I just found the original thread to this and wanted to reply but it was closed (lets try not to have a browser war with this one).
Here are some of the reasons I see that people haven't switched to CSS layout. Currently I use a mix of tables and CSS layout (tables for the big picture, CSS for the details) and will switch when I have time.
1) Tables work in all browsers the way back to the 3.0 browser days(WITHOUT HACK AFTER HACK AFTER HACK).
2) Tables are easy to troubleshoot and debug (at least once you have done it a few times without having to deal with padding/margin/border/float bugs/nuances.... just turn on the border and figure out where you missed a closing tag or column span)
3) After years of doing it, I can generate anything in a table quickly. While I plan on learning to do it using CSS, I don't have time to do it on the company dime when I am under tight deadlines. I plan on learning the transition when I redo my homepage.
4) You don't have to hack for various browsers, have a seperate page for older browsers etc etc etc.
5) When dealing with external groups in a large corporate environment (the backend development team, the content managers who will maintain the site when you leave), its much easier to deal with tables because if these people know much at all about HTML, they are *probably* going to be familiar with table layout. You have to remember that its not just internal websites or sites that you will maintain yourself that we are talking about. Having to not only learn it yourself but to teach 15 other people the nuances of CSS isn't exactly something you jump into when you are given 3 months to do a 6 month job.
6) Did I mention the ugly hacks?? Imagine trying to explain those to a 3rd party who writes web pages in word and hits "convert to html" for maintence purposes when you turn the source code over.
7) writing individual IDs for a 20 page site is all good. Writing IDs for a 2k page site is a bit more complex if you don't want a huge style sheet to Download .
8) You can generate a very tight or very loose layout and it will look great across platform/browser. You can micromanage all the details and get exactly what you expect. But this is also a pitfall. Its very easy to break. The first sign of a content overflow problem and its "where am I going and why am I in a handbasket".
Reasons people should switch....
1) Accessibility Accessibility Accessibility
2) Flexibility
3) Ease of maintenence. At least in regards to site wide changes. However with the current system of hack and bash(your head against the wall), that is not the case. Hopefully we will see future compliance with the standards (and without the massive glaring bugs) so that this will become the reality.
Currently I use a mix and match of table and css layout. It works well, easy to maintain and is quick to generate. When I redo my homepage in the near future, I will probably go to a straight css layout just for the learning experience. But right now, I am on someone else's dime and they want their site developed quickly (and without css-p).
One interesting trend that I have seen over the past few years is the transition of who is doing the DHTML coding. During they dot com hayday there were 3 different groups (and this wasn't always the case), designers, front-end/dhtml developers, and backend developers. During the dot-com bomb, of the places that survived at all, they seemed to have canned all of the middle men and told the designers or back-end developers "its your problem now". This lead to the rise of frontpage, dreamweaver, etc. Now companies are starting to see that if they want a really cool website they need someone who actually knows what in the world they are doing instead of relying on Microsoft to generate code for them.
I was one of the front end developers who got a nice 2 year resort stay at club McDonalds. Needless to say I didn't keep up as much as I should have and am a bit rusty, but I also prefer to code once and have it work. I generated a javascript library that has 0 browser specific code in it and a fairly robust (at least when it was developed 2 years ago) homepage with only 1 line of browser code in it (ie6 had a bug that wouldn't reset a form properly when it was first released). So all of the css hacks needed to make 1 page look right just isn't my cup of tea. While I don't expect or foresee the browsers becoming totally compliant anytime soon, if some of the major issues were addressed (bounding box in particular) I would happily jump on the "CSS rocks, tables suck bandwagon". I did for javascript/DOM.
Code once, move on.
P.S. sorry for the ramblingohh yeah, forgot to say that I know the CSS way is better in the long run. Otherwise I wouldn't be looking to switch over to it. I look forward to being able to develop in a more flexible environment.
But there are 2 sides to every story. Its a transition that involves more than just developers. Remember the nightmares of developing cross-browser for the 4.0 browsers? For the moment people have a solution that works cross browser (css+table), I honestly wouldn't expect to see major adoption of a pure CSS layout until the browsers catch up. Just like you didn't see major adoption of the standards that only IE supported before IE had the monster share and/or mozilla came out.
As far as the ADA lawsuits. How can they truly enforce ADA when the tools to make it work are not available? Sure we could all makestrictly standards and ADA compliant websites but guess what, nobody would be able to view them properly because NONE of the browers work correctly (some are just better than others). When the ADA goes after browser makers instead of websites, then maybe progress will be made.I am short on time so must be short on this... apologies for that.
Not a clue why they are afraid, but that's not really the word for it actually. Often it's just not practical in a given environment...
I do nothing but CSS anymore... Unless of course I'm working a site, as I currently am, that was horribly put together with FrontPage, bubble gum and baling wire. And not a small site either... so will be a slow go on this one. But will eventually convert it over...
Adoption of the newer and better things can be a slow process, at this point in time... things have progressed to a point, on all fronts, where usability without major issues has been reached. There are even better, more efficient ways, to 'hack' for the browser issues.
And I won't even get into 'the browser wars' ... My browser history regarding use would be... Netscape ... IE ... Mozilla for the last 3+ years. Maybe some day standards will be interpreted properly by all, not holding my breath though... just keep up on my research!Refer to my two posts on your previous topic. And for the love of God, this Frankenstein topic should be dead.
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.webdeveloper.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=42418&perpage=15&highlight=people%20afraid&pagenumber=2Originally">http://www.webdeveloper.com/forum/showt ... Originally</a><!-- m --> posted by Malas
... When the ADA goes after browser makers instead of websites, then maybe progress will be made.
Can I get an "AMEN!"AMEN!
Here are some of the reasons I see that people haven't switched to CSS layout. Currently I use a mix of tables and CSS layout (tables for the big picture, CSS for the details) and will switch when I have time.
1) Tables work in all browsers the way back to the 3.0 browser days(WITHOUT HACK AFTER HACK AFTER HACK).
2) Tables are easy to troubleshoot and debug (at least once you have done it a few times without having to deal with padding/margin/border/float bugs/nuances.... just turn on the border and figure out where you missed a closing tag or column span)
3) After years of doing it, I can generate anything in a table quickly. While I plan on learning to do it using CSS, I don't have time to do it on the company dime when I am under tight deadlines. I plan on learning the transition when I redo my homepage.
4) You don't have to hack for various browsers, have a seperate page for older browsers etc etc etc.
5) When dealing with external groups in a large corporate environment (the backend development team, the content managers who will maintain the site when you leave), its much easier to deal with tables because if these people know much at all about HTML, they are *probably* going to be familiar with table layout. You have to remember that its not just internal websites or sites that you will maintain yourself that we are talking about. Having to not only learn it yourself but to teach 15 other people the nuances of CSS isn't exactly something you jump into when you are given 3 months to do a 6 month job.
6) Did I mention the ugly hacks?? Imagine trying to explain those to a 3rd party who writes web pages in word and hits "convert to html" for maintence purposes when you turn the source code over.
7) writing individual IDs for a 20 page site is all good. Writing IDs for a 2k page site is a bit more complex if you don't want a huge style sheet to Download .
8) You can generate a very tight or very loose layout and it will look great across platform/browser. You can micromanage all the details and get exactly what you expect. But this is also a pitfall. Its very easy to break. The first sign of a content overflow problem and its "where am I going and why am I in a handbasket".
Reasons people should switch....
1) Accessibility Accessibility Accessibility
2) Flexibility
3) Ease of maintenence. At least in regards to site wide changes. However with the current system of hack and bash(your head against the wall), that is not the case. Hopefully we will see future compliance with the standards (and without the massive glaring bugs) so that this will become the reality.
Currently I use a mix and match of table and css layout. It works well, easy to maintain and is quick to generate. When I redo my homepage in the near future, I will probably go to a straight css layout just for the learning experience. But right now, I am on someone else's dime and they want their site developed quickly (and without css-p).
One interesting trend that I have seen over the past few years is the transition of who is doing the DHTML coding. During they dot com hayday there were 3 different groups (and this wasn't always the case), designers, front-end/dhtml developers, and backend developers. During the dot-com bomb, of the places that survived at all, they seemed to have canned all of the middle men and told the designers or back-end developers "its your problem now". This lead to the rise of frontpage, dreamweaver, etc. Now companies are starting to see that if they want a really cool website they need someone who actually knows what in the world they are doing instead of relying on Microsoft to generate code for them.
I was one of the front end developers who got a nice 2 year resort stay at club McDonalds. Needless to say I didn't keep up as much as I should have and am a bit rusty, but I also prefer to code once and have it work. I generated a javascript library that has 0 browser specific code in it and a fairly robust (at least when it was developed 2 years ago) homepage with only 1 line of browser code in it (ie6 had a bug that wouldn't reset a form properly when it was first released). So all of the css hacks needed to make 1 page look right just isn't my cup of tea. While I don't expect or foresee the browsers becoming totally compliant anytime soon, if some of the major issues were addressed (bounding box in particular) I would happily jump on the "CSS rocks, tables suck bandwagon". I did for javascript/DOM.
Code once, move on.
P.S. sorry for the ramblingohh yeah, forgot to say that I know the CSS way is better in the long run. Otherwise I wouldn't be looking to switch over to it. I look forward to being able to develop in a more flexible environment.
But there are 2 sides to every story. Its a transition that involves more than just developers. Remember the nightmares of developing cross-browser for the 4.0 browsers? For the moment people have a solution that works cross browser (css+table), I honestly wouldn't expect to see major adoption of a pure CSS layout until the browsers catch up. Just like you didn't see major adoption of the standards that only IE supported before IE had the monster share and/or mozilla came out.
As far as the ADA lawsuits. How can they truly enforce ADA when the tools to make it work are not available? Sure we could all makestrictly standards and ADA compliant websites but guess what, nobody would be able to view them properly because NONE of the browers work correctly (some are just better than others). When the ADA goes after browser makers instead of websites, then maybe progress will be made.I am short on time so must be short on this... apologies for that.
Not a clue why they are afraid, but that's not really the word for it actually. Often it's just not practical in a given environment...
I do nothing but CSS anymore... Unless of course I'm working a site, as I currently am, that was horribly put together with FrontPage, bubble gum and baling wire. And not a small site either... so will be a slow go on this one. But will eventually convert it over...
Adoption of the newer and better things can be a slow process, at this point in time... things have progressed to a point, on all fronts, where usability without major issues has been reached. There are even better, more efficient ways, to 'hack' for the browser issues.
And I won't even get into 'the browser wars' ... My browser history regarding use would be... Netscape ... IE ... Mozilla for the last 3+ years. Maybe some day standards will be interpreted properly by all, not holding my breath though... just keep up on my research!Refer to my two posts on your previous topic. And for the love of God, this Frankenstein topic should be dead.
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.webdeveloper.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=42418&perpage=15&highlight=people%20afraid&pagenumber=2Originally">http://www.webdeveloper.com/forum/showt ... Originally</a><!-- m --> posted by Malas
... When the ADA goes after browser makers instead of websites, then maybe progress will be made.
Can I get an "AMEN!"AMEN!