Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.
Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?
P.S. Slashdot returned a 403 Forbidden to the validator but when I saved
the homepage locally, it failed too.
--
[ Sugapablo ]
[ http://www.sugapablo.net <--personal | http://www.sugapablo.com <--music ]
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On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 08:01:30 -0500, Sugapablo wrote: Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.
Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?
P.S. Slashdot returned a 403 Forbidden to the validator but when I saved
the homepage locally, it failed too.
I follow the standards. It isn't a guarantee that the page(s) will work
everywhere, but I like to think it will. Maybe eventually, the browsers
will catch up and follow the standards too. In the mean time, some
manufacturers like to make their own standards, rather than following
those already in existance.
I also try to produce pages with minimal bloat. Keep the pages small, so
they load fast. It also makes them easier to edit later on.
Carolyn
On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 08:08:11 -0500, Carolyn Marenger wrote: I also try to produce pages with minimal bloat. Keep the pages small, so
they load fast. It also makes them easier to edit later on.
Yeah, that's why I created http://www.subuse.net
Sometimes, I still get this romantic nostalgia for the days when I had a
2400 baud modem, telix, lynx, and nothing but command line. Silly, but...
Plus, today, with so many web phones and mobile devices, there aren't many
sites that work well with them, so I figured there's a need for minimalism
again.
--
[ Sugapablo ]
[ http://www.sugapablo.net <--personal | http://www.sugapablo.com <--music ]
[ http://www.2ra.org <--political | http://www.subuse.net <--discuss ] http://www.subuse.net : text-only, low bandwidth, anonymous web forums
Sugapablo wrote: Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.
Good idea; good initiative.
Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".
That is sad news. This reflects on disregard for standards and moreover --
the inexperience of Web developers that these companies hire.
The movement of Web standards, much like that of Open Source, promotes a Web
that does not discriminate. This benefits everybody. So surely, Amazon,
Yahoo and M¥¢ro$o£t do not care enough. Mozilla have been discriminated
against for many years.
Want to know more about Web standards? Talk to the visually impaired, talk
to the PDA user, talk to the person in Africa who cannot afford a Window$
licence.
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards?
Yes. One day many of us will have to 'clean up' our Web sites. You, however,
will not need to do so. Your present effort will be merited. 1 year ago
people designed their site to be compatible with IE. With so much going on
at the moment, can anyone look 5 years ahead?
I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?
Once you practice a few validations, you learn from your mistakes and no
longer repeat them. Valid code becomes innate.
P.S. Slashdot returned a 403 Forbidden to the validator but when I saved
the homepage locally, it failed too.
Ouch. Probably the result of several people collaborating on content.
Roy
--
Roy Schestowitz http://schestowitz.com
Sugapablo wrote: Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.
Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?
P.S. Slashdot returned a 403 Forbidden to the validator but when I saved
the homepage locally, it failed too.
You should note that it can be pretty hard to get such pages (I mean the
large portal like microsoft, yahoo...) valid. Such pages are dynamically
constructed with content from various sources. It is more of an
organizational monster act, to get the code corrected in databases in
various departments (finding and convincing the responsible people first),
hardcoded in custom software (perhaps developed by external contractors),
ad code delivered by affiliates...
mozilla.org is (compared to the others) a pretty small site and has just
been redesigned.
Even if the others started fixing their sites two year ago, I wouldn't
expect them to get the job done by now.
Microsoft for example just started this job (not sure, if it was
microsoft.com or another of their portal sites). They did pretty well, but
are still far from being perfect. IIRC some microsoft guy wrote about it -
and the obstacles in his blog.
--
Benjamin Niemann
Email: pink at odahoda dot de
WWW: http://www.odahoda.de/
I too try and follow the standards but I don't take much stock in the W3C
validator. Sometimes it will say stupid stuff like " a space is not allowed
here". I mean is that really gunna make a difference.
Also on things like CSS, IE does not support correctly half of it. Like
positioning is iffy. So I try my best and test my pages in IE and Mozilla or
Fire Bird. I'm more worried about my spelling!
--
Andrew C. Cooper www.wordforlife.com/cmhm
Check Out Our New Free Christian
Music Downloads At www.wordforlife.com
"Sugapablo" <ru**@REMOVEsug apablo.com> wrote in message
news:pa******** *************** *****@REMOVEsug apablo.com... On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 08:08:11 -0500, Carolyn Marenger wrote:
I also try to produce pages with minimal bloat. Keep the pages small, so
they load fast. It also makes them easier to edit later on.
Yeah, that's why I created http://www.subuse.net
Sometimes, I still get this romantic nostalgia for the days when I had a
2400 baud modem, telix, lynx, and nothing but command line. Silly, but...
Plus, today, with so many web phones and mobile devices, there aren't many
sites that work well with them, so I figured there's a need for minimalism
again.
--
[
]
[ http://www.sugapablo.net <--personal | http://www.sugapablo.com
<--music ]
[ http://www.2ra.org <--political | http://www.subuse.net
<--discuss ]
http://www.subuse.net : text-only, low bandwidth, anonymous web forums
In article <pa************ *************** *@REMOVEsugapab lo.com>,
Sugapablo <ru**@REMOVEsug apablo.com> wrote: So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?
Web standards are validation are a tool for you, for your own
development work -- today and into the future. But there's no value to
the visitor in trumpeting a web site as standards-compliant. No one
cares. But it definitely makes your job easier if you can check your
code against the W3C validators.
The Microsoft, Amazon and Yahoo! sites are works in progress. They
contain a great deal of legacy content and code, and are being modified
and updated all the time, on the fly. It is not surpirsing that such
sites are not yet standards-compliant. Only sites that are rewritten
from the ground-up can be made easily using web standards.
If web standards help you as a web developer, then use them, and forget
what the huge portals are doing.
--
Jim Royal
"Understand ing is a three-edged sword" http://JimRoyal.com
On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 08:01:30 -0500, Sugapablo
<ru**@REMOVEsug apablo.com> wrote: Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.
Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".
Why, I'm *shocked* that major corporations aren't developing to
standards! ;-)
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort.
Think of it as "future-proofing" your markup. You won't have to go
back and fix your sites that are broken in IE 8.2 or Fire&animal; 3.5.
What do yinz think?
I think you must be from Pittsburgh.
Nick
--
Nick Theodorakis ni************* *@hotmail.com
contact form: http://theodorakis.net/contact.html
Sugapablo wrote: Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?
I took a look at the nutrition info for some of the most popular eateries in
the US: McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell. Turns
out they're terrible for you! Loaded down with fat, sugar, and sodium.
So, if these places don't seem to care, why should the rest of us concern
ourselves with nutrition when we're cooking our own meals?
sherm--
--
Cocoa programming in Perl: http://camelbones.sourceforge.net
Hire me! My resume: http://www.dot-app.org
On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 08:01:30 -0500, Sugapablo <ru**@REMOVEsug apablo.com> wrote: So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards?
Violating my own standards here (read all responses already made, before
responding myself, as to avoid duplication of answers):
I get my motivation to code according to standards from within. I don't really
care what others do. _I_ mind, because:
- I like to create with a certain quality, and I think working according to
standards adds quality to what I create;
- I experience how easy it is to maintain quality code;
- I experience how easy it is to find flaws and mistakes with validating my
pages every now and again, when I made some major changes; flaws and mistakes
that can influence the rendering of my pages in a way that I think is
undesirable;
- I experience expanding my knowledge (train as I 'fight') if I challange myself
to stay within standards.
But, I like to be a bit naughty sometimes, so I created my own DTD that included
the <nobr> for example. So 'web standards' is really what you make of them in
the end, how else does evolution get a change ;-)
Now, I'll read what others had to say on this.
--
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