On Sun, 30 Apr 2006 09:35:03 +0200 Barbara de Zoete <tr******@pretl etters.net> wrote:
| On Sun, 30 Apr 2006 08:41:16 +0200, <ph************ **@ipal.net> wrote:
|
|> Is there really any advantage to using DIV elements with float style
|> properies, vs. the old method of TABLE and TR and TD?
|
| [ snip ]
|
|> I bet someone has already written "Tables considered harmful". But is
|> it really justified?
|
| This discussion has been done over and over again, in this group and other
|
www.authoring groups. Go through the archives first and then make up your
| mind.
| <URL:http://www.google.com/search?q=tablel ess+design>
| <ULR:http://groups.google.c om/groups/search?q=no+tab les++css+group: comp.infosystem s.www.authoring .*+group:alt.ht ml.*>
|
| In short:
| - Try to understand what markup is for: it 'tells' browsers and bots and
| the like what your content is. So a div is only needed if no other
| appropriate element is available (likewise with <span>).
Stop with the "try to understand" religion. I'm getting tired of it.
| - Tables are for tabular data. Using them for layout purposes is just the
| same thing as using blockquote for the left margin, <br> for whitespace
| between paragraphs, for padding on inline elements, <h4> for
| creating a block of text with a slightly larger, bold font. Just a few
| examples. It shows the author doesn't understand markup. It is all about
| abusing elements because of there appearance in graphical browsers.
That's all fine, but ...
| If done properly, in a html page the content is structured and marked up
| using meaningful elements. This should give the author already a lot of
| 'handles' to create the appearance of the page, for every element s/he
| uses in the body of the page, including the body element itself, can be
| used as a selector in a style sheet.
While CSS can do quite a lot, and can even do a lot of things that cannot
be done in just HTML, there remains a few things CSS cannot do. So it is
NOT yet time to say that HTML must be pure content.
Just accept the fact that, as good as it is, CSS still needs work!
| If some content needs to be treated differently than the standard looks
| the author created for the element, it gets a class or maybe an id. If
| some content is to be 'physically separated' from the rest of the page,
| the author can put it in a containing div and asign a class or id to that
| div.
I understand the principle. I've understood this for years, even before
CSS was practical enough to even try to use. The issue is NOT about the
understanding of the principle; the issue is that CSS has been growing
up from a state of being totally unusable (e.g. Netscape 3) to being a
royal PiTA (e.g. Netscape 4) to being now quite viable for _most_ things
(Firefox 1.5). But even still, it's not at 100%.
In many cases CSS forces the HTML (which should just be content and nothing
more) to have extra markup just to support style. For example, styling a
page to have some appearance of a grid structure through the use of float
requires _additional_ DIV elements to be added to the content. That
violates the principle of separation of content and style right there. If
CSS "had it right" then I could put some content in _just_ _one_ DIV element
and then you can put ANY style on it that you want, including hover raised
drop shadow effect that so far requires at least 3 layers of DIV elements in
the content to achieve. And that can confuse someone trying to restyle it
to something else.
| Once an author understands the concept of markup, why it came about in the
| first place, how to use it properly, s/he will no longer feel the need for
| tables for layout any longer.
Once you guys understand that CSS does NOT yet do all the things that people
_want_ to do, and _can_ be done with HTML hacks, then we won't see threads
like this and won't have repeated conversations like this.
The drop shadow effect is _better_ done in CSS than with HTML because it
requires lots of "wedges" in the form of extra table cells and transparent
GIF images to accomplish with just HTML. BUT ... it is still NOT RIGHT in
CSS because it _should_ be doable with exactly _one_ DIV element (which can
then be styled as anyone would want).
So ... I'm moving to use CSS for drop shadow effects.
The table grid is NOT _better_ in CSS, yet. There are _two_ reasons for
this. Reason 1 is that the way being promoted now (e.g. float:left) does
not work the same way. That is, not all the same effects are accomplished
with float:left as would be using TABLE/TR/TD. These effects include
syncronized alignment and rigid arrangement. Reason 2 is that, like the
case above for shadows though for different reasons, it still requires the
insertion of extra DIV elements in the content markup (beyond the two layers
that would obviously be needed in any method to distinguish what is to be in
a row and what is to be in a column). And I forgot to count some of the
column and row span features, which float:left can do only in limited ways.
So ... I'm going to stick with certain uses of tables for grid structure.
Please stop with the f*****g annoying "markup and style" religious promotion
and either work towards making CSS better (like maybe a CSS3 that fixes the
issues mentioned), or showing new creative ways to accomplish things that
people have been using HTML hacks for years to do, or just be quiet and take
a seat and watch the events unfold without your influence.
But just STOP ... NOW ... with all the "once authors understand ..." BS.
Get your OWN understanding that CSS just isn't at the 100% level, yet.
--
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| Phil Howard KA9WGN |
http://linuxhomepage.com/ http://ham.org/ |
| (first name) at ipal.net |
http://phil.ipal.org/ http://ka9wgn.ham.org/ |
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