Darice de Cuba

I finally got around to reading “Everything you know about CSS is wrong!”. I took a while on the second chapter while I studied the next CSS layout technique; display: table; and it’s supporting selectors and properties.

So what is this book all about? Well like everyone knows Microsoft is gearing up to release IE8 in the first half of 2009. With this final release all mayor browsers; Firefox, Opera and Safari have an up to date support for CSS tables. Which means time for all CSS coders to start applying correct and valid code for coding websites. No more hacks for each browser, multiple floats and so on.

First of all as soon as I read table based layout I assumed “what back to tables?!” But that is not the case…the nightmare of tons of HTML code to create table is not coming back. This is a term for describing the layout….web layout today is still like traditional media: a grid of cells. HTML tables are still just for tabular data en CSS tables is for layout/structure.

Chapter one gives a run down of the browsers support these past years, mainly on IE6 holding down web progress. Chapter 2, 3 and 4 gives some examples on using CSS tables and how to deal with IE 6 and 7. Chapter 5 gives a prospect of what the future holds with CSS 3.

The author clearly states that this is an opinionated book. You’ll have to have an open mind while reading it. I know there are lots of people who keep insisting on how important it is to keep fully supporting IE6 and now IE7 too. But even I said this to people before: “you cannot have a modern website full of the newest gimmicks and expect it to function the same way in IE6.”

The book compares the time that IE8 will come out with year 2001, when Jeffrey Zeldman wrote the famous article “To hell with bad browsers”. Now it’s up to the website coders to make full use of the latest techniques to move people to upgrade to the latest browsers.

The books argument is to instead of keep using floats and all kind of hacks for browsers, to start implementing CSS tables and push people to upgrade their browsers. Instead of waiting a few years till IE6 and IE7 die out. This makes sense, Microsoft is already getting Windows 7 ready, if they move fast it will be out soon.(With IE or without here in Europe…to be decided yet). Which means the only available Windows; XP, Vista and 7 use IE 8. Off course there will be users with old browsers left but they will be a small minority.

But the headline is: we the people who make websites need to teach users that they need to upgrade their browsers. How other would they know? If you keep bending backwards to fix a website to work in older browser, how would the user know their browser is old? A gentle solution would be adding a browser specific message that integrates nicely with the design to point users to the fact that they are using an old browser which is restricting their internetting experience.

But all in all I have yet to see if once IE8 is out I’ll be able to switch my coding style or keeping the old floats and hacks going. I guess it’s up to how much time one is willing to invest. I think for my personal weblog I’ll give it a go. And make a simple version for IE 6 and 7. But change is inevitable huh? I guess we all had a good example of change recently

We need to progress if we want more flexibility for coding web designs. And it starts with us applying the new techniques and bettering them. This book is a good read to get a grasp of what is about to change and what options there are considering new and old browsers.

Vacation is over and I have been back at work since this week. Vacation went by too fast, my mom was here for a month which felt more like a week. December has been very but very cold, which made going to the city more of a chore then shopping fun. But it was nice having my mother here for the holidays and someone to taste my cooking

This week also marks my one year working. Last year January 14 I started and worked the whole year without vacations till last month. It’s not always easy but I manage to keep a good balance between work and medical life. I decided to try save money for a Macbook, considering my Mac mini from 2006 is not meeting my needs anymore. My VPN won’t work which keeps me from doing extra work at home when the office is closed.

I’m also hoping to go to Aruba around June/July for 2 weeks as I haven’t been home in more than two years. If my health allows it I’ll do my best to go, because I have been having some serious home sickness again lately. And the extreme cold isn’t helping me much.

Last year I ordered “Everything you know about CSS is wrong!” and I haven’t read past the first two pages. I have been so busy with doing anything but website work. I read the whole “Twilight” series, all four books in one week. Now that I’m back in the CSS/XHTML routine I’ll do my best to read the book and move on on getting ready for HTML 5. The next website I code is going to be hardcore semantic!