Web developer survey. (Research project concern with Web Standards.)

[David Wilding]

Hi

I am a student of Leeds Metropolitan University (West Yorkshire,
England) conducting a research project concerned with 'Web Standards'.
As part of my primary research I am conducting a survey aimed at
professional web developers/designers based in either the UK or the
USA.

The questionnaire is 10 questions in length.
It will take approximately 3 minutes to complete.
No previous knowledge of 'Web Standards' is required.
The questionnaire is completely anonymous.

The questionnaire can be found at:
http://www.davewilding.co.uk/qindex.asp

The results of the completed study will be available on-line at
http://www.davewilding.co.uk in a couple of months.
Your participation would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance.
Dave Wilding

Comments, questions or queries: (e-mail address removed)

 

[Weyoun the gowd damn Dominion Vorta who certainly]

The questionnaire can be found at:
http://www.davewilding.co.uk/qindex.asp

Question 5

The Web Standards Project states that: “most of the Web (is) a
Balkanized mess of non—valid mark-up, unstructured documents yoked to
outdated presentational hacks, and incompatible code fragments that
leave many millions of web users frustrated and disenfranchised."


I selected "Disagree"

Whilst I agree that "most of the Web (is) a Balkanized mess of non—valid
mark-up, unstructured documents yoked to outdated presentational hacks,
and incompatible code fragments"

I do not agree

"that leave many millions of web users frustrated and disenfranchised."

Most people don't notice or don't care. Most sites that are badly coded
are designed for IE in which it works fine. And since 9x% of people use
IE, they dont notice the effects.

 

[Toby A Inkster]

I do not agree

"that leave many millions of web users frustrated and disenfranchised."

Most people don't notice or don't care. Most sites that are badly coded
are designed for IE in which it works fine. And since 9x% of people use
IE, they dont notice the effects.

Say 90% of people use IE/win (which I think is an over-estimate
personally). That means that 10% don't.

Say that there are 500 million web users out there (which is probably an
under-estimate). Then there are about 50 million people out there who
don't use IE/win.

Say 25% of *those* people run into a site that is so badly broken that it
*requires* IE/win (also probably an under-estimate). Then this justifies
the statement:

"that leave many millions of web users frustrated and disenfranchised."

 

[Whitecrest]

Say 90% of people use IE/win (which I think is an over-estimate
personally). That means that 10% don't....

The flaw in that argument is that you are making the assumption that a
page that works in IE does not work in anything else. Well that is
untrue. Working in IE, and working in any other browser are not
mutually exclusive. It is a design issue.

In a perfect world you are correct, you need to design for the
standards, but this is far from a perfect world. You should design for
reality, and the reality is that about 90% of the people that come to
your site will be using IE. So above all else, good code, bad code, it
makes no difference, but it had better work right in IE EVEN if that is
at the expense of the other 10%

 

[Toby A Inkster]

The flaw in that argument is that you are making the assumption that a
page that works in IE does not work in anything else.

Didn't you read the third paragraph of my post? I allowed for 75% of those
people using non-IE browsers to blissfully continue using the web without
running into any major obstacles.

 

[Ben Measures]

In a perfect world you are correct, you need to design for the
standards, but this is far from a perfect world. You should design for
reality, and the reality is that about 90% of the people that come to
your site will be using IE. So above all else, good code, bad code, it
makes no difference, but it had better work right in IE EVEN if that is
at the expense of the other 10%

I do hope you're saying,
"code to the standards, yeah, but _make sure_ that it works right in IE,
the most used browser, and forget about making other broken browsers work"

and *not*,
"forget the standards, make it look nice in IE, nevermind about other
browsers"
which seems to be your implication.

If you code it to the standards as set out in w3.org, you can be assured
of it looking respectable for future browsers. After all, you can't
predict what the next generation IE will support, other than assuming
general w3 compliance. It's hard enough making IE 5.x and IE 6.x display
the same without trying to second-guess what IE 7.x will look like
(if/when it ever comes out).

 

[Whitecrest]

I do hope you're saying,
"code to the standards, yeah, but _make sure_ that it works right in IE,
the most used browser, and forget about making other broken browsers work"

Shoot for the standards, but make sure it works in IE.

If you code it to the standards as set out in w3.org, you can be assured
of it looking respectable for future browsers.

Code for what is, not what might be.