The best way only out of these to comment

**Dez** · Apr 30, 2009 12:05

Fully aware that there's other, probably better ways to code comments, but if you could only choose just one out of the 4 below, which one would be more correct than the others please ?







Dez.

**logic_earth** · Apr 30, 2009 12:34

**Dez** · Apr 30, 2009 12:47

Many thanks, the quick input's appreciated. Do you, or anyone else know, if a comment such as that  would have a detrimental effect on an onclick="document.getElementById please ?

Dez.

**Tryst** · Apr 30, 2009 13:23

Originally Posted by Dez

Only really ever used this one. Didn't know the other were possible.

I don't really know what you mean in your follow up question.

**Dez** · Apr 30, 2009 13:27

Many thanks Tryst.

In the follow up - I can't give an example url at the moment, but I remember a few months ago, that when the comments code was higher up on the page, and the onclick code lower down, the onclick 'focus' didn't work properly. Just wondered if others here have come across a similar thing with them.

Dez.

**Tryst** · Apr 30, 2009 13:31

No sorry.

But come back with an example when possible and we can look then.

**AutisticCuckoo** · May 1, 2009 10:48

#1 is valid, and I can see why some might prefer it because of the symmetry.

#2 is the normal way to write a comment.

#3 is odd, because the final exclamation point is outside the comment (the comment is terminated by the second pair of dashes). It might even be invalid.

#4 is wrong. It's not an SGML or XML comment.

**kohoutek** · May 1, 2009 12:32

I'm a fan of commenting code, and out of the three, #2 is what I use, though I'm trying to get away from commenting my HTML documents because IE6 doesn't always play nice in that regard.

**Dez** · May 2, 2009 09:32

Originally Posted by kohoutek

I'm a fan of commenting code, and out of the three, #2 is what I use, though I'm trying to get away from commenting my HTML documents because IE6 doesn't always play nice in that regard.

Many thanks for the input. One thing, in what way didn't IE6 play ball ? Was you using forms on the page ?

**kohoutek** · May 2, 2009 09:35

No, it didn't have anything to do with forms, at least not in my case. I simply had (probably too many) comments in my HTML and noticed that IE6 reacted with rendering issues. After removing a few comments, everything was fine again.

**Dez** · May 2, 2009 09:39

Originally Posted by kohoutek

No, it didn't have anything to do with forms, at least not in my case. I simply had (probably too many) comments in my HTML and noticed that IE6 reacted with rendering issues. After removing a few comments, everything was fine again.

Many thanks for the confirmation. Has anyone found a way to solve that at all (without removing the comments) ? Wondering if formatting the comments like number 1 above would help ?

**Dez** · May 2, 2009 09:31

Originally Posted by AutisticCuckoo

#1 is valid, and I can see why some might prefer it because of the symmetry.

#2 is the normal way to write a comment.

#3 is odd, because the final exclamation point is outside the comment (the comment is terminated by the second pair of dashes). It might even be invalid.

#4 is wrong. It's not an SGML or XML comment.

Many thanks for the detailed response - I'll stick with number 2.

**zcorpan** · May 4, 2009 01:32

Originally Posted by AutisticCuckoo

#3 is odd, because the final exclamation point is outside the comment (the comment is terminated by the second pair of dashes). It might even be invalid.

Yes it is invalid and some browsers close it while others don't (and in some it depends on whether there's a later "-->" or not).

**C. Ankerstjerne** · May 4, 2009 01:59

The code below is also a comment, if we want to follow the specification closely:

Code html4strict:

<!------ *** PAGE START *** -------->
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
 
<html>
 <head>
  <title>Comment example</title>
 </head>
 <body>
  <h1>Comment example</h1>
  <p>This text is all a part of the comment.</p>
 </body>
</html>
<!-------- *** PAGE END *** ------>

**gary.turner** · May 4, 2009 08:43

Not exactly true. Each pair of hyphens toggles the comment off or on.

cheers,

gary

**C. Ankerstjerne** · May 4, 2009 15:41

Originally Posted by gary.turner

Not exactly true. Each pair of hyphens toggles the comment off or on.

cheers,

gary

Precisely. Count the hyphens.  would break down as:

<!: Begin comment tag
------: Begin comment (--), end comment (--) and begin comment (--)
*** PAGE START ***: Comment
--------: End comment (--), begin comment (--), end comment (--), begin comment (--)

Everything following this (including the > immidiately following as well as the later <!) will be part of the comment, until the next time a double hyphen is encountered.

**cooper.semantics** · May 4, 2009 10:04

Originally Posted by Dez

Fully aware that there's other, probably better ways to code comments, but if you could only choose just one out of the 4 below, which one would be more correct than the others please ?







Dez.

I usually do something like this for indication of closing large sections of my document.
<div class="section">
</div>


This way its easy to go back and troubleshoot

3,4 are invalid ---

**Blake Tallos** · May 4, 2009 18:24

Originally Posted by cooper.semantics

I usually do something like this for indication of closing large sections of my document.
<div class="section">
</div>


This way its easy to go back and troubleshoot

3,4 are invalid ---

Ohhh, for a large container you mean right? I had to go back and read that I was like wahhh? I understand now though.