Comparing stylesheets

[David]

I've got a 50k main.css file that's referenced by a load of sites.
Each of these sites also has a site.css file that modifies certain
styles defined in main.css. Changing the colour of borders, boxes etc,
as well as defining certain site specific styles. site.css is small
and easy to understand, and the only bit that can be edited by the
masses.

That's the theory. The practice is that there are now 4 sites going
live
in a week where some muppet who claims to understand css has just
copied
main.css in chunks, renamed it site.css, tweaked some bits and added
more, without deleting the inherited styles (*nice full explanation
below). It all works fine, but it means each site's site.css is now
about 60k, when it's meant to be nice and neat and about 10/20k.

So, to the question:
What tools do people out there use that could help me? Is there any
tool that can compare declarations across multiple stylesheets to
prevent me from sitting down and laboriously going through every style
declaration in site.css to check if it's redundant or not? 4 times
over? I've had a look at Topstyle and it doesn't seem to perform this
function, which I find surprising. Am I being stupid?

diff/sed/awk etc aren't options, btw...(I ain't a unix god)


*Crystal clear explanation:
in main.css there is this statement:

A.backtotop:lin k, A.backtotop:vis ited {
float:right;
margin-top:5px;
margin-right:10px;
margin-left:7px;
padding-left:10px;
font-size:70%;
color:#fff;
background:url( arrow_white_up. gif) 0 0.6em no-repeat;
}
A.backtotop:hov er {color:#fff;}
In site.css there is this statement:

A.backtotop:lin k, A.backtotop:vis ited {
float:right;
margin-top:5px;
margin-right:0;
margin-left:7px;
padding-left:10px;
font-size:70%;
text-decoration:none ;
color:#000;
background:url( arrow_black_up. gif) 0 0.6em no-repeat;
}
A.backtotop:hov er {text-decoration:unde rline; }
site.css doesn't need those duplicate declarations, so that the
declaration in site.css *should* read:

A.backtotop:lin k, A.backtotop:vis ited {
margin-right:0;
text-decoration:none ;
color:#000;
background:url( arrow_black_up. gif) 0 0.6em no-repeat;
}
A.backtotop:hov er {text-decoration:unde rline; }
But, like, there's 240k of this stuff...

[C A Upsdell]

"David" <da********@yah oo.co.uk> wrote in message
news:99******** *************** ***@posting.goo gle.com...

I've got a 50k main.css file that's referenced by a load of sites.
Each of these sites also has a site.css file that modifies certain
styles defined in main.css. Changing the colour of borders, boxes etc,
as well as defining certain site specific styles. site.css is small
and easy to understand, and the only bit that can be edited by the
masses.

That's the theory. The practice is that there are now 4 sites going
live
in a week where some muppet who claims to understand css has just
copied
main.css in chunks, renamed it site.css, tweaked some bits and added
more, without deleting the inherited styles (*nice full explanation
below). It all works fine, but it means each site's site.css is now
about 60k, when it's meant to be nice and neat and about 10/20k.

So, to the question:
What tools do people out there use that could help me? Is there any
tool that can compare declarations across multiple stylesheets to
prevent me from sitting down and laboriously going through every style
declaration in site.css to check if it's redundant or not? 4 times
over? I've had a look at Topstyle and it doesn't seem to perform this
function, which I find surprising. Am I being stupid?

If you made a backup before the muppet showed up, restore the files from the
backup. Otherwise ...

.... if you have Windows, you can try to recover the old files from the
Recycle Bin.

[Lauri Raittila]

David wrote;

I've got a 50k main.css file that's referenced by a load of sites.
Too heavy.
below). It all works fine, but it means each site's site.css is now
about 60k, when it's meant to be nice and neat and about 10/20k.
Worse
So, to the question:
What tools do people out there use that could help me? Is there any
tool that can compare declarations across multiple stylesheets to
prevent me from sitting down and laboriously going through every style
declaration in site.css to check if it's redundant or not? 4 times
over? I've had a look at Topstyle and it doesn't seem to perform this
function, which I find surprising. Am I being stupid?

diff/sed/awk etc aren't options, btw...(I ain't a unix god)
Too bad... Perl?... If you can't find any tool, it might made sence to
pay someone to do such tool, so next time such exsist. If I ahd this
problem, I would certainly make a tool... Someone with knowledge of some
CSS parser would make better tool.
in main.css there is this statement:

A.backtotop:lin k, A.backtotop:vis ited {
float:right;
margin-top:5px;
margin-right:10px;
margin-left:7px;
padding-left:10px;
font-size:70%;
color:#fff;
background:url( arrow_white_up. gif) 0 0.6em no-repeat;
}
A.backtotop:hov er {color:#fff;}
Easy solution: Back to top links are not good idea, so delete both and
markup related...
But, like, there's 240k of this stuff...

Hm, If I got you right, you have 4 site.css, and you need to get common
stuff out of them to main.css? Or do you have some specific reason to
just remove stuff in main.css from site.csses?

--
Lauri Raittila <http://www.iki.fi/lr> <http://www.iki.fi/zwak/fonts>

[Harlan Messinger]

"Lauri Raittila" <la***@raittila .cjb.net> wrote in message
news:MP******** *************** *@news.individu al.net...

Easy solution: Back to top links are not good idea, so delete both and
markup related...

That's the first time I've seen that opinion. Why aren't they a good idea?

[David]

Lauri Raittila <la***@raittila .cjb.net> wrote in message news:<MP******* *************** **@news.individ ual.net>...

I've got a 50k main.css file that's referenced by a load of sites.
Too heavy.

Yeah. You're right. It's big. Lots of commonality across sites...we're
actually going to split it up a bit so we've got a

main.css
sitegroup.css
site.css

....sort of layout. Should reduce main to about 30k or so.

Too bad... Perl?... If you can't find any tool, it might made sence to
pay someone to do such tool, so next time such exsist. If I ahd this
problem, I would certainly make a tool... Someone with knowledge of some
CSS parser would make better tool.

I am getting the horrible sinking feeling that it's going to be a perl
jobby. Not *too* difficult (for someone other than me), but I was
really hoping TopStyle had this functionality - I'm quite surprised it
doesn't, given the nature of CSS it would seem natural that at some
point you'd be importing multiple stylesheets into a document and have
the possibility of duplicate styles occurring. Be a dead useful
feature. For me. Right now. Ho hum.

Easy solution: Back to top links are not good idea, so delete both and
markup related...

Interesting. Perhaps not the forum for it (I imagine we'd get justly
flamed for discussing non-css stuff), but if you want to take this off
list I'd be interested to know your reasons for saying back to top
links aren't a good idea...it's something I've never heard before...

Hm, If I got you right, you have 4 site.css, and you need to get common
stuff out of them to main.css? Or do you have some specific reason to
just remove stuff in main.css from site.csses?

Nope. I need to remove declarations in the site.css files that are
identical to declarations in main.css...

[David]

"C A Upsdell" <cupsdell0311XX X@-@[e-mail]> wrote in message news:<hu******* *************@r ogers.com>...

If you made a backup before the muppet showed up, restore the files from the
backup. Otherwise ...

... if you have Windows, you can try to recover the old files from the
Recycle Bin.

Oh, if only it were that simple :)

The muppet has (to be honest) done a pretty extensive amount of OK
work on the site.css files, it's just the inclusion of redundant stuff
that's the problem.

[Mark Tranchant]

David wrote:

Lauri Raittila <la***@raittila .cjb.net> wrote in message news:<MP******* *************** **@news.individ ual.net>...

Easy solution: Back to top links are not good idea, so delete both and
markup related...

Interesting. Perhaps not the forum for it (I imagine we'd get justly
flamed for discussing non-css stuff), but if you want to take this off
list I'd be interested to know your reasons for saying back to top
links aren't a good idea...it's something I've never heard before...

It's a feature. We don't like features round here. ;-)

--
Mark.
http://tranchant.plus.com/

[Daniel Déchelotte]

"Harlan Messinger" <h.*********@co mcast.net> a écrit :

| "Lauri Raittila" <la***@raittila .cjb.net> wrote in message:
|
| > Easy solution: Back to top links are not good idea, so delete both and
| > markup related...
|
| That's the first time I've seen that opinion. Why aren't they a good
| idea?

As a user, have you ever used one of them? Have you ever _needed_ one of
them?

--
Daniel Déchelotte
http://yo.dan.free.fr/

[Alan J. Flavell]

On Tue, 19 Oct 2004, Daniel [ISO-8859-15] Déchelotte wrote:

| "Lauri Raittila" <la***@raittila .cjb.net> wrote in message:
|
| > Easy solution: Back to top links are not good idea, so delete both and
| > markup related...
[...]
As a user, have you ever used one of them? Have you ever _needed_
one of them?

No; but there's some kind of theory (I'd tend rather to think of it as
"superstiti on", I'm afraid) that they are useful for accessibility.

However, I don't know a browser that doesn't have several different
ways of its own to get to the head of the page[1], so I reckon they're
just a confusing waste of good markup. Those disabled folks that I've
met have shown much better abilities at using the browser's own
built-in tools on every page (rather than letting themselves be misled
by page-specific or site-specific ersatz features) - as compared to
some ordinary folks whose only "disability " was shortage of a clue.

cheers

[1] Notice that I didn't say "back to the head of the page", because a
reader who went to a fragment URL (wibble#whateve r) might never have
seen the head of the page before - hence, it can be illogical to speak
about going "back" to it.

[Harlan Messinger]

"Daniel Déchelotte" <ma**********@f r.club-internet.invali d> wrote in message
news:2004101917 2426.6d459e1e.m a**********@fr. club-internet.invali d...

"Harlan Messinger" <h.*********@co mcast.net> a écrit :

| "Lauri Raittila" <la***@raittila .cjb.net> wrote in message:
|
| > Easy solution: Back to top links are not good idea, so delete both and
| > markup related...
|
| That's the first time I've seen that opinion. Why aren't they a good
| idea?

As a user, have you ever used one of them?
Yes, frequently.

Have you ever _needed_ one of them?

I don't need a mouse either--at least for web sites that build pages fully
accessible by keyboard--but I use one.