Re: Let's play 'explain the error' in test suite for HTML::Tidy

"... aging but probably still-useful module ..."

Everything about that module indicates that it is very old. I did a small amount of investigation.

HTML 3.2 was superseded by HTML 4.01 last century. HTML5 is current. See W3C Standards - HTML publication history if you're interested in details.
HTML::Tidy was last updated eight years ago.
- It's a wrapper around tidyp whose website, https://tidyp.com/, shows "This domain for sale!".
- The Repository Description has: "HTML::Tidy is no longer being maintained.".
- See the GitHub repo for Changes, Issues and so on.

I'm not a user of any HTML::Tidy* modules; however, from my reading I'd suggest changing to HTML::Tidy5. Other monks with more familiarity may have a better answer.

— Ken

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Re^2: Let's play 'explain the error' in test suite for HTML::Tidy by Intrepid (Curate) on Sep 20, 2025 at 01:04 UTC
Ken generously researched into HTML::Tidy and convincingly noted: from my reading I'd suggest changing to HTML::Tidy5 ...Everything about that module indicates that it is very old ... Yeah, I looked into HTML::Tidy5 after trying to build `libtidyp` from the source at its github repo; I changed lanes because the C coding in one header file was causing a fatal error in gcc/cpp. I got a solution for that, btw (on SnarkOverflow), and was ultimately able to create a static `libtidyp.a` from the object code. That's because other problems I encountered included having libtool hang forever–no libtool, no .dll. That's why I stopped at having a static library. But back to HTML::Tidy5: it's very different from HTML::Tidy under the hood (or "bonnet" if you prefer ;-), in that it just invokes the stand-alone binary installed or locally built from tidy-html5, whereas HTML::Tidy was a true Perl extension using XS to interface with the C tidyp lib. As for one obvious question some will have after reading about my adventure, to wit "why go to all that trouble if you know there's a modern replacement?" ...I'm just stubborn like that. I get a certain way into a problem and then I just don't want to let it go without some substantial resolution. — Soren Sep 20, 2025 at 01:04 UTC	[reply]

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Re^2: Let's play 'explain the error' in test suite for HTML::Tidy
by Intrepid (Curate) on Sep 20, 2025 at 01:04 UTC

Ken generously researched into HTML::Tidy and convincingly noted:

from my reading I'd suggest changing to HTML::Tidy5 ...Everything about that module indicates that it is very old ...

Yeah, I looked into HTML::Tidy5 after trying to build libtidyp from the source at its github repo; I changed lanes because the C coding in one header file was causing a fatal error in gcc/cpp. I got a solution for that, btw (on SnarkOverflow), and was ultimately able to create a static libtidyp.a from the object code. That's because other problems I encountered included having libtool hang forever–no libtool, no .dll. That's why I stopped at having a static library. But back to HTML::Tidy5: it's very different from HTML::Tidy under the hood (or "bonnet" if you prefer ;-), in that it just invokes the stand-alone binary installed or locally built from tidy-html5, whereas HTML::Tidy was a true Perl extension using XS to interface with the C tidyp lib.

As for one obvious question some will have after reading about my adventure, to wit "why go to all that trouble if you know there's a modern replacement?" ...I'm just stubborn like that. I get a certain way into a problem and then I just don't want to let it go without some substantial resolution.

— Soren

Sep 20, 2025 at 01:04 UTC

[reply]