Opinion: Do web standards matter?

[Sugapablo]

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.
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[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

c.thornquist wrote:

"Beauregard T. Shagnasty" <a.*********@ex ample.invalid> wrote in
message news:e3******** *******@twister .nyroc.rr.com.. .

Oh, Firefox is less than 5MB.

My Add/Remove programs says Mozilla Firefox 1.0.2 is 15.80MB.
Can't remember where FF was saving to, but I'll find it.

That is the installed/expanded size of the program, not the download
file size. My Win2K installation says 15.6MB.

Search for: Firefox Setup 1.0.2.exe (yeah, with spaces)

--
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[Toby Inkster]

Travis Newbury wrote:

Toby Inkster wrote:

I can certainly see the need for a max-width and a min-width. A mimimum
width is needed if you're using multi-columns of any reasonably large
images. A maximum width may be a good idea for reasons of readability.

And if only IE had thought about this... Maybe with the next version...

I don't necessarily mean the CSS "max-width" and "min-width" properties,
though it certainly would be handy if IE/win supported those.

There are other ways impose a minimum and maximum width on a design. An
example of an imposed miminum width (though one that I would by no means
recommend) would be:

<table>
<tr>
<td>
<h1>
<img src="header" alt="My Site" width=600 height=80>
</h1>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<!-- Content goes here. -->
</td>
</tr>
</table>

The width of the graphic stops the table from shrinking to less than
600px, but there is nothing to stop it growing to more than 600px.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
Contact Me ~ http://tobyinkster.co.uk/contact
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[c.thornquist]

"Toby Inkster" <us**********@t obyinkster.co.u k> wrote in message
news:pa******** *************** ****@tobyinkste r.co.uk...

c.thornquist wrote:

Why is that silly? Even on a 14" monitor that's a foot of text to read
across at a stretch.

A typical 14" (diagonal) monitor is 10.5" wide. Taking account of a scroll
bar and a little margin around the edge of the page, it's probably
slightly under 10", but let's call it ten as it's an easier calculation.

An example is at http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/

The text is just over a foot across in my 19" monitor at 1024x768.
Statistically, people are moving toward, not away from, larger monitors.
Just as they are moving toward 1024x768, from 800x600. And, since the
majority of visitors do not want to have to make any adjustments, it makes
sense to keep the text at a reasonable width.

It's not a trivial matter. I read constantly on the WWW and find it tiresome
to have to read such long blocks of text. Also, I need glasses for reading,
yet even without my glasses, I find the text at w3.org's site too large.
Most of us read a newspaper daily. And books. And look up numbers in phone
books occasionally. We're accustomed to a much smaller font & more narrow
blocks of text. (W3.org's font size looks typical of a childrens book.) Why
should websites be so different?

Newspaper publishers don't provide several versions of the daily paper to
all customers routinely. It would cost too much. Likewise, I'm not paid
enough to build multiple versions of the same website for different
resolutions & monitor sizes. Most people purchase eyeglasses if they have
trouble reading their newspaper or phone book.

I want my sites to be accessible, comfortable to read, easy to navigate and
visually appealing. Common sense dictates, to me, that we have to draw the
line somewhere.

Carla

[c.thornquist]

"Toby Inkster" <us**********@t obyinkster.co.u k> wrote in message
news:pa******** *************** *****@tobyinkst er.co.uk...

Travis Newbury wrote:

Toby Inkster wrote:

<snip>
There are other ways impose a minimum and maximum width on a design. An
example of an imposed miminum width (though one that I would by no means
recommend) would be: <snip> The width of the graphic stops the table from shrinking to less than
600px, but there is nothing to stop it growing to more than 600px.

What if your top header or banner just won't work visually with anything
other than its width, say 650 pixels? Does CSS allow you to to keep that
width throughout the page w/o using tables?

Carla

[Alan J. Flavell]

On Sat, 2 Apr 2005, c.thornquist wrote:

The text is just over a foot across in my 19" monitor at 1024x768.
Statistically, people are moving toward, not away from, larger
monitors.
Statistically, presentation situations for web pages are getting *more
diverse*. That's the chief lesson we have to take from these
discussions, IMHO.

Another lesson is that people are moving from CRTs to panels - and the
latter have an inherent resolution in pixels. Getting the kind of
resolution that we were already using with CRTs years ago (1600x1200
would not be uncommon) is prohibitively expensive with panels, so some
of our users are taking a hit on that - just the opposite of what you
claimed.
Just as they are moving toward 1024x768, from 800x600. And, since
the majority of visitors do not want to have to make any
adjustments, it makes sense to keep the text at a reasonable width.
If you believe that the majority of users don't want to make any
adjustments, they'll presumably be working at the browser's
installation default window size.
I want my sites to be accessible, comfortable to read, easy to
navigate and visually appealing. Common sense dictates, to me, that
we have to draw the line somewhere.

Indeed, and I draw that line at people who will insist on making an
absurd choice and then complaining about the consequences. Those who
use a handheld display, or who have sight impairment, or who have
browsing requirements which are unusual in other ways, might not have
much choice in the matter. But those who can casually tell us how
easy it is to change from the installation default display (a
reasonably-sized window) to something else (fullscreen display) surely
cannot tell us that it's impossibly hard to change back again when the
need arises. I'm happy to specify a max-width, as I already said; but
I'm not prepared to show much sympathy for those who need max-width
but choose a browser without it.

[Uncle Pirate]

Ángel wrote:

In alt.html Uncle Pirate <st**@surecann. com> wrote:

That's it, I beleive. I know that I am no designer. So, in the
upcoming redesign of the large website I manage (http://alamo.nmsu.edu),
the design will be created by a committee consisting of people from our

Please do not allow the person who had the idea of adding the animated
gif behind the address to join in to the committee :-)

Oh, he'll be on the committee (me), but input will be offset by some
people from the art department. :) I freely admit, I am a developer,
not a designer. I intend to limit my input to technical details this time.

--
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Webmaster/Computer Center Manager, NMSU at Alamogordo
Coordinator, Tularosa Basin Chapter, ABATE of NM; AMA#758681; COBB
'94 1500 Vulcan (now wrecked) :( http://motorcyclefun.org/Dcp_2068c.jpg
A zest for living must include a willingness to die. - R.A. Heinlein

[c.thornquist]

"Alan J. Flavell" <fl*****@ph.gla .ac.uk> wrote in message
news:Pi******** *************** *******@ppepc56 .ph.gla.ac.uk.. .

On Sat, 2 Apr 2005, c.thornquist wrote:
<snip> But those who can casually tell us how
easy it is to change from the installation default display (a
reasonably-sized window) to something else (fullscreen display) surely
cannot tell us that it's impossibly hard to change back again when the
need arises. I'm happy to specify a max-width, as I already said; but
I'm not prepared to show much sympathy for those who need max-width
but choose a browser without it.

I'm talking about back & forth...back & forth. You can view my sites just
fine in the browsers' reasonable, as you call it, default. That's not the
case with websites in which the text spreads across 100% of the monitor.
Luckily, for me, most sites don't fill my screen with text at 100% width.

Don't you think most people keep their browsers open to 100%? I just asked
my teenagers & they said "always" 100%. There's probably research somewhere
about it.

Maybe you don't understand the desire to open to 100% because it doesn't fit
the way you use your computer. But as site builders we have to think of what
most people do.

Carla

[c.thornquist]

"Uncle Pirate" <st**@SureCann. com> wrote in message
news:42******** @nntp.zianet.co m...

Ángel wrote:

In alt.html Uncle Pirate <st**@surecann. com> wrote:

Oh, he'll be on the committee (me), but input will be offset by some
people from the art department. :) I freely admit, I am a developer, not
a designer. I intend to limit my input to technical details this time.

The bottom right of all images in the slideshow are missing for me in IE.

Carla

[kchayka]

c.thornquist wrote:

An example is at http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/

(W3.org's font size looks typical of a childrens book.)

That's funny, I find both the font family and size to be absolutely
perfect, since I'm getting my own browser default for both. :-)

If you don't like how your browser default font looks, then change it.
Just don't complain about it.

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[Toby Inkster]

c.thornquist wrote:

Don't you think most people keep their browsers open to 100%? I just
asked my teenagers & they said "always" 100%. There's probably research
somewhere about it.

As it happens, I did a survey on this 13 months ago, but never published
the results. I would guess they are still roughly valid.

Will add them to my site now and post a link when done.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
Contact Me ~ http://tobyinkster.co.uk/contact