Re: CSS for positioning

[Jenn]

Op 13-5-2010 16:22, Jenn schreef:

Let me refrase that: They were not considered un-healthy.

Some people were warning against the use of tobacco even at the
beginning of the last century. They were probably ignored because the
bad effects of tobacco were not widely known or even acknowledged.

Today we know better.

We also know better where it concerns the use of frames, tables for
layout, pixel-perfect layouts, use of Xhtml etc etc.
But you have to appreciate that there are new techniques and new
technology that makes these things out-dated.

You very consistently ignore this and you keep defending what you
learned in the Nineties and have used ever since.

My perspective is that I use what I know will work for the scenario that I'm
required to either fix or create. What I use works despite it not being the
newest or coolest technique. As newer scenarios are required of me I will
search for newer techniques as needed, but I see no problem with combining
the new with the old if they work. When I first came to my current
position, the company needed a tool on the website, but one was not
available for the current set-up. A tech who worked in the next office next
to me was formerly a programmer. He sent me a simple code that has worked
for many years for that particular set-up that I needed. It still works
today and I still use it if I need a particular functionality. Later, a new
tool was created, but it still will not do everything that is needed, so the
old tool is still used on occasion. In other words ... it's great to learn
the new stuff.. but don't toss out the old stuff that still works just
because something new comes along. It doesn't matter to me what year a code
or tool was used if it still works today.

 

[Rob W.]

Op 13-5-2010 16:25, Jenn schreef:

Not really .. the internet has no borders or boundaries....

In my opinion your missing the point.

Publishing a website and forcing your viewers to use a specific browser
or to use javascript should not go together.

Ofcourse you've seen many sites that have these 'warnings'.
It has been said before in this thread: large numbers don't make it right.

 

[Doug Miller]

I haven't *nymshifted* 3 times ... I'll repeat for you since you have
comprehension issues.... I have 3 computers.... 2 of them I use every day,
and the 3rd (my laptop) I use less often, and all 3 I use to access my
usenet ngs.

That of course makes one wonder why you have different configurations for each
of the three news clients...

 

[Jenn]

Op 13-5-2010 16:25, Jenn schreef:

In my opinion your missing the point.

I understand your point.. I just happen to believe differently.

Publishing a website and forcing your viewers to use a specific
browser or to use javascript should not go together.

A webmaster should make sure the site is exactly what the client is wanting
and not put limits on it based on a webmasters pre-conceived notions about
code and standards. I'm not saying it's not a good thing to have code
standard... I'm saying if you put how, for example, Google indexes websites
ahead of geo-targeting and what the site will be used for, how advertising
will be implemented to promote the site, and other such things, then the
webmaster has severely limited the possibilities of the website already.

Of course you've seen many sites that have these 'warnings'.
It has been said before in this thread: large numbers don't make it
right.

You can box yourself into only one method and mindset for implementing
websites when you become so stringent on standards.... It would be
different if a website that didn't follow strict w3c code standard failed
when the average user hit the site.. but that's just not the case. ALOT of
code works in multiple browsers despite not reaching that code standard.
Large numbers simply means that there may be a standard, but that standard
doesn't cause sufficient errors to sites rendering properly for the majority
to see the necessity to code so strictly.

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Have you ever heard of geo-targeting?

Of course. It still has nothing to do with which is the most-used search
engine *by the people*.

 

[Jonathan N. Little]

Have you ever heard of geo-targeting?

If you mean tailoring a website based upon a visitors IP? Well that's a
bad idea. Client IP != geographical location of the client.

Do a look-up on me and you will be wrong if you think I am anywhere near
where my IP indicates.

 

[Jeremy J Starcher]

They are highly dynamic sites that cater to millions of viewers. If
those millions of viewers did not like the quality of the product they
would go elsewhere.

Allow me to offer something else that you might want to consider, Jen.

How many of those large sites had to be quickly patched/updated/fixed
when IE7 came out?

How many failed /again/ when IE8 came out?

Hint: LOTS.

Enough sites broke that Microsoft keeps a list of broken web pages and
offers them to IE8 saying 'Render this as IE7.'

For /months/ after IE8 came out there was a large number of sites I had
trouble accessing.. including my email.

On the other hand, well designed pages simply ... worked. When IE7 came
out, I loaded up my pages and went "Ah, thats how they look in IE7." I
made the same process with IE8.

Good design practice means ... less work.


Here is something else you should do:
Go to
http://www.testiphone.com/

and try browsing through your site and your favorite pages. See how many
of them require horizontal scrolling and are horribly difficult to use.

Then look at a site like:
http://cuyahogafallshistoricalsociety.com/


See how much better it fits?

The amount of extra work I had to go through to handle the iPhone?
None. First time I looked at it, actually.

As hand-held devices become more popular, and viewports become smaller
again, some people are going to have to scurry and "fix" all of their
documents, and others are just going to smile.

 

[Rob W.]

Op 13-5-2010 20:51, Jenn schreef:

Rob W. wrote:

A website is not all about the validation and search engines, and if all a
webmaster thinks about is that, they will only be targeting a small portion
of the people who might be valid customers for a site.

This is exactly what I said about you missing the point:
nowhere did I state that a website is all (and only) about validation
nowhere did I state that it is all a webmaster should think about.

I just happened to mention the aspects that we were discussing.

... but I am adding an additional dimension to this
topic, which is also important. Despite the standards that some here wish
to follow, I am providing examples of very large sites that don't follow
those standards, yet, they have a very huge following as far as viewers who
use their site, so, while the standard you speak of may be a goal to reach
for, that goal is obviously not practically implemented by a majority in the
industry.

Adhering to standards *and* using up to date techniques should make the
work on these websites simpler and less time-consuming.

Furthermore: while attracting large numbers of viewers, you have very
likely no idea about the number of people who cannot make use of these
sites or who experience difficulties (e.g. by the sites using tables for
layout)

It is no fun to solely be a *taker* with any group..

That may be so, but I fail to see the advantage of *giving* outdated
advice or opinions.

I have little patience for people who treat others badly simply because they have a different point of
view than the status quo.

Status quo is the current state of affairs. This implies that there is a
history.
Most people in this newsgroup are aware of history and they have moved on.
They not only have kept from history what is good and left behind what
was bad or became useless, they are also very much willing to look ahead
and discuss new developments.

It's not surprising that they have little patience for someone who has
not moved along.

Rarely do I miss a straight out point someone is wanting to make...

Let's agree to disagree, OK?

 

[Jenn]

That of course makes one wonder why you have different configurations
for each
of the three news clients...

well geee .. they are different ... one is old .. one is newer, and the
third is a laptop somewhere in the middle.

 

[Jenn]

In message <[email protected]>
Jenn wrote:

... [remarks of a non-personally wounding nature}

I am not a person inclined to use rude words, but you are trying
my patience with your stupidity.


And, of course, you have nothing really to do with the matter,
there is some guy with a gun to your head forcing you to reply
and engage with this lady and you greatly resent having to do

Hasn't she nymshifted three times now?

I haven't *nymshifted* 3 times ... I'll repeat for you since you have
comprehension issues.... I have 3 computers.... 2 of them I use
every day, and the 3rd (my laptop) I use less often, and all 3 I use
to access my usenet ngs.

I have *SIX* computers that I read news from. Can you tell which one
I'm posting from? Do I have separate configs on each machine to evade
kill files?

Nope. that's because I'm not a nymshifting troll. You posted
exclusively from ONE nym until people started telling you they'd
killfiled you, then you posted from a second nym. After some time you
posted froma third nym

You're a nymshifting troll.

... and I'm not a computer hardware configuration person either... so sue me
.... I have 3 computers that access the ngs. Once they are set up I don't
mess with their ng setups. I EVEN added to my sigtag that I was using my
laptop. Now .. since you've let me know all your machines are in sinc..
It'll be very easy to add you to my own kill file. LOL

 

[Jeremy J Starcher]

A webmaster should make sure the site is exactly what the client is
wanting and not put limits on it based on a webmasters pre-conceived
notions about code and standards. I'm not saying it's not a good thing
to have code standard... I'm saying if you put how, for example, Google
indexes websites ahead of geo-targeting and what the site will be used
for, how advertising will be implemented to promote the site, and other
such things, then the webmaster has severely limited the possibilities
of the website already.

What a client /wants/ and what a client /asks for/ are very very very
different things. A web designer should be a consultant and that
consultant's job is to help the client choose the correct path to take.

On top of that, the /coding standards/ very little to do with content.
The client, unless you are extremely lucky [or extremely unlucky], only
knows the content that he wants. That content can be brought to reality
using good markup standards or bad markup standards. NOTHING that has
been suggested that in any way limits the design of the site.

(if anything, there are more design options available through proper
HTML4.01 strict and proper CSS .. and the prototyping and trying of ideas
is much faster.)

You can box yourself into only one method and mindset for implementing
websites when you become so stringent on standards.... It would be
different if a website that didn't follow strict w3c code standard
failed when the average user hit the site.. but that's just not the
case.

There is nothing that can be done in bad coding practice that can't be
done well.

Besides, the "average user" shouldn't be your only concern. Once again,
get FireVOX and spend a few hours browsing the web.

ALOT of code works in multiple browsers despite not reaching that
code standard. Large numbers simply means that there may be a standard,
but that standard doesn't cause sufficient errors to sites rendering
properly for the majority to see the necessity to code so strictly.

You act as if coding strictly is really any more difficult than *not*
coding strictly. There is precious little time difference once you get
the hang of it, and the strict coding makes tracking down certain types
of errors sooo much easier.

(Have you ever gotten a stray '>' in your document somewhere that turned
out to be from <b>bad</b>> markup? Sans validator.. enjoy looking. With
validator, it will tell you line and character number.)

 

[Doug Miller]

well geee .. they are different ... one is old .. one is newer, and the
third is a laptop somewhere in the middle.

And that means you're unable to configure the same email address on all three?

 

[Jenn]

And that means you're unable to configure the same email address on
all three?

It means I don't care since all 3 emails are spoofed anyway. I really don't
see why it's a big deal.

 

[Jenn]

Op 13-5-2010 20:51, Jenn schreef:



That may be so, but I fail to see the advantage of *giving* outdated
advice or opinions.

I don't consider my point of view to be outdated since it is how I see
things currently. How, I set them in the future may change.

Status quo is the current state of affairs. This implies that there
is a history.
Most people in this newsgroup are aware of history and they have
moved on. They not only have kept from history what is good and left
behind what was bad or became useless, they are also very much
willing to look ahead and discuss new developments.

Thus far they don't discuss new developments... they are arrogant and feel
they have a right to shove them down others throats.

It's not surprising that they have little patience for someone who has
not moved along.

Patience if a virtue in every encounter with people and in life. Arrogance
has little or no value in either scenario.

Let's agree to disagree, OK?

Ok with me. It's always good to discuss issues with someone who is
willing to do so. Future discussions may find us on the same side of an
issue.. who knows?

 

[Doug Miller]

It means I don't care since all 3 emails are spoofed anyway. I really don't
see why it's a big deal.

It's not a big deal, except to the extent that it can easily be perceived as
an attempt to evade killfilters. Clearly it's no more difficult to configure
three clients with the same email address than it is to configure them with
three different addresses. And it seems odd that the *first* time you were
accused of nymshifting, you said, no, not really, you're just using two
different computers. Now it's *three* different computers. How long before
it's "four"?

 

[Jenn]

Allow me to offer something else that you might want to consider, Jen.

How many of those large sites had to be quickly patched/updated/fixed
when IE7 came out?

How many failed /again/ when IE8 came out?

Hint: LOTS.

Those are good questions... The large site I work on needed no updates due
to those browser updates. They were better off because IE6 was no longer
the top browser. (thank GOD!)

The issue is those sites now still have hundreds of errors listed by the
validator.. yet .. they function fine and have, more than likely, millions
of views.

Enough sites broke that Microsoft keeps a list of broken web pages and
offers them to IE8 saying 'Render this as IE7.'

For /months/ after IE8 came out there was a large number of sites I
had trouble accessing.. including my email.

On the other hand, well designed pages simply ... worked. When IE7
came out, I loaded up my pages and went "Ah, thats how they look in
IE7." I made the same process with IE8.

Good design practice means ... less work.


Here is something else you should do:
Go to
http://www.testiphone.com/

and try browsing through your site and your favorite pages. See how
many of them require horizontal scrolling and are horribly difficult
to use.

Then look at a site like:
http://cuyahogafallshistoricalsociety.com/


See how much better it fits?

The amount of extra work I had to go through to handle the iPhone?
None. First time I looked at it, actually.

As hand-held devices become more popular, and viewports become smaller
again, some people are going to have to scurry and "fix" all of their
documents, and others are just going to smile.

Maybe so.. maybe not ... technology is changing so fast I really don't see
any of that as unusual.

 

[Jenn]

dorayme wrote:

Maybe, but not the one that recognize that her "arguments" are mostly
false. When challenged offers "proof" with no basis. And then is
dismissive to anyone who does offer credible evidence to the contrary.
Although there are much larger sites out there, mine is not small and
is contrary to her assertion that validation is only possible with small
hobby sites.

Jonathan ... I've already said elsewhere that I meant nothing negative in
regards to your site, and I also have never offered any critique on your
site, either. I don't consider your site to be large in comparison to the
sites I quoted (cnn.com, msnbc.com, foxnews.com, etc.)

 

[Jenn]

It's not a big deal, except to the extent that it can easily be
perceived as
an attempt to evade killfilters. Clearly it's no more difficult to
configure
three clients with the same email address than it is to configure
them with
three different addresses. And it seems odd that the *first* time you
were
accused of nymshifting, you said, no, not really, you're just using
two
different computers. Now it's *three* different computers. How long
before
it's "four"?

If I was of a mindset to bug someone who I thought was killfiling me, I'd do
it right to begin with..... I wouldn't mess with doing it once or twice
between the computers I use... but I *don't really have the mindset* to do
that ... LOL

Not that I really need to explain what I do to anyone.. I will offer an
explanation to clarify... I generally use 2 computers for ngs... I usually
only boot up my laptop if my pc is unavailable to use or if I want to video
chat with friends because my laptop has a cam, but my pcs don't. My laptop
is my backup, more or less, and I don't use it every day. The particular
day I used my laptop because I was running my pc through a scan and was
bored waiting for it to finish, so I booted up my laptop to read and post
til my pc was done scanning. I don't sit around worrying about people who
might want to killfile me.. that's not my problem to worry with... I also
added to my sigtag that I was posting from my laptop (for me anyway so when
I go back and read I will know where I posted that from.)

 

[Jenn]

And, as counterexamples, I offer:

http://www.ibm.com
http://www.sony.com
http://www.mit.edu
http://www.ca.gov
http://www.navy.mil

question .. the validator says it was checked as XHTML 1.0 Transitional.

I thought I've seen people here say that that particular doctype was old and
shouldn't be used now? 1999?

 

[Peter]

I didn't say leave it blank (or omit it); I said it's not required, as
you were claiming.

I guess from that perspective you are correct. Mind you, just for fun I
may try a few tests on the meta description just to see whether it is
just used for descriptive purposes.

And "what text to display" .. on my personal site for example, I have
only the domain name in the meta description, but google shows the first
couple sentences of page content in the search results.

True, it depends upon what your site is about. Any kind of commercial
site should use a meta description in my personal point of view.