Frames are bad - really?

[grakat]

I don't use frames myself - nasty, horrible things - but for a smallish
site (half a dozen pages or so) are they really that bad?

I know that search engines only see the main page, and that you can't
bookmark an internal page, but is that really so bad? Are there
accessability issues, for example? (yes, if by enlarging the text size
you can no longer see all the navigation)

Tear me to shreds, please! I'm looking for ammo, here.
I've read a few sites (Google is my friend) but they all seem to be a
few years old.

 

[Adrienne]

I don't use frames myself - nasty, horrible things - but for a smallish
site (half a dozen pages or so) are they really that bad?

I know that search engines only see the main page, and that you can't
bookmark an internal page, but is that really so bad? Are there
accessability issues, for example? (yes, if by enlarging the text size
you can no longer see all the navigation)

Tear me to shreds, please! I'm looking for ammo, here.
I've read a few sites (Google is my friend) but they all seem to be a
few years old.

The only thing that frames are good for, IMHO, is that they can be
resized by the user with a mouse (correct me if I am wrong if this can be
done with a keyboard). But how many times is that going to be an issue?
Almost never. I can hear the peanut gallery shouting "image gallery!",
and I refer you to Brucie's Sexy Butterflies
<http://butterflies.usenetshit.info/>.

Of course, one of the main problems is orphan SERPs[1]. The author can
add javascript to have the page call the frameset, but then, 1) it's
usually the index page and not the SERP, 2) users without javascript
still get the orphan. This can all be aleviated server side, but if you
have access to server side, why use frames in the first place?

Then there's bookmarking, very similar to the SERP problem, but the
browser will bookmark the frameset, not the document. So, you go back
and you get the index page again, and have to dig around until you find
the page you originally bookmarked.

There are other problems as well, so, as Nancy says, Just Say No. Use a
server side include, or use a preprocessor, but don't use frames.

[1] - Search Engine Result Page

 

[dorayme]

I don't use frames myself - nasty, horrible things - but for a smallish
site (half a dozen pages or so) are they really that bad?

I know that search engines only see the main page, and that you can't
bookmark an internal page, but is that really so bad? Are there
accessability issues, for example? (yes, if by enlarging the text size
you can no longer see all the navigation)

Tear me to shreds, please! I'm looking for ammo, here.
I've read a few sites (Google is my friend) but they all seem to be a
few years old.

Frames are great for fixing a navigation bar. They are well supported from
my observations. And from what I see folk saying here, the alternatives
(fixed nav wise) are not any better supported. I would be unlikely to use
them for a new site, (better to design otherwise altogether), but it would
be a lot of work to change the one site I did years back with frames - I
don't think it is justified to spend money on this feature at the moment.

Toby Inkster has just about said all of how best to guard against the bad
things. Ask him. In my case I make sure there is a link to a home page which
*is* frame-free.

Search is not everything on the internet, Google is not everything,
Bookmarks are not everything. There are other priorities in many cases. In
my case, it is a manufacturer who is aiming at the distributors, a fixed lot
by and large, and it serves as a reference to potential retail customers who
phone in and are told to see things on the website, thus saving having to
post out an expensive paper catalogue (the manufacturer does not trade with
the public directly).

By the home page being frame-free it is easy to bookmark. The frames are a
great convenience elsewhere despite potential and other technical drawbacks.
They are not nasty and horrible things at all. They are big friendly cuddly
things, think whales, they mean real well, they may be a bit clumsy and have
drawbacks but ... just writing this is making me yearn to go and be among
some...

dorayme

 

[jake]

I don't use frames myself - nasty, horrible things

.... warm, cute, cuddly things ... like a big teddy-bear?

- but for a smallish
site (half a dozen pages or so) are they really that bad?

Frames are just fine -- providing they're used properly.

I know that search engines only see the main page,

But that's OK. You just need to ensure:
(a) You use the <noframes></noframes> to supply either a menu or a link
to a menu page.
(b) The content frames contain a link back to the menu (frameset or menu
page).

and that you can't
bookmark an internal page, but is that really so bad?

Not really -- even if it was true. But it's not.

IE users have been able to bookmark a framed page 'in context' for years
(and that's 85-90% of your audience); other browser manufacturers
haven't thought it a big enough deal to warrant providing the facility.

Are there
accessability issues, for example? (yes, if by enlarging the text size
you can no longer see all the navigation)

Most modern AT (assistive technology) UAs (screen readers, talking
browsers, etc.) handle a well-written framed site without any
difficulty.

Tear me to shreds, please! I'm looking for ammo, here.

Hmmm. Can't think of anything significant to provide you with.

I've read a few sites (Google is my friend) but they all seem to be a
few years old.

Aren't they, just.

Still, just sit back and wait for the frames-are-evil people to provide
you with a lot of references. Just remember to take the batteries out of
your bogosity meter while your reading them to prevent being constantly
distracted;-)regards.

 

[Barbara de Zoete]

By the home page being frame-free it is easy to bookmark.

The entire argument being that pages somewhere deep down inside the site should
be the ones a visitor should be able to bookmark, this seems fully beside the
point.



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[Toby Inkster]

Toby Inkster has just about said all of how best to guard against the bad
things. Ask him. In my case I make sure there is a link to a home page which
*is* frame-free.

I am part way through writing a frames tutorial, that explains how to
circumvent most of the problems with frames:

http://examples.tobyinkster.co.uk/frames/frameset.php

However, these are just a few ideas, and (perhaps with a little more
effort) you'll generally achieve better results by dropping frames
altogether.

 

[Travis Newbury]

I don't use frames myself - nasty, horrible things - but for a smallish
site (half a dozen pages or so) are they really that bad?

Frames like everything else have their place. I use them on a daily
bases for client slide shows. Could I use brucies method? Sure I
could. But Photoshop doesn't know it. And All I have to do to make a
slide show to show clients their picutres is pick a menu item in
potoshop.

Would I use them in a comercial site? Most likely not. Do I use then
for clients? Absolutely. Have I ever had a customer complain? Never.
Have I ever had a customer who could not see them? Never. Have I ever
had a customer that could not see them and I don't know? Nope, because
there is a 1 to 1 relationship between the slide shows and the
customers and we are on the phone with theme very single time the look
at them.

So there is a place for them.

 

[rf]

I am part way through writing a frames tutorial, that explains how to
circumvent most of the problems with frames:

Re:
http://examples.tobyinkster.co.uk/frames/frameset.php?page=keep


I always like to explain that the separate frames (or in your terminology,
"layers", the blue bits in your graphic) are in fact separate <insert
operating system> GUI windows that are child windows of the browsers client
window (the red bit, the one that contains the "frameset" page).

This makes it very easy to explain why the nice pretty dropdown menu system
you have created in your top "menu" frame (if you would rotate your image 90
degrees clockwise) do not work, that is the dropdowns seem to disappear
"underneath" the content frame below the menu frame.

They of course disappear because they drop down *outside* the GUI window in
which they live, just as if you ran that menu frame by itself in a browser
window 100 or whatever pixels high.

<aside>
The blue bits don't exactly cover the red bit. The screen real estate in the
vertical gap between the blue bits (in your graphic) is owned by the red
bit. It is the so called frame "border" you can mouse drag. It is not
actualy the frame border, it is maintained and event handled by the window
that contains the frameset, the browsers client window. Much like an MFC
splitter window, if you do MFC that is

I feel this is important because just about everybody talks about "dragging
the frame borders". You aren't. You are actualy dragging the gap between the
frames.
</aside>




Your PHP solution for having a seperate "URL" for each "page" is neat, I
surmise you are using that page parameter to choose the appropriate content
page for the generated frameset.

There is another solution available if server side stuff is not available to
the masses.

Have a seperate frameset for each "page". The menu frame links, and all
other links for that matter, target _top.

True, almost twice as many files but each frameset will refer to the same
menu frame so we get the "one menu page" benefit and we get the unique URL
bit. The frameset pages would naturally be generated by a suitable
pre-processor.

You might have thought of this, AFAICT you stopped typing part way through
this page

Cheers
Richard.

 

[Dennis]

On 02 Jul 2005 Adrienne wrote in alt.html

I can hear the peanut gallery shouting "image gallery!",
and I refer you to Brucie's Sexy Butterflies
<http://butterflies.usenetshit.info/>.

I keep waiting for brucie to do one that works that nice with 500 images. I
know the old fart could do it in a weekend if he didn't keep getting all
tangled up in his pink gaffers tape.

 

[Dennis]

On 03 Jul 2005 rf wrote in alt.html

You are actualy dragging the gap

sounds sexy.

 

[Toby Inkster]

Your PHP solution for having a seperate "URL" for each "page" is neat, I
surmise you are using that page parameter to choose the appropriate
content page for the generated frameset.

Yep -- all the PHP source is available:

http://examples.tobyinkster.co.uk/frames/

The NOFRAMES feature is far more fun than the unique URLs.

Opera > Tools > Preferences > Advanced > Content > Enable Frames > disable.

And yes, it is possible to do this without any server-side scripting, but
it's a whole lot easier if you script.

 

[dorayme]

The entire argument being that pages somewhere deep down inside the site
should
be the ones a visitor should be able to bookmark, this seems fully beside the
point.

It depends on what the point is. The *entire* argument is not over this. You
seem over confident to me on this...

dorayme

 

[dorayme]

I am part way through writing a frames tutorial, that explains how to
circumvent most of the problems with frames:

http://examples.tobyinkster.co.uk/frames/frameset.php

However, these are just a few ideas, and (perhaps with a little more
effort) you'll generally achieve better results by dropping frames
altogether.

I think this is good advice ...

dorayme

 

[grakat]

I don't use frames myself - are they really that bad?

Thanks everybody. I guess frames aren't really evil after all; maybe
just a little misunderstood.
I still won't use them on a new site, but I'll stop obsessing over old
ones.

 

[Leonard Blaisdell]

Thanks everybody. I guess frames aren't really evil after all; maybe
just a little misunderstood.
I still won't use them on a new site, but I'll stop obsessing over old
ones.

If your old sites are commercial, now would be a good time to get your
thoughts together about how you used "cutting-edge" technology to
provide clients with the "very best solution available" at the time. But
alas, the web has moved on, and events have forced you to come to them
now, as the web has matured, to offer to redo the sites without frames
and incidentally for a fee, as they are now obsolete. You'll use a whole
new and much better technology that utilizes any-size-design, CSS to
unclutter the pages and make them faster, compliance to some spec, etc,
etc... If you have your thoughts together and you're good at sales, you
can do this. Otherwise someone else probably will.
I wouldn't advertise old framed sites until I fixed them up. Nearly all
commercial sites get upgraded periodically. It keeps developers alive.

leo

 

[Andy Dingley]

I guess frames aren't really evil after all; maybe just a little misunderstood.

I've never subscribed to that "frames are evil" view, but they're
certainly broken as an implementation of the concept.

For me, bookmarking (and its inability) is the killer. It's _possible_
to do bookmarkable frames, but it requires server-side coding and lots
of URL re-writing. On the whole it's easier to use SSI (or something)
and duplicate the repeated content across multiple pages than it is to
use frames just to get a menu, then have to sort out the frame's
problems.

 

[jake]

I've never subscribed to that "frames are evil" view, but they're
certainly broken as an implementation of the concept.

For me, bookmarking (and its inability) is the killer. It's _possible_
to do bookmarkable frames, but it requires server-side coding and lots
of URL re-writing.

Or you just need to use Internet Explorer (like 90% of the rest of the
Web population).

 

[Barbara de Zoete]

You
seem over confident to me on this...

I couldn't care less what you think about me since that has nothing to do with
the content of the argument.



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[Toby Inkster]

Or you just need to use Internet Explorer (like 90% of the rest of the
Web population).

And miss out on tabbed browsing, decent CSS support, decent security, etc
just to be able to bookmark a handful of framed pages? No thanks.

And even if frames were universally bookmarkable, it still doesn't solve
the related problem of linking to a particular frame.

 

[kchayka]

Or you just need to use Internet Explorer (like 90% of the rest of the
Web population).

Why should I use an inferior browser just because the masses do?