Opinion: Do web standards matter?

S

Sugapablo

Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.

Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".

So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?

P.S. Slashdot returned a 403 Forbidden to the validator but when I saved
the homepage locally, it failed too.


--
[ Sugapablo ]
[ http://www.sugapablo.net <--personal | http://www.sugapablo.com <--music ]
[ http://www.2ra.org <--political | http://www.subuse.net <--discuss ]

http://www.subuse.net : text-only, low bandwidth, anonymous web forums
 
C

Carolyn Marenger

Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.

Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".

So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?

P.S. Slashdot returned a 403 Forbidden to the validator but when I saved
the homepage locally, it failed too.

I follow the standards. It isn't a guarantee that the page(s) will work
everywhere, but I like to think it will. Maybe eventually, the browsers
will catch up and follow the standards too. In the mean time, some
manufacturers like to make their own standards, rather than following
those already in existance.

I also try to produce pages with minimal bloat. Keep the pages small, so
they load fast. It also makes them easier to edit later on.

Carolyn
 
S

Sugapablo

I also try to produce pages with minimal bloat. Keep the pages small, so
they load fast. It also makes them easier to edit later on.

Yeah, that's why I created http://www.subuse.net

Sometimes, I still get this romantic nostalgia for the days when I had a
2400 baud modem, telix, lynx, and nothing but command line. Silly, but...

Plus, today, with so many web phones and mobile devices, there aren't many
sites that work well with them, so I figured there's a need for minimalism
again.

--
[ Sugapablo ]
[ http://www.sugapablo.net <--personal | http://www.sugapablo.com <--music ]
[ http://www.2ra.org <--political | http://www.subuse.net <--discuss ]

http://www.subuse.net : text-only, low bandwidth, anonymous web forums
 
R

Roy Schestowitz

Sugapablo said:
Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.

Good idea; good initiative.
Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".

That is sad news. This reflects on disregard for standards and moreover --
the inexperience of Web developers that these companies hire.

The movement of Web standards, much like that of Open Source, promotes a Web
that does not discriminate. This benefits everybody. So surely, Amazon,
Yahoo and M¥¢ro$o£t do not care enough. Mozilla have been discriminated
against for many years.

Want to know more about Web standards? Talk to the visually impaired, talk
to the PDA user, talk to the person in Africa who cannot afford a Window$
licence.
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards?

Yes. One day many of us will have to 'clean up' our Web sites. You, however,
will not need to do so. Your present effort will be merited. 1 year ago
people designed their site to be compatible with IE. With so much going on
at the moment, can anyone look 5 years ahead?
I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?

Once you practice a few validations, you learn from your mistakes and no
longer repeat them. Valid code becomes innate.
P.S. Slashdot returned a 403 Forbidden to the validator but when I saved
the homepage locally, it failed too.

Ouch. Probably the result of several people collaborating on content.

Roy
 
B

Benjamin Niemann

Sugapablo said:
Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.

Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".

So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?

P.S. Slashdot returned a 403 Forbidden to the validator but when I saved
the homepage locally, it failed too.
You should note that it can be pretty hard to get such pages (I mean the
large portal like microsoft, yahoo...) valid. Such pages are dynamically
constructed with content from various sources. It is more of an
organizational monster act, to get the code corrected in databases in
various departments (finding and convincing the responsible people first),
hardcoded in custom software (perhaps developed by external contractors),
ad code delivered by affiliates...

mozilla.org is (compared to the others) a pretty small site and has just
been redesigned.
Even if the others started fixing their sites two year ago, I wouldn't
expect them to get the job done by now.
Microsoft for example just started this job (not sure, if it was
microsoft.com or another of their portal sites). They did pretty well, but
are still far from being perfect. IIRC some microsoft guy wrote about it -
and the obstacles in his blog.
 
A

accooper

I too try and follow the standards but I don't take much stock in the W3C
validator. Sometimes it will say stupid stuff like " a space is not allowed
here". I mean is that really gunna make a difference.

Also on things like CSS, IE does not support correctly half of it. Like
positioning is iffy. So I try my best and test my pages in IE and Mozilla or
Fire Bird. I'm more worried about my spelling!

--
Andrew C. Cooper
www.wordforlife.com/cmhm
Check Out Our New Free Christian
Music Downloads At
www.wordforlife.com
Sugapablo said:
I also try to produce pages with minimal bloat. Keep the pages small, so
they load fast. It also makes them easier to edit later on.

Yeah, that's why I created http://www.subuse.net

Sometimes, I still get this romantic nostalgia for the days when I had a
2400 baud modem, telix, lynx, and nothing but command line. Silly, but...

Plus, today, with so many web phones and mobile devices, there aren't many
sites that work well with them, so I figured there's a need for minimalism
again.

--
[
]
[ http://www.sugapablo.net <--personal | http://www.sugapablo.com
<--music ]
[ http://www.2ra.org <--political | http://www.subuse.net
<--discuss ]

http://www.subuse.net : text-only, low bandwidth, anonymous web forums
 
J

Jim Royal

Sugapablo said:
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?

Web standards are validation are a tool for you, for your own
development work -- today and into the future. But there's no value to
the visitor in trumpeting a web site as standards-compliant. No one
cares. But it definitely makes your job easier if you can check your
code against the W3C validators.

The Microsoft, Amazon and Yahoo! sites are works in progress. They
contain a great deal of legacy content and code, and are being modified
and updated all the time, on the fly. It is not surpirsing that such
sites are not yet standards-compliant. Only sites that are rewritten
from the ground-up can be made easily using web standards.

If web standards help you as a web developer, then use them, and forget
what the huge portals are doing.
 
N

Nick Theodorakis

Just out of curiosity, while checking on a site I was working on, I
decided to throw a couple of the web's most popular URLs into the W3C
Markup Validator.

Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".

Why, I'm *shocked* that major corporations aren't developing to
standards! ;-)
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort.

Think of it as "future-proofing" your markup. You won't have to go
back and fix your sites that are broken in IE 8.2 or Fire&animal; 3.5.

What do yinz think?

I think you must be from Pittsburgh.

Nick
 
S

Sherm Pendley

Sugapablo said:
Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".

So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?

I took a look at the nutrition info for some of the most popular eateries in
the US: McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell. Turns
out they're terrible for you! Loaded down with fat, sugar, and sodium.

So, if these places don't seem to care, why should the rest of us concern
ourselves with nutrition when we're cooking our own meals?

sherm--
 
T

Toby Inkster

accooper said:
I too try and follow the standards but I don't take much stock in the
W3C validator. Sometimes it will say stupid stuff like " a space is not
allowed here". I mean is that really gunna make a difference.

The W3C validator doesn't ask itself "is this mistake going to make a
difference?" It just asks "is this valid?" And when it answers, it's
rarely incorrect.
 
B

Barbara de Zoete

So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards?

Violating my own standards here (read all responses already made, before
responding myself, as to avoid duplication of answers):

I get my motivation to code according to standards from within. I don't really
care what others do. _I_ mind, because:
- I like to create with a certain quality, and I think working according to
standards adds quality to what I create;
- I experience how easy it is to maintain quality code;
- I experience how easy it is to find flaws and mistakes with validating my
pages every now and again, when I made some major changes; flaws and mistakes
that can influence the rendering of my pages in a way that I think is
undesirable;
- I experience expanding my knowledge (train as I 'fight') if I challange myself
to stay within standards.

But, I like to be a bit naughty sometimes, so I created my own DTD that included
the <nobr> for example. So 'web standards' is really what you make of them in
the end, how else does evolution get a change ;-)

Now, I'll read what others had to say on this.

--
,-- --<--@ -- PretLetters: 'woest wyf', met vele interesses: ----------.
| weblog | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/_private/weblog.html |
| webontwerp | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/html/webontwerp.html |
|zweefvliegen | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/html/vliegen.html |
`-------------------------------------------------- --<--@ ------------'
 
R

Roy Schestowitz

Toby said:
The W3C validator doesn't ask itself "is this mistake going to make a
difference?" It just asks "is this valid?" And when it answers, it's
rarely incorrect.

Actually it answers (should answer) "it /is/ correct", as defined by the
standards in question. At present this means that it will "rarely be
rendered incorrectly by browsers". This implies that some browsers are
broken, not the validators which rely on formal standards.

Roy
 
A

Adrienne

Gazing into my crystal ball I observed Sugapablo
Out of microsoft.com, google.com, amazon.com, yahoo.com, aol.com, and
mozilla.org, only Mozilla's site came back "Valid HTML".

Opera is valid XHTML
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem
to care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves
with standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What
do yinz think?

I write valid markup for a few reasons:

1. It's easier for me to write to standards.
2. It's easier to find bugs. I do a lot of server side coding, and I
find it's easier to find a server side bug if I know the markup is valid
first. 3. Documents are more consistent across browsers and platforms.
4. Search engines seem to like valid markup better, and they seem to like
semantic markup even more. 5. I'm a control freak. I like everything to
be "just so".
 
D

David Ross

If my Web page complies with the W3C specifications, any problem
you have with viewing it as I intended is the fault of your
browser. It's not my fault, and I won't do anything about it.

If your page does not comply with the specifications and guidelines
— or worse uses proprietary capabilities found in only one
company's browser — any problem that I have with viewing it as you
intended may easily be the fault of your Web page. You need to fix
your page before pointing an accusing finger at my browser. If you
don't care, then I don't choose to view your page.

For details, see
<URL:http://www.rossde.com/internet/Webdevelopers.html>.

--

David E. Ross
<URL:http://www.rossde.com/>

I use Mozilla as my Web browser because I want a browser that
complies with Web standards. See <URL:http://www.mozilla.org/>.
 
U

Uncle Pirate

Sugapablo said:
So if all these places, with their teams of web developers don't seem to
care, should the rest of us small time web devs concern ourselves with
standards? I do, but sometimes I feel it's a wasted effort. What do yinz
think?

I sometimes wonder if it's worth it too. I try to stick to the
recommendations and do none of the stuff that causes me to leave so many
sites today. I also teach HTML and I use the w3c validator as part of
my grading. I do tell me students that I am teaching them the "correct"
way and expect all of their pages to validate. Once they are done with
the class however, they are free to follow the recommendation they want
to (loose, strict, whatever). I've seen many of my students finish the
class and go right back to table layout and either no doctype or a loose
doctype.

Because the browser manufacturers allow the crap code to work, it's a
losing battle. Personnally, though, I'll keep putting out the best
markup that I possibly can.

--
Stan McCann "Uncle Pirate" http://stanmccann.us/pirate.html
Webmaster/Computer Center Manager, NMSU at Alamogordo
Coordinator, Tularosa Basin Chapter, ABATE of NM; AMA#758681; COBB
'94 1500 Vulcan (now wrecked) :( http://motorcyclefun.org/Dcp_2068c.jpg
A zest for living must include a willingness to die. - R.A. Heinlein
 
B

Barbara de Zoete

I also teach HTML and I use the w3c validator as part of my grading. I do
tell me students that I am teaching them the "correct" way and expect all of
their pages to validate. Once they are done with the class however, they are
free to follow the recommendation they want to (loose, strict, whatever).
I've seen many of my students finish the class and go right back to table
layout and either no doctype or a loose doctype.

Hmmm. Makes me wounder. What is the reason you give your students? Not just so
they understand the knowledge you provide, but the actual insight, wisdom,
whatever, that takes them beyond the simple understanding level. What is it you
strive to accomplish with your students?

--
,-- --<--@ -- PretLetters: 'woest wyf', met vele interesses: ----------.
| weblog | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/_private/weblog.html |
| webontwerp | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/html/webontwerp.html |
|zweefvliegen | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/html/vliegen.html |
`-------------------------------------------------- --<--@ ------------'
 
U

Uncle Pirate

Barbara said:
Hmmm. Makes me wounder. What is the reason you give your students? Not
just so they understand the knowledge you provide, but the actual
insight, wisdom, whatever, that takes them beyond the simple
understanding level. What is it you strive to accomplish with your
students?

I tell my students that "Transitional" means just that. Although things
may "work" with no doctype or using the transitional method, it is
outdated. The time of transition from a 1998 recommendation is long
past; new pages *should* meet the recommendations. I give them
information about quirks mode, how browsers render differently
with/without various doctypes. I show them how much simpler pages are
to work on eliminating the table layout methods. I try to teach the
"modern correct" methods of web development. But I can only "make" them
do it while they are taking my class and being graded on their
assignments. Your question makes me wonder if I shouldn't gather some
statistics to review. Your question just might make a good course
assessment project. Thanks.

--
Stan McCann "Uncle Pirate" http://stanmccann.us/pirate.html
Webmaster/Computer Center Manager, NMSU at Alamogordo
Coordinator, Tularosa Basin Chapter, ABATE of NM; AMA#758681; COBB
'94 1500 Vulcan (now wrecked) :( http://motorcyclefun.org/Dcp_2068c.jpg
A zest for living must include a willingness to die. - R.A. Heinlein
 
B

Barbara de Zoete

I tell my students that "Transitional" means just that. Although things may
"work" with no doctype or using the transitional method, it is outdated. The
time of transition from a 1998 recommendation is long past; new pages *should*
meet the recommendations. I give them information about quirks mode, how
browsers render differently with/without various doctypes. I show them how
much simpler pages are to work on eliminating the table layout methods. I try
to teach the "modern correct" methods of web development. But I can only
"make" them do it while they are taking my class and being graded on their
assignments. Your question makes me wonder if I shouldn't gather some
statistics to review. Your question just might make a good course assessment
project. Thanks.

What I miss in your explanation to me, is the passion. The reasoning about
Transitional is what they can read or figger out themselves. The passion tells
them about reaching all people on earth that are somehow connected to the
internet. No matter what machine, what browser, what ever means, if someone is
connected, you can reach them.

I once stood on a line in Europe, a path that was several thousands of
kilometers long, knowing that with me, in a few hours before me and after me,
over one hundred and fifty milion people stood on that same line. It was the
path that plotted the course of the shadow on earth of a full sun eclips, as it
occured. I rarely ever felt so bonded with people before or after, but sometimes
I get that feeling if a visitor of my site responds out of the blue to my
publishings.

That. That is why I code to standards. I want everybody to be able to connect to
me. If you are serious about reaching out, your code shows it.

--
,-- --<--@ -- PretLetters: 'woest wyf', met vele interesses: ----------.
| weblog | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/_private/weblog.html |
| webontwerp | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/html/webontwerp.html |
|zweefvliegen | http://home.wanadoo.nl/b.de.zoete/html/vliegen.html |
`-------------------------------------------------- --<--@ ------------'
 
B

Blinky the Shark

Nick said:
On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 08:01:30 -0500, Sugapablo


Why, I'm *shocked* that major corporations aren't developing to
standards! ;-)
Think of it as "future-proofing" your markup. You won't have to go
back and fix your sites that are broken in IE 8.2 or Fire&animal; 3.5.
I think you must be from Pittsburgh.

:) I can't seem to find it, but there used to be a great dictionary
site on how to talk like you're from Picksburgh. I think it's best if
you have some Arn City within arm's reach.
 

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