[WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
Hello All - I have the opportunity to hire two people in the next few weeks to help me with my one-man-band web development business. Problem is, these two know only the most basic aspects of HTML and don't know anything about CSS or web standards. Problem also is that I can't afford to hire anyone currently proficient at these two disciplines. Learning CSS was a painfully slow process for me (as I never had time to concentrate on it, or standards coding, because I was always doing everything else as well). To this day, I still wouldn't consider myselfanywhere near expert level: The moans and groans and "geez, why did that happen" is pretty much behind me, but I'm no expert. Since I'll still be too busy to sit with them for hours at a time teaching them the little that I know, I'd like to have some opinions on the best way to bring two absolute newbies up to CSS/Web Standards proficiency without me having to be at their elbow every step along the way. By proficiency, I mean that I can give them a Photoshop design comp, and they will be able to create anXHTMLcode foundation as well as a CSS style and positioningspec without too much whining and head-scratching. My plan is toget them completely compeletely trainedin these areas before letting them dive into any real project development. All comments welcome and greatly appreciated. Cole
Re: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
On 5/23/05, Cole Kuryakin - x7m [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have the opportunity to hire two people in the next few weeks to help me with my one-man-band web development business. Problem is, these two know only the most basic aspects of HTML and don't know anything about CSS or web standards. I would recommend Zeldman's Designing with web standards as a good primer, on both how to approach web standards and why. My copy has been around our office several times now and is looking rather dog-eared and annotated. I'm still not allowed to take it home! K. -- Kay Smoljak http://kay.smoljak.com/ ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: *** Spam *** [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
ask them to purchase eric meyer's books: eric meyer on css more eric meyer on css cascading style sheets: a definitive guide or you could purchase the books for your library. hth, dwain -- Dwain Alford http://www.alforddesigngroup.com web hosting: http://www.1and1.com/?k_id=7653741 http://www.spreadfirefox.com/?q=affiliatesamp;id=0amp;t=1/ The artist may use any form which his expression demands; for his inner impulse must find suitable expression. Wassily Kandinsky, Concerning The Spiritual In Art --- avast! Antivirus: Outbound message clean. Virus Database (VPS): 0520-4, 05/20/2005 Tested on: 5/23/2005 7:03:48 AM avast! - copyright (c) 1988-2005 ALWIL Software. http://www.avast.com ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
On Monday, May 23, 2005 7:35 AM, Cole Kuryakin - x7m wrote: By proficiency, I mean that I can give them a Photoshop design comp, and they will be able to create an XHTML code foundation as well as a CSS style and positioning spec without too much whining and head-scratching. My plan is to get them completely compeletely trained in these areas before letting them dive into any real project development. Hi Cole, Just a few quick points re: getting these people up to speed. Books and blogs are the order of the day. You might have a suggested reading list for them, including as Kay suggested, Zeldman's Designing With Web Standards. I would also suggest Dan Cederholm's Web Standards Solutions. While that book may seem to be too advanced at the beginning, it digs deep into code and samples. Like Dan's SimpleQuiz series from his blog, there is a lot more to semantics and code then meets the eye, and that can be enlightening for developers to see. Add into the mix a healthy dose of blogs so that they can keep up with and find the latest and greatest, even if it is only 4 or 5 blogs. Web Design World 2004 was held in Boston in December 2004. Molly Holzchlag and Ethan Marcotte did a presentation that is archived online. In that presentation, Ethan deconstructs the conversion of one of Harvard University's web sites from tables to CSS layout. While it doesn't demonstrate every aspect of the code, nor converting a PhotoShop comp into a CSS based layout, I find that it does a great job of demonstrating the ethos and principles behind modern web development. The presentation is linked from here: http://www.ftponline.com/reports/wdwboston/2004/holzschlag/ When you click on the link for the presentation, instead of http: it lists mms: I'm not exactly sure what that protocol is, but clicking the link brings up a message about launching an external app. I just changed it to http: instead of mms: and it worked fine. Finally, re: my plan is to get them completely trained in these areas before letting them dive into any real project development In my opinion, this isn't really a good idea. Here are some things to consider (this is mostly my opinion, based on my experience both as a developer and instructor): 1. if they only know basic HTML, getting them up to speed will take a while. If they are doing nothing but training, they'll quite possibly get bored, and web standards will be to blame. 2. learning these new techniques are best done with real projects. Contrived examples are usually ok, but work on a real project is much more effective for learning as they are doing something real and will have different motivation for getting the job done. 3. From a learning perspective, you have to start small. Get them working on a small component of a real site. Something like a nav bar, or a footer using only semntically sound HTML and CSS would be useful. Get them to do it on its own, and then you show them how that fits into the big picture of the rest of the site (which you will presumably be doing). 4. For those small pieces, point them in the right direction - get them started by showing them some examples, and see if they can make something work using the examples as a model. You can then work with them to deconstruct their attempts and really help them understand what is going on. 5. You have to keep challenging them - they need to move from creating a nav bar with HTML and CSS to being responsible for the entire header, to header plus footer plus secondary nav perhaps, and then responsible for all an entire site. OK, I could write forever about this, but that is more than enough to digest for now... Hope this is helpful to you... Best regards, Derek. -- Derek Featherstone [EMAIL PROTECTED] phone: 613.599.9784; toll-free: 1.866.932.4878 (North America) Web Development: http://www.furtherahead.com Web Accessibility: http://www.wats.ca Personal: http://www.boxofchocolates.ca ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
Hi Cole, Sounds like you want to train someone in the (not easy) transition to standards by having to do very little. If you can find a way to get them proficient in the basics, have a thorough knowledge of hacks and browser behaviour and be able to produce original designs (sort of like zen garden stuff) in a very short space of time, I expect that several on this list would be very interested! (me first, please:-) :-) Bob McClelland, Cornwall (U.K.) www.gwelanmor-internet.co.uk ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
Cole Kuryakin - x7m wrote: My plan is to get them completely compeletely trained in these areas before letting them dive into any real project development. A few thoughts about basic learning: No books and training-methods can beat the time-factor. The learning-curve is steep, and no one can focus well on one subject for more than a few hours (3-5h). Anything more than that is either routine (which they don't have), or a complete waste of time. Make room for plenty of positive distractions/breaks (walk in the park or whatever). Let them be in control of how they use their working-hours, while you stay in control of the overall working-day. Organize well, but leave the details out. They will probably not be able to stay better organized than you are, so be what you preach. Creating PhotoShop-lookalikes is not very useful as a first stage. Better give them some real content, and make them organize it for the web -- semantically. Design should come later, so even CSS may be left out (more or less) in the beginning. If it doesn't work without CSS, then CSS won't help much anyway. Keep them away from anything that isn't strictly standard-based (x)html and CSS for a while. Let them work and test against real browsers and the validators, and make sure IE/win doesn't get in the way with its broken standard-support and tag-soup recovery. Good luck -- you're gonna need it :-) regards Georg -- http://www.gunlaug.no ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
On May 23, 2005, at 10:58 AM, Gunlaug Sørtun wrote: Keep them away from anything that isn't strictly standard-based (x)html and CSS for a while. Let them work and test against real browsers and the validators, and make sure IE/win doesn't get in the way with its broken standard-support and tag-soup recovery. Stick them on Firefox with these two extensions: HTML VALIDATOR (based on Tidy) http://users.skynet.be/mgueury/mozilla/ Validates as they view their pages, so they should always see the beautiful green checkmark that says the HTML is valid. It has some issues, but hopefully it will train them to cringe when they miss that closing slash on their link tag. WEB DEVELOPER http://chrispederick.com/work/firefox/webdeveloper/ Web Developer is a toolbar with wonderful, wonderful abilities for people learning CSS. Chief among them is the Outline menu and the ability to switch styles off with a keystroke, IMO. The Tools menu also trains them to validate, validate, validate. -- Ben Curtis : webwright bivia : a personal web studio http://www.bivia.com v: (818) 507-6613 ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
I'm with Ben on this one. I learned loads after installing Firefox and adding the validator and developer toolbar. I went to different sites and ran them through the validator, saw the errors (or not) and learned about how to and how not to code to standards. Leslie Riggs Keep them away from anything that isn't strictly standard-based (x)html and CSS for a while. Let them work and test against real browsers and the validators, and make sure IE/win doesn't get in the way with its broken standard-support and tag-soup recovery. Stick them on Firefox with these two extensions: HTML VALIDATOR (based on Tidy) http://users.skynet.be/mgueury/mozilla/ Validates as they view their pages, so they should always see the beautiful green checkmark that says the HTML is valid. It has some issues, but hopefully it will train them to cringe when they miss that closing slash on their link tag. WEB DEVELOPER http://chrispederick.com/work/firefox/webdeveloper/ Web Developer is a toolbar with wonderful, wonderful abilities for people learning CSS. Chief among them is the Outline menu and the ability to switch styles off with a keystroke, IMO. The Tools menu also trains them to validate, validate, validate. ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
I keep a list of online tutorials at my msn group site, http://groups.msn.com/htmlwebdesigndreamers/ and try to keep it as up to date as possible. You will see "CSS Tutorials in the lefthand nav bar of the group. There you will find tuts and articles from beginners to advance that I've scoped the 'net for. I like Ben's idea too, and will try that for myself. I wonder if a person that only has html knowledge will be able to learn CSS using thismethod alone though. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Cole Kuryakin - x7mSent: Monday, May 23, 2005 6:35 AMTo: wsg@webstandardsgroup.orgSubject: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards Hello All - I have the opportunity to hire two people in the next few weeks to help me with my one-man-band web development business. Problem is, these two know only the most basic aspects of HTML and don't know anything about CSS or web standards. Problem also is that I can't afford to hire anyone currently proficient at these two disciplines. Learning CSS was a painfully slow process for me (as I never had time to concentrate on it, or standards coding, because I was always doing everything else as well). To this day, I still wouldn't consider myselfanywhere near expert level: The moans and groans and "geez, why did that happen" is pretty much behind me, but I'm no expert. Since I'll still be too busy to sit with them for hours at a time teaching them the little that I know, I'd like to have some opinions on the best way to bring two absolute newbies up to CSS/Web Standards proficiency without me having to be at their elbow every step along the way. By proficiency, I mean that I can give them a Photoshop design comp, and they will be able to create anXHTMLcode foundation as well as a CSS style and positioningspec without too much whining and head-scratching. My plan is toget them completely compeletely trainedin these areas before letting them dive into any real project development. All comments welcome and greatly appreciated. Cole
Re: [WSG] Best way to train someone in css and web standards
Hi, I have the opportunity to hire two people in the next few weeks to help me with my one-man-band web development business. Problem is, these two know only the most basic aspects of HTML and don't know anything about CSS or web standards. Problem also is that I can't afford to hire anyone currently proficient at these two disciplines. Learning CSS was a painfully slow process for me (as I never had time to concentrate on it, or standards coding, because I was always doing everything else as well). To this day, I still wouldn't consider myself anywhere near expert level: The moans and groans and "geez, why did that happen" is pretty much behind me, but I'm no expert. Since I'll still be too busy to sit with them for hours at a time teaching them the little that I know, I'd like to have some opinions on the best way to bring two absolute newbies up to CSS/Web Standards proficiency without me having to be at their elbow every step along the way. By proficiency, I mean that I can give them a Photoshop design comp, and they will be able to create an XHTML code foundation as well as a CSS style and positioning spec without too much whining and head-scratching. My plan is to get them completely compeletely trained in these areas before letting them dive into any real project development. All comments welcome and greatly appreciated.Two things come to mind. If you are in Australia, keep an eye on this list for an announcement soon about standards development workshops by the people who bring you Web Essentials (including the founders of WSG). Keep July clear if you are interested people :-) Also, at the risk of shilling, check out these courses, that are very highly regarded, have been done by thousands of people around the world, and were developed in Australia by people who have been involved with Web Standards since the very beginning(oh yeah, that includes me)http://westciv.com/courses/index.htmlWe also have a lot of very useful free training resources too,http://westciv.com/style_master/house/index.htmlthanksjohn John Allsopp style master :: css editor :: http://www.westciv.com/style_master support forum :: http://support.westciv.com blog :: dog or higher :: http://westciv.typepad.com/dog_or_higher
