 55console prompt, but there are GUI encapsulations available, e.g. 56HTML-Kit, which you might prefer.</p> 57 58<p>If you are using Windows, the first step is to unzip the zip file 59and place the tidy.exe file in a folder somewhere on your executables 60path. You may also want to set up a config file to save having to type 61lots of options each time you run Tidy. From the console prompt you can 62run Tidy like this:</p> 63 64<pre> 65C> tidy -m mywebpage.html 66</pre> 67 68<p>In this case, the <code>-m</code> option requests Tidy to write 69the tidied file back to the same filename as it read from 70(mywebpage.html). Tidy will give you a breakdown of the problems it 71found and the version of HTML the file appears to be using.</p> 72 73<p>To get a listing of Tidy command line options, just type 74<code>tidy -?</code>. To see a listing on configuration options, 75try <code>tidy -help-config</code>. To get more info on the 76config options, see the <a 77href="http://tidy.sourceforge.net/docs/quickref.html">Quick Reference</a>.</p> 78 79<p>See also Dave Raggett's <a href="http://tidy.sourceforge.net/docs/Overview.html#help">User Guide</a>.</p> 80 81<p>If you're not comfortable with the DOS command line, you should 82try one of the <a href="http://tidy.sourceforge.net/#tidylibapps">GUI 83Applications</a>.</p> 84</dd> 85 86<dt><a name="support" id="support"></a>How To Get Support</dt> 87 88<dd> 89<p>For general HTML Tidy support, the original mailing list 90html-tidy@w3.org is best. Sometimes developers are the last to 91know... Also, this list covers both Java and C versions, not to 92mention various value-added products such as GUI front ends, Perl 93and Python integration, etc. If you don't get a response after a 94couple tries or if you have a bug fix, bump it over to the 95developer list at tidy-develop@lists.sourceforge.net. It's not a 96hard line, but that is the general arrangement.</p> 97</dd> 98 99<dt><a name="bug" id="bug"></a>How to Submit A Bug Report</dt> 100 101<dd> 102<p>You are encouraged to report bugs you found to the Tidy 103developer team. Tidy's quality depends on your feedback. You can 104either file your bug report in the Sourceforge <a 105href="http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=add&group_id=27659&atid=390963"> 106bug tracker</a> for HTML Tidy (<em>recommended</em>) or send a mail 107to the mailing list at html-tidy@w3.org. Note you do <em>not</em> 108have to have a Sourceforge account in order to file bug reports, or 109be subscribed to html-tidy@w3.org in order to post messages to the 110list.</p> 111 112<p>Prior to submitting a bug report, please check that the bug is 113not already known. Many are. If you are not sure, just ask. If it 114is new bug, make sure to include at least the following information 115in your report:</p> 116 117<ul> 118<li>A desciption of what you think went wrong.</li> 119 120<li>The HTML Tidy version (find it out by running <code>tidy 121-v</code>) and operating system you are running.</li> 122 123<li>The input, that exposes the bug.<br /> 124 A small HTML document that reproduces the problem is best.</li> 125 126<li>The configuration options you've used. Command line options 127like<br /> 128 <code>-asxml</code>, configuration files, etc. You may use 129<code>tidy -show-config</code> to get an overview of the active 130Tidy settings.</li> 131 132<li>Your e-mail address for further questions and comments.</li> 133</ul> 134 135<p>These information are necessary to reproduce whatever is 136failing, without them we cannot help you. Additional information - 137and patches - are very welcome!</p> 138 139<p><em>Please include only one bug per report.</em> Reports with 140multiple bugs are less easy to track and some bugs may get 141missed.</p> 142</dd> 143 144<dt><a name="feature" id="feature"></a>How to Submit A Feature 145Request</dt> 146 147<dd> 148<p>If you want Tidy to do something new that it doesn't do today 149(or stop doing something), then it is probably a feature 150request.</p> 151 152<p>The process for submitting a feature request is very similar to 153bug requests. A different <a 154href="http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=390966&group_id=27659"> 155tracker</a> is used on SourceForge to denote the difference in 156subject matter.</p> 157 158<p>As with bugs, please be sure that the feature has not already 159been requested. If the feature has already requested, you can add 160your comments to the feature request tracker, or send mail to the 161<a href="mailto:html-tidy@w3.org">mailing list</a> indicating your 162wish to also have the feature implemented. If the feature has not 163already been requested, send the same information as for a bug 164report, but place special emphasis on the desired output for a 165given input, desired options, etc. - please be as specific as 166possible about what you want Tidy to <em>do</em>.</p> 167</dd> 168 169<dt><a name="layout" id="layout"></a>How Do I Control the Output Layout?</dt> 170 171<dd> 172<p>There are three primary options that control how Tidy 173formats your markup:</p> 174<ul> 175 <li><a class="code" 176 href="quickref.html#indent">indent</a></li> 177 <li><a class="code" 178 href="quickref.html#indent-attributes">indent-attributes</a></li> 179 <li><a class="code" 180 href="quickref.html#vertical-space">vertical-space</a></li> 181</ul> 182 183<p>Briefly, <code>indent</code> sets the level of left-to-right indenting 184and, somewhat, how often elements are put onto a new line. The options 185are <code>yes</code>, <code>no</code>, and <code>auto</code>. 186<code>indent-attributes</code> is a flag that, when set, tells Tidy to 187put each attribute on a new line. <code>vertical-space</code> is a flag 188that, when set, tells Tidy to add some empty lines for readability. The 189default for all three is <code>no</code>. These options may be used in 190any combination to control you you want your markup to look. The best 191thing is to experiment a bit to see what you like. Be aware that 192<code>indent yes</code> is deprecated for production use as it will 193cause visual changes in most browsers.</p> 194 195<p>To get Tidy <em>Classic</em> <code>--indent auto</code> layout, use the following options:</p> 196 197<pre> 198indent: auto 199indent-attributes: no 200vertical-space: yes 201</pre> 202 203<p>You can read about more <em>Pretty Print</em> options 204<a href="quickref.html#PrettyPrintHeader">here</a>.</p> 205</dd> 206 207<dt><a name="version" id="version"></a>What Version of Tidy Should 208I Use?</dt> 209 210<dd> 211<p>The current Source Forge builds are recommended. You can find these at 212<a href="http://tidy.sourceforge.net">http://tidy.sourceforge.net</a>. 213People continue to report examples where Tidy does not catch some 214ill-formed HTML or, worse, generates ill-formed HTML. These cases have 215been significantly reduced. That said, be sure to test Tidy with some 216representative files from your environment.</p> 217 218<p>For development work, use CVS directly on your development 219system. For information on how to pull Tidy sources from <a 220href="http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=27659">CVS</a>. This way 221you can keep abreast of changes to Tidy and quickly resolve 222conflicts.</p> 223 224<p>For building a front end (e.g. GUI or language binding), the 225simplest approach is to use TidyLib. For more information 226about building and coding with TidyLib, see the <a 227href="http://tidy.sourceforge.net/libintro.html">Introduction To TidyLib</a>.</p> 228</dd> 229 230<dt><a name="regression" id="regression">How Do I Run A 231Regression Test?</a></dt> 232<dd> 233<p>You might ask, "Why should I run a regression test?". If you 234are a Tidy user, you might want to compare a new version of Tidy 235to the version you are currently running. This is a good idea 236if you are using Tidy in production applications such as web 237publishing. If you are a Tidy developer, it is a good idea to 238run the regression test suite to make sure your fix or enhancement 239doesn't add new bugs.</p> 240 241<p>Detecting new bugs is easier said than done, because sometimes 242they are subtle and can only be seen in browsers (or one particular 243browser you don't even have). But you can catch most crashes and 244many layout problems by running the test suite as described here.</p> 245 246<p>The basic process is simple: run the test suite <strong>before</strong> 247and <strong>after</strong> making changes to TidyLib and compare the output 248markup and messages. Be aware that the test scripts for WinNT/2K/XP 249(alltest.cmd) and Linux/Unix (testall.sh) place the output files in 250<code>tidy/test/tmp</code>. If you forget to run the <strong>before</strong> 251test, you can always download a binary from the <a 252href="http://tidy.sourceforge.net/#binaries">Project Page</a>. If you 253are not a TidyLib developer, you can download the <a 254href="http://tidy.sourceforge.net/test/tidy_test.tgz">Test Suite</a> 255directly. Here are the steps to evaluate the impact of a TidyLib change.</p> 256 257<h3>For Windows</h3> 258<p><strong>Before</strong> making changes:</p> 259<pre> 260C:\tidy\test> alltest.cmd 261C:\tidy\test> ren tmp baseline 262</pre> 263 264<p><strong>After</strong> making changes and building Tidy:</p> 265<pre> 266C:\tidy\test> alltest.cmd 267C:\tidy\test> windiff tmp baseline 268</pre> 269 270<h3>For Linux/Unix</h3> 271<p><strong>Before</strong> making changes:</p> 272<pre> 273~/tidy/test$ /testall.sh 274~/tidy/test$ mv tmp baseline 275</pre> 276 277<p><strong>After</strong> making changes and building Tidy:</p> 278<pre> 279~/tidy/test$ /testall.sh 280~/tidy/test$ diff -u tmp baseline > diff.txt 281</pre> 282</dd> 283 284<!-- 285 <dt><a name="" id=""></a></dt> 286 <dd> 287 </dd> 288 289 <dt><a name="" id=""></a></dt> 290 <dd> 291 </dd> 292 --> 293<!-- Save for future questions 294 <dt><a name="" id=""></a></dt> 295 <dd> 296 </dd> 297 --> 298</dl> 299</body> 300</html> 301