Anyone still hand-coding web sites?

[RFox]

I date back to the early days of the web when HTML was limited
but very managable, and have always maintained that hand-coding
HTML gives you far better control and cleaner HTML markup than
any WYSIWYG editor.

But all the sites I created and manage are small sites (<50 pages).
And I've been out of the loop in terms of what's new in
methodology and with the specifications for the past couple
of years.

I need to get back into web design and am having to catch up
with a lot, as I find that most of the stuff I knew and did
is probably considered "archaic" and tedious.

It will just take me some time to familiarize myself with the
newer specs, but I can't decide if I should stay with hand-coding
web pages, or move to some kind of pre-packaged management
system.

I hear Dreamweaver is very popular, but have never used it.
Are people still hand-coding web design and web pages, or should
I move to a newer, more efficient method?

[Barry Pearson]

Stan Brown wrote:

In article
<X%**********************@news01.bloor.is.net.cabl e.rogers.com> in
comp.infosystems.www.authoring.html, Jonathan Snook
<go***************@snook.ca> wrote:

My requirement in running my personal site is that it "works" in all
browsers but doesn't have to look the _same_ in all browsers.

This should be emblazoned on the forehead of every Web designer.

So _much_ effort is wasted trying to get pages to look the same in
different browsers, when the only one who will know is the author.
With the possible exception of people who review Web sites for a
living, no user who is trying to get information cares what the site
looks like in a browser other than the one she happens to be using -
- provided the browser she's using can display the information.

I expect my pages to look the same on my PC in my test-set of browsers used at
their default setting, or at least I want to know why not. (And, typically,
the latter is "because Mozilla Firebird is a bit peculiar"). My test set is IE
6, Opera 7.2, and Firebird 0.6.1. All on W2000. That is all I have the
resources for at the moment.

There are various valid reasons for this policy:

- I care a lot about the presentation of my pages. (I don't need to justify
that attitude, neither is it negotiable. I am my own client).

- I have found that when differences appear, there are often important reasons
for it. Sometimes it is because of peculiarities in certain browsers that I
needed to be aware of. (And can often easily correct with valid code/CSS).
Sometimes it is because I have got the HTML or the CSS wrong and one browser
is "trying to tell me".

- Once things are published, things get uncontrollable. But if someone queries
what they see, I want to be able to understand it. So by "controlling the
controllables", I have reduced the variety, and can sort out problems faster.

As the proportion of older browsers with non-compliant behaviour reduces, I
expect it to become far easier to have the same look across my set of test
browsers at their default settings.

--
Barry Pearson
http://www.Barry.Pearson.name/photography/
http://www.BirdsAndAnimals.info/
http://www.ChildSupportAnalysis.co.uk/

[d2003xx]

Barbara de Zoete <b_********@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<bl************@ID-52872.news.uni-berlin.de>...

d2003xx schreef:

Barbara de Zoete wrote:

d2003xx schreef:

Kris schreef:d2003xx schreef:Hmmmm... I code php to produce html pages.... (not embedding php in
>>html) I started to use this because the layout of html pages becomes
>>too complex (hundreds of tables in one page). And it can improve
>>maintainablity a lot.
>
>Replace as much of the presentational HTML by CSS and you will be
>cheering. PHP/CSS/Structural HTML is a very good combination.

I tried, but CSS is badly supported. :(

Now this is news to me. Why do you think "CSS is badly supported" ?

For example, "display: block" and "position: absolute"... Try to use
them to control the layout on different browsers and you will see.

All of my pages have a two colomn layout (except for one, which has
three colomns). To get the colomns in place I use position:absolute;
(and display:block; if necessary, which is rare).
As far as I can see, using various browsers (IE6, OP7.11, NS7.1, Moz1.4,
Firebird0.6, Avant8.02, Konqueror) none of the newer browsers have any
problem with that what so ever.

So what are the problems you encountered?

I forgot the detail (have given up css for a long time..), but the
problem is mainly about "display: block".. For example, put a big
image on the background (by "<img>", to fit the size of browser
window), then put text or other things on it.

[Barbara de Zoete]

d2003xx schreef:

Barbara de Zoete <b_********@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<bl************@ID-52872.news.uni-berlin.de>...

d2003xx schreef:

Barbara de Zoete wrote:
d2003xx schreef:
>I tried, but CSS is badly supported. :(

Now this is news to me. Why do you think "CSS is badly supported" ?

For example, "display: block" and "position: absolute"... Try to use
them to control the layout on different browsers and you will see.

All of my pages have a two colomn layout (except for one, which has
three colomns). To get the colomns in place I use position:absolute;
(and display:block; if necessary, which is rare).
As far as I can see, using various browsers (IE6, OP7.11, NS7.1, Moz1.4,
Firebird0.6, Avant8.02, Konqueror) none of the newer browsers have any
problem with that what so ever.

So what are the problems you encountered?

I forgot the detail (have given up css for a long time..), but the
problem is mainly about "display: block".. For example, put a big
image on the background (by "<img>", to fit the size of browser
window), then put text or other things on it.

With fitting an image to the size of the browser window, one should
encounter problems ;-) One doesn't know the size of the browser window
of the visitor, now does one?
I found that if I couldn't get things working one way around, I could
always change the order of the content in my html source. Like put the
text in normal <p> tags and at the end of the source place whatever
blocks I need to be positioned absolute. Ofcourse giving a logical
z-index to make one appear over the other.

So

<h1>test page</h1>
<p>some text</p>
<p>some more text</p>
<img src="image.jpg" alt="foo">

with a style applied to the image (position:absolute; top:0; left:0)
works for me. z-index On <p> say 100; z-index on image say 10.
Also putting the image in the background of the body could be helpful if
it is meant to be a background image :-)

Give CSS another try, if you are still willing. It is really making life
so much easier.

--

Barbara

http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/html/weblog.html *Dagboek*
http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/html/vliegen.html *Zweefvliegen*?