[ | | | ]

Validator Tabs

This is where you set up options that affect the validation engine and its output. The validator options are divided into multiple tabs because of the large number of options that are available.

Note that several of these options are designed for XHTML. CSE HTML Validator Lite v3.0x now supports many or all of these options. However, they must be manually turned on and off. This causes inconvenience when checking both HTML and XHTML documents because the options must constantly be changed depending on the document being checked (though you may be able to leave some of them checked all the time (like XML compatibility) regardless of whether or not you are checking an HTML or XHTML document). In contrast, CSE HTML Validator Professional will automatically turn on many of the XHTML options automatically if an XHTML document is detected.

Validator 1 Options

Edit Boxes

Maximum errors - This edit box lets you specify the number of errors that CSE HTML Validator will generate for a single HTML document before terminating the validation due to too many errors. It is recommended that you do not set this to more than 20 errors, since one "true" error can cause many other "phantom" errors to be generated that may not necessarily provide useful information. Correct the first few errors of a document, and then revalidate it to see how the correction of the first few errors affect the remaining errors; they may all disappear. The default is 20 errors.
Maximum warnings - This edit box lets you specify the number of warnings that CSE HTML Validator will generate for a single HTML document before terminating the validation due to too many warnings. The default is 20 warnings.

Character Reference Options

Validate references - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to validate references (both numeric and symbolic). It is recommended that you keep this box checked. This option is enabled by default.
Numeric references include Unicode - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to validate 16-bit Unicode numeric character references. This option is enabled by default.
Allow hexadecimal numeric references - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to allow hexadecimal numeric character references. These references are in the form &#xH;, where H is a hexadecimal number. Note that some browsers may not support hexadecimal references. This option is not enabled by default.
Allow double quote in text - Check this box if you do not want HTML Validator to generate error messages when you use the double quotation mark in the text portion of HTML documents. If unchecked, HTML Validator will generate errors when quotation marks are used where the character reference '"' should be used instead. This option is enabled by default.
Check references in attribute values - Check this box to generate warning messages for incorrect references in attribute values. This also finds the common problem of not encoding ampersands as "&". This option is enabled by default. (New v5.00)
Allow numeric references 128-159 - Check this box to allow numeric references from  to . In the standard Internet character sets, these characters are control characters so they should not be used. However, there may be some limited cases where these characters work better for your needs than the substitute standard Internet characters. In this case, you may want to check this option. This option is not enabled by default. (New v5.00)

Message/Output Options

Show warnings - Check this box to show any warning messages that are generated during a validation. This box must be checked to receive any warning messages, even if Show comment warnings is checked. It is highly recommended that you keep this option enabled (most warning messages are usually important). This option is enabled by default.
Show comment warnings - Check this box to show warning messages when a comment in the form  contains '<' and '>' characters. This option only has an effect if Show warnings is checked. This option is not enabled by default.
Show missing attribute warnings - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to show warning messages for missing attributes that have the Warn if missing option checked. This option only has an effect if Show warnings is checked. This option is enabled by default.
Show messages - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to show any messages that occur as an HTML document is validated. Messages contain miscellaneous and generally useful information. Note that messages in the context of this option are messages generated by the validator engine that are not errors, warnings, or comments. It is highly recommended that you keep this option enabled. This option is enabled by default. (New v3.04)
Show comments - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to show comments in the output file when a validation is completed. These comments may provide you with new, useful information. Some comments are dependent on the kind of errors and warnings generated. It is recommended that you keep this option enabled and that you read any comments that are produced. This option is enabled by default.
Show extended message info - Check this box if you want to enable extended messages. Currently extended messages include displaying the actual valid and invalid range when a tag is out of range, displaying the valid attributes when an invalid attribute is used, and displaying the valid attribute values for an attribute when an invalid attribute value is used. Disabling extended messages simplify certain messages but also reduce the amount of information contained in them. This option is enabled by default. (New v3.00)
Change warning messages to error messages - Check this box to change warning messages to error messages. You may want to check this box if you consider warning messages to be as serious as error messages and therefore want warning messages to be treated the same as error messages. This option is not enabled by default. (New v5.02)
Enable override by message ID - Most (but not all) validator messages have a unique message ID. This unique message ID can be used to disable individual messages or to change an individual message's type (for example, from a warning to an error). This is normally done by bringing up the context menu for the individual message and choosing an option under Options for this Message. When Enable override by message ID is checked, changes to messages by message ID will take effect (this is the default). This means that if you disabled an individual message or changed a message's type, then the change that you made will override the default state. If this option is unchecked, the changes will not override the default state but the messages that would have been affected if this option were checked will be indicated by an [OVERRIDE ...] string in the message. By temporarily unchecking this option, you can see what changes have been made and you can enable a message that has previously been disabled. This option is enabled by default. (New v5.50)

Spell Checking Options (Pro, Std, Lite) (New v4.51)

These spell checking options affect the spell checker in the validator engine, not in the editor. CSE HTML Validator Lite supports editor spell checking but not validator engine spell checking.

Enable spell checking - Check this box to enable spell checking. Enabling spell checking will result in slower validations, especially when using HTML Validator with most third party tools because the dictionary may need to be loaded for every validation. If you want faster validations, disabling spell checking may help. This option is enabled by default.
Check spelling in comments - Check this box to enable spell checking for words that are contained in comments. This option is enabled by default.
Display misspelled word list message as a warning instead of a comment - Check this box if you want the message containing the words that may be misspelled to be a warning message instead of a comment message. Warning messages normally cause an "error or warning" sound at the end of a validation but comment messages do not. By controlling whether the misspelled word list message is a warning or comment message, you have some control over how severe misspelled words are when they occur and whether an "error or warning" sound is generated. This option is not enabled by default (it was enabled by default in versions prior to v5.02).
Include the number of times a word has been misspelled in the misspelled word list - This is best explained using an example: If you have used the misspelled word "validater" three times and this option is checked, "validater" will be displayed in the misspelled word list as "validater (3x)" to indicate that you have misspelled it three times. If this option is unchecked, then it will be displayed as "validater" with no indication of how many times this word was found. This option is enabled by default.
Sort misspelled word list by number of occurrences of the misspelled word instead of alphabetically - Check this option to sort the misspelled word list in ascending (increasing) order by the number of times the misspelled word was found. Usually misspelled words will only be misspelled once and therefore would appear at the beginning of the misspelled word list if this option is checked. Words that are correct but not in the dictionary are likely to be repeated more than once and, therefore, to be at the end of the list if this option is checked. Words misspelled the same number of times are sorted alphabetically within the subsection of the list that contains words misspelled the same number of times. If this option is not checked, then the list is sorted alphabetically. This option is enabled by default.

NOTE: Words contained in tags that are marked as "ignore to close" (like "style" and "script") are not checked. This is true even if the words are in comments and Check spelling in comments is checked.
NOTE: These options affect spell checking as done by the validator engine. Spell checking from the integrated editor is different. These options do not affect the spell check when done using the Spell Check tool in the integrated editor.

Validator 2 Options

Miscellaneous Options

Check HTML tag nesting - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to report potential nesting problems from such input as <H1>HTML Validator Released!</H1>. Here, the heading tag is closed before the italics tag is closed, even though the heading tag was opened first, resulting in a nesting error. This option is enabled by default.
Allow spaces around '=' - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to not generate warning messages for attributes that have spaces before or after the equal sign. For example, if this box is not checked, ALIGN = CENTER and ALIGN= CENTER will generate warning messages due to the spaces around the equal sign. If this box is checked, spaces around the equal sign do not generate validation warnings. According to HTML 4.0, spaces are valid around '=' when assigning values to attributes. This option is enabled by default.
Tag range always valid - Check this box to override range checking of tag names. If a tag name's category is active, the tag will always be in valid range. It is strongly recommended that you keep this option unchecked unless you have a good reason to enable it. This option is not enabled by default.
Check for high ASCII characters - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to report high ASCII characters as warnings. A high ASCII character is a character with an ASCII value of over 127. Note that this option checks the whole HTML document, even if there are sections in the document that are set to be ignored. Note also that you can use character entities as an alternative to using high ASCII characters in your documents. However, it is technically acceptable to use high ASCII characters (such as accented letters and some punctuation marks) in your documents and to not encode them with character entities. The only time character entities must be used is when using control characters such as <, > and &. Beginning with v4.02, this option is not enabled by default.
Allow multi-line quotes - Check this box if you want to be able to have parts of the same quoted string on more than one line. It is usually best to keep this box unchecked and to keep your complete quotes on a single line. This makes it easier for you to find errors when an opening or closing quotation mark is missing, which also causes numerous errors to be generated. It is also likely that having a quoted string that is broken up onto two or more lines may cause problems with some browsers. This option is not enabled by default.
Require quoted attribute values - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to require that all attribute values be in quotation marks. This option is not enabled by default. (New v3.02)
Allow spaces such as in  - Check this box to allow spaces immediately before the closing '>' character in a tag. With this option checked, tags such as will not generate warnings due to the spaces in the tags. It is recommended that you leave this option unchecked for good style and to avoid possible problems caused by these spaces. Spaces immediately after the opening '<' character of a tag will generate an error message regardless of this setting. This option is enabled by default. (New v2.53, default changed to enabled from not enabled in v5.50)
Require optional end tags - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to require that all tags having optional end tags instead have required end tags. For example, has an optional end tag if this option is unchecked. If this option is checked, errors will be generated if there is not a matching end tag for each tag. This may be useful for educational purposes or for anyone who's style is to close all tags. This option is not enabled by default.
Ignore text in <% ... %> - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to ignore text (usually server side scripts for Microsoft IIS) between '<%' and '%>' strings. (Note that similar processing is always done to ignore PHP blocks). This option is enabled by default.
 Strict comment format - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to generate error messages for comments not in the  format. A comment such as <! Document modified 5/21/96 > will generate errors if this box is checked. It is recommended that you keep this box checked and use this type of comment in your documents. This option is enabled by default.
(first tag) can be anywhere - Check this box if you want any tags with (first tag) as the valid range to be valid anywhere. Otherwise if (first tag) is the only valid range for the tag, then it must be the first tag in the document (normally the first tag in a document should be HTML). This option is not enabled by default. (New to v2.53)
Treat all quotes as equivalent - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to treat single and double quotes as equivalent when they are used to enclose attribute values. This function will cause an attribute value that is enclosed in single quotes not to generate an error message if the configuration requires that the value must be enclosed in double quotes, because the single quotes are 'equivalent' to the double quotes. You may want to enable this option if your documents are written for 'modern' browsers that do not have problems with using single quotes. This option is enabled by default.
Collapse <% ... %> in tags to 'ASP' - Check this box to replace any <% ... %> block occurring in a tag to 'ASP'. This minimizes the number of errors HTML Validator generates due to using <% ... %> blocks in tags. This option has no effect if Ignore text in <% ... %> is not checked. (Note that similar processing is always done for PHP blocks and Miva macros). This option is enabled by default.
XML compatibility - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to understand quick close tags like <IMG SRC="picture.gif"/>. HTML Validator will also make sure that any quick close tags like the above cannot have another, separate end tag. This option is enabled by default. (New v3.00)
Ignore all quotation requirements - Check this box if you want HTML Validator to ignore all quotation requirements for attribute values. HTML Validator will not generate error messages due to quoting or failing to quote any attribute values. It is recommended that you keep this option unchecked. This option is not enabled by default.
Require lowercase tags and attributes - Check this box if you want to generate error messages for opening tags, end tags, or tag attributes that contain uppercase characters. This option is not enabled by default. (New v4.0012)
Require quick close ( ) - Check this box if you want to generate error messages for tags that do not have an end tag (like </TAGNAME>) and are not in the format <TAGNAME ... />. This option is not enabled by default. (New v4.0012)
Warn if no space before '/' ( ) - Check this box to generate a warning message when there is no space before the '/' character in an XML style empty tag. It is a good idea to include these spaces in XHTML documents for backward compatibility with HTML. With this option checked, using would generate a warning while would not. This option is not enabled by default. (New v4.0500)
Require attribute values - Check this box to require that ALL attributes have attribute values. This option should be checked for XML or XHTML documents. The default configuration file that is included with CSE will automatically act as if this box is checked if an XHTML document is detected. This option is not enabled by default. (New v4.0500)
Ignore tag names with colons - Check this box so that tag names with a colon in them are ignored (such as "jsp:useBean"). This will also ignore all attributes and attribute values for that tag. Does not ignore end tags with a colon but an end tag with a colon for a previously ignored tag name with a colon is OK. Does not ignore tag names that are included in the configuration. This option is enabled by default. (New v4.9910)

[ Table of Contents ]