W3C HTML Validator Error - Invalid content-type

Trevor Orton

Hello, I'm having a slight problem using the W3C html validator and I've
reviewed the FAQ's with no luck so hopefully someone here would be kind
enough to point me in the right direction.

I recently validated my site's css and the bulk of the html pages via the
W3C validator but was forced to use the file upload option because the
'Validate by URL' option returns the following error:

Sorry, I am unable to validate this document because its content type is

http://www.ortonage.com, which is not currently supported by this service.
The Content-Type field is sent by your web server (or web browser if you use
the file upload interface) and depends on its configuration. Commonly, web
servers will have a mapping of filename extensions (such as ".html") to MIME
Content-Type values (such as text/html).

I'd now like to determine why I'm receiving the error. The web site is
http://www.ortonage.com. So far, I've verified that the server mime types
are configured correctly on the web server (MS IIS). I know I'm probably
going to get beat up because I'm using MS IIS but it has met my needs so
far. :) I've also verified the doctype is correct <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC
"-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd"> and that the meta tag <META
HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> is
correct. I'm now at a loss on where to look next.

The site uses a URL rewriter so even though the URL appears as static to the
client it gets modified by the server to a dynamic URL before processing and
responding to the client. I'm wondering if the server is not including the
correct content-type in the header information because the ".htm" is
stripped from the URL during processing and before the response is actually
returned to the client side. If that is the case, any ideas on how to
rectify the problem? I also have the meta tag equivalent in each web page
so I thought that it might guarantee the content-type is set correctly.
Works fine for Netscape and IE browsers. I've only seen this problem on W3C
so far.

Any suggestions would be very much appreciated.

Thanks.

Trevor Orton (www.ortonage.com)

Jul 23 '05 #1

Subscribe Reply

5691

Steve Pugh

On Sat, 13 Nov 2004 00:48:06 -0500, "Trevor Orton"
<or******@yahoo .com> wrote:

I recently validated my site's css and the bulk of the html pages via the
W3C validator but was forced to use the file upload option because the
'Validate by URL' option returns the following error:
Sorry, I am unable to validate this document because its content type is

http://www.ortonage.com, which is not currently supported by this service.
The Content-Type field is sent by your web server (or web browser if you use
the file upload interface) and depends on its configuration. Commonly, web
servers will have a mapping of filename extensions (such as ".html") to MIME
Content-Type values (such as text/html).

I'd now like to determine why I'm receiving the error. The web site is
http://www.ortonage.com. So far, I've verified that the server mime types
are configured correctly on the web server (MS IIS).

No they're not.

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.0
Date: Sat, 13 Nov 2004 06:32:48 GMT
Set-Cookie: u=1704538305; expires=Tuesday , 11-Nov-14 06-32-48 GMT;
path=/;
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.0
Date: Sat, 13 Nov 2004 06:32:48 GMT

See? No Content-Type header at all.

Steve

Jul 23 '05 #2

Leonard Blaisdell

In article <z4************ ********@rogers .com>, "Trevor Orton"
<or******@yahoo .com> wrote:

Any suggestions would be very much appreciated.

<http://www.htmlhelp.co m/tools/validator/> says everything is OK. The W3C
validator can't parse it. I'll leave it to others to tell you why.
You asked only for a solution to one problem. I have to tell you that from
a design point of view, you have two.

leo

--
<http://web0.greatbasin .net/~leo/>

Jul 23 '05 #3

David Ross

First of all, the validator is saying there is something wrong with
your server, not with your page. It never even tried to validate
your page.

You need to have your Web host correct the server's .htaccess file
to define a MIME type for HTML files. It's not unusual for an
individual Web site to also have its own .htaccess file for
esoteric MIME types; I have one. However, your Web server should
already have HTML defined in its master .htaccess.

However, I can tell you that you definitely have a design problem.
A well-designed Web page should not require right-left scrolling,
especially for text.

--

David E. Ross
<http://www.rossde.com/>

I use Mozilla as my Web browser because I want a browser that
complies with Web standards. See <http://www.mozilla.org/>.

Jul 23 '05 #4

Trevor Orton

> >http://www.ortonage.com. So far, I've verified that the server mime
types

are configured correctly on the web server (MS IIS).

No they're not.

Ok, I'll have to dig into why IIS is not transmitting the content-type
header even though it is configured to do so. I'm guessing that IIS is
confused because I modify the URL before processing. The fix may be to
force the content-type header through the dynamic page generation sequence
instead of relying on the server.

I assume then that the meta tag for content-type is of little value to the
W3C validator and I assume then that the browsers must either use the meta
tag or assume text/html in the absence of the content-type header.

Thanks for the response Steve.

Jul 23 '05 #5

Trevor Orton

> <http://www.htmlhelp.co m/tools/validator/> says everything is OK. The W3C

validator can't parse it. I'll leave it to others to tell you why.
You asked only for a solution to one problem. I have to tell you that from
a design point of view, you have two.

leo

Hi Leo. Yes, I had already ran the same validator but it did not complain,
nor did W3C when I uploaded the page source individually.

Please comment on what you feel are design issues (even if you don't want to
get into why or how to fix them). The site was my first attempt with css and
compliant html so I'm not surprised you feel there are other problems. It
seems to be rendering correctly under recent versions of IE and NS and I
plan to do some testing with additional browsers in the future when time
permits.

Thanks for your time.

Trevor

Jul 23 '05 #6

Trevor Orton

"David Ross" <no****@nowhere .not> wrote in message
news:41******** *******@nowhere .not...

First of all, the validator is saying there is something wrong with
your server, not with your page. It never even tried to validate
your page.
Makes sense.
You need to have your Web host correct the server's .htaccess file
to define a MIME type for HTML files. It's not unusual for an
individual Web site to also have its own .htaccess file for
esoteric MIME types; I have one. However, your Web server should
already have HTML defined in its master .htaccess.
I didn't know MS IIS had a .htaccess file. I thought .htaccess was used
with linux based web servers only. My IIS GUI shows that text/html is
configured correctly so I'll have to investigate this one further.
However, I can tell you that you definitely have a design problem.
A well-designed Web page should not require right-left scrolling,
especially for text.

Yes, I used absolute positioning in my css and may have used too wide of a
page design. Also, I have only tested it on recent versions of IE and NS so
far so it could be brutal on other browsers at the moment and I wouldn't
even know. I've got some work to do on that end.

Thanks for your feedback.

Trevor

Jul 23 '05 #7

Harrie

Trevor Orton said the following on 11/13/04 20:55:

"David Ross" <no****@nowhere .not> wrote in message
news:41******** *******@nowhere .not...
You need to have your Web host correct the server's .htaccess file
to define a MIME type for HTML files. It's not unusual for an
individual Web site to also have its own .htaccess file for
esoteric MIME types; I have one. However, your Web server should
already have HTML defined in its master .htaccess.

I didn't know MS IIS had a .htaccess file. I thought .htaccess was used
with linux based web servers only.

AFAIK .htaccess is specific to Apache. But Apache is not Linux based
only, it's a cross platform web server that also runs on Windows. You
might want to give it a try.

--
Regards
Harrie

Jul 23 '05 #8

Harrie

Trevor Orton said the following on 11/13/04 06:48:

The site uses a URL rewriter so even though the URL appears as static to the
client it gets modified by the server to a dynamic URL before processing and
responding to the client. I'm wondering if the server is not including the
correct content-type in the header information because the ".htm" is
stripped from the URL during processing and before the response is actually
returned to the client side. [..]
Why (stripping the ".htm" part)?
[..] If that is the case, any ideas on how to
rectify the problem?

Maybe by not stripping the stripping the ".htm" part?

--
Regards
Harrie

Jul 23 '05 #9

Brian

Trevor Orton wrote:

I didn't know MS IIS had a .htaccess file.
AFAIK, it doesn't.
I thought .htaccess was used with linux based web servers only.

No. It is used with *Apache* only, regardless of operating system. I use
it on Apache/Linux and Apache/Windows.

--
Brian (remove "invalid" to email me)

Jul 23 '05 #10

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