Clever Geek Handbook

Objects with symbol numbers ... Nomenclature

It used to be that easy. Or so I thought.

  • nbsp

    is an object
  •  

    is therefore an entity reference (object reference)
  •  

    is a symbol reference (reference to the numeric value of a symbol)

But these days I have read so many documents, even official ones, where all these words are knocked down; you have symbol objects, symbol names, number objects, reference objects, etc.

So what is it really? What are these things really called? Who can I trust to have this right these days?

Edit: So far, the resolution is that  

u  

have names ending in "link" (although before "link" changes between HTML4, HTML5, and XML). If you call them something ending in "essence," you are most likely wrong.

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2 answers


You are correct, except that nbsp

it is not an entity, but an object name. An object is what the object reference refers to, in this case a space character without a space.

An entity reference can also be invoked by a named object reference (since SGML generally allows you to reference other types of entity references). Similarly, a character reference can be called a numeric character reference (to distinguish it from some SGML concepts that have never been used in HTML).

This is the SGML (ISO 8879) terminology that the HTML specification nominally adheres to, and is their official reference to the SGML standard, up to HTML 4.01.



(However, even HTML specifications use SGML terminals, and HTML was never actually implemented as SGML-based, although some SGML features are reflected in implementations.)

XHTML is based on XML, which simplifies SGML and is formally defined as stand-alone. XML uses the terms entity reference and character reference like SGML, but longer names do not apply.

HTML5 is something different: designed to be independent of SGML and XML. He also introduces his own terminology.

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I am basing this answer on the HTML5 spec, which I generally regard as trustworthy, although this is a working draft that is subject to change.

nbsp

is the name of the symbol reference "(but the spec also calls this the" entity name ")

 

is a link with a symbol name



 

is a decimal numeric symbolic link

There is another option:

†

is a hexadecimal numeric symbolic link

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