Re: [WSG] Web design education
I've been following this discussion with great interest. I've taught HTML, CSS and JavaScript at a TAFE, but not as part of a coding course, as part of a graphic design course. That's an interesting environment in which to think about standards -- the students were totally focused on design and graphics, and were really learning three applications: Photoshop, FireWorks and DreamWeaver, rather than what web pages were all about. A brief excursion into source code left them for the most part baffled, if not horrified. Why would anybody do it that way when we have Dreamweaver? I agree with points others have made: 1) IT staff have an amazing amount of control over what is allowed -- to the detriment of the students' learning what happens in the real world. Not one of my students had ever FTPd a file to a server so, for instance, all their paths had to be relative and they could make mistakes with case-sensitivity with impunity. 2) Syllabuses are either out of date, or more likely, so general as to be meaningless -- students on my JavaScript course had to learn a scripting language. Students on my HTML course had to learn a markup language. I could have taught them Visual Basic and SGML and been entirely within the guidelines. 3) There's no time -- I taught a class of fifteen graphic designers the very basics of HTML in a class lasting in total, five hours or so. When they said how do I get two columns in my page? I taught them to do a table. Mea Culpa. I did, of course, explain about table versus div positioning, font tags versus CSS, but I didn't attempt to teach them two completely different languages in that very short time. If they achieved a valid page with an h1, a couple of ps and a working link, I was happy. But I can't say I advanced the cause of standards much... Have You Validated Your Code? John Horner(+612 / 02) 8333 3594 Developer, ABC Kids Onlinehttp://www.abc.net.au/ ** 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] Web design education
Hi John,How long ago was this per chance?I find your comments very interesting because it's taken right from direct experience in formal web education (albeit to graphic designers at the time).In essense, higher/further education guidelines (IT/Graphic Design or otherwise) don't seem to be able to bridge the gap between basic 'HTML know-how' and 'Web Standards-friendly' web design techniques. This is an extremely important foundation for shaping a web design community that is more web-standards aware...and it's an epic task to try and overhaul this in one country - yet alone the world at large (!) I greatly appreciate insights from educators (or former educators) such as yourself - because it gives other web design professionals a greater sense of what the educational establishments are teaching to the next generation of potential web professionals. Regards,Matt---http://www.mattrobin.comOn 16/02/06, [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I've been following this discussion with great interest.I've taught HTML, CSS and _javascript_ at a TAFE, but not as part of acoding course, as part of a graphic design course. That's aninteresting environment in which to think about standards -- the students were totally focused on design and graphics, and were reallylearning three applications: Photoshop, FireWorks and DreamWeaver,rather than what web pages were all about. A brief excursion intosource code left them for the most part baffled, if not horrified. Why would anybody do it that way when we have Dreamweaver?I agree with points others have made:1) IT staff have an amazing amount of control over what is allowed --to the detriment of the students' learning what happens in the real world. Not one of my students had ever FTPd a file to a server so,for instance, all their paths had to be relative and they could makemistakes with case-sensitivity with impunity.2) Syllabuses are either out of date, or more likely, so general as to be meaningless -- students on my _javascript_ course had to learn ascripting language. Students on my HTML course had to learn amarkup language. I could have taught them Visual Basic and SGML and been entirely within the guidelines.3) There's no time -- I taught a class of fifteen graphic designersthe very basics of HTML in a class lasting in total, five hours orso. When they said how do I get two columns in my page? I taught them to do a table. Mea Culpa. I did, of course, explain about tableversus div positioning, font tags versus CSS, but I didn't attempt toteach them two completely different languages in that very shorttime. If they achieved a valid page with an h1, a couple of ps and a working link, I was happy. But I can't say I advanced the causeof standards much...Have You Validated Your Code? John Horner(+612 / 02) 8333 3594Developer, ABC Kids Onlinehttp://www.abc.net.au/ **The discussion list forhttp://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help**
Re: [WSG] Web design education
Title: Re: [WSG] Web design education How long ago was this per chance? Just last year. In essense, higher/further education guidelines (IT/Graphic Design or otherwise) don't seem to be able to bridge the gap between basic 'HTML know-how' and 'Web Standards-friendly' web design techniques. To be honest, the HTML know-how part is a quick glimpse of code because that's a formal requirement of the course. Given the choice I think both students and staff might gladly skip it altogether in favour of more time with Photoshop. The real issue is that the course is, from the point of view of the people on this list, back to front. A website should not be something which starts out as an attractive graphic and is then wrestled into HTML-table/GIF/JPEG format so that it can be put on the web. But that's the way it's taught, in the same way that students in other modules are taught to create work, then turn their work into other output formats, wrestling with the details of different colour systems, inks and papers. Have You Validated Your Code? John Horner (+612 / 02) 8333 3594 Developer, ABC Kids Online http://www.abc.net.au/
Re: [WSG] Web design education
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I've been following this discussion with great interest. I've taught HTML, CSS and JavaScript at a TAFE, but not as part of a coding course, as part of a graphic design course. That's an interesting environment in which to think about standards -- the students were totally focused on design and graphics, and were really learning three applications: Photoshop, FireWorks and DreamWeaver, rather than what web pages were all about. I actually think that is a sign of the educational institutions being slow to catch up in their approach to web design. From what I can tell it currently seems to be considered either: * an add-on to a graphic design course, in the form of 'and you can turn your print/marketing campaign into a web site/online marketing campaign'. * as a part of programming and applicatoin development. Again, anecdotally, either scenario seems to prioritise one aspect of the process whilst downplaying or ignoring the importance of the other. It would seem that eventually a crossover course is needed, perhaps in the form of some type of 'design or development major' . Design students interested in the web should receive the relevant knowledge to work in that environment right from the beginning. Equally developers should we well versed in aspects of usability and interface design, particularly when learning their client side technologies. At the moment in Ultimo we have the balance of 9 hours/week multimedia and design, 9 hours per week scripting, HTML, CSS and XML, and 1 1/2 hours usability and accessibility. It's a fairly good balance but there is so much to get through in 6 months. Once they leave the Cert IV they don't cover any aspects of client side web design again - the next year is all .NET development (no PHP unfortunately ;( ) I have sat in course implementation workshops where interface design has been dismissed as drawing pretty pictures, and then HTML and CSS has been downplayed to learning a few tags - 6 or 8 hours tops (by the same person, no less!) I am not suggesting that we produce a jack of all trades, but I feel the education must start out in a much more generalised way. On a positive note, I have noticed a steady stream of designers enrolling in the course to learn how to work for web. Most come in with some Dreamweaver experience and the notion that they will learn advanced Dreamweaver. For some of them 12 weeks of css and html in notepad is too much, but most of them embrace the idea of learning theories of usability, accessibility and end up performing really well. It would be great, however, if there was a course that started taking responsibility for the different aspect of web design in a far more holistic way right from the begiinning. I agree with points others have made: 1) IT staff have an amazing amount of control over what is allowed -- to the detriment of the students' learning what happens in the real world. Not one of my students had ever FTPd a file to a server so, for instance, all their paths had to be relative and they could make mistakes with case-sensitivity with impunity. 2) Syllabuses are either out of date, or more likely, so general as to be meaningless -- students on my JavaScript course had to learn a scripting language. Students on my HTML course had to learn a markup language. I could have taught them Visual Basic and SGML and been entirely within the guidelines. 3) There's no time -- I taught a class of fifteen graphic designers the very basics of HTML in a class lasting in total, five hours or so. When they said how do I get two columns in my page? I taught them to do a table. Mea Culpa. I did, of course, explain about table versus div positioning, font tags versus CSS, but I didn't attempt to teach them two completely different languages in that very short time. If they achieved a valid page with an h1, a couple of ps and a working link, I was happy. But I can't say I advanced the cause of standards much... Have You Validated Your Code? John Horner(+612 / 02) 8333 3594 Developer, ABC Kids Onlinehttp://www.abc.net.au/ ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** ** 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] Web design education
On 2/16/06, James Gollan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: It would be great, however, if there was a course that started taking responsibility for the different aspect of web design in a far more holistic way right from the begiinning. I think in terms of four year or two year programs, especially in things like information science, web development, etc, the one thing that is overlooked the most is CSS. Even for graphic designers, this is a shame, since just a few minutes of browsing the CSS Zen Garden shows how much graphic designers can do with even a basic knowledge of CSS (and it can't be done so elegantly with tables... sometimes not at all). I think the day I see programs with a full semester dedicated to CSS, I can celebrate. Even a semester of CS130 at Cornell, covering 1/3 CSS (the rest XHTML and basic PHP) is not enough to teach decent layout/positioning skills... and I'm saying this because I've seen other students struggle with it. Next fall I'll most likely get to be a Teaching Assistant for the course, so I'll get an even better idea of just how much time and material students need to really learn CSS. -- -- Christian Montoya christianmontoya.com ... rdpdesign.com ... cssliquid.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] Web design education
Hi all, First post - I teach IT and support half of the computer network for the Arts IT section at Bathurst TAFE. We teach Web Design (as well as other courses like Digital Media and Client Support) and for the last five years have pushed for students to not only design using XHTML and CSS but to have assessments meet the standards for the different WAI levels. With pressure from teachers and the Head Teacher students have access to Internet Explorer, Firefox, Mozilla, Opera and Lynx. The last three years have seen hosting on LAMP servers so students are required to learn PHP and MySQL. The modules are the same as those used by all the other TAFE Campuses but our teachers are determined to produce students who know the standards and can design effective, artistic and meet the standards. We have been blocked by the IT Network support staff at higher levels but with pressure from staff and students the required applications have been installed because it is the teaching that is important. Keep up the pressure about standards compliance - it is important and will save businesses large sums of money (just ask Target USA). Regards, Steve On 14/02/2006, at 10:28 PM, Ric Raftis wrote: Your comments reminded me that I had neglected to mention something else regarding my TAFE experiences. Perhaps I should mention that I am 50 years of age and attended as a mature age student and not someone out of high school, however despite all amounts of agitating and lobbying, the Bendigo TAFE refused to provide access to Firefox or Opera or any other browser apart from IE. That was the only browser that you could use to access the outside world. You couldn't install or run your own versions locally, so consequently Firefox and the Web Developer Extension were not available to test your sites or ensure that code was valid. Maybe this will change in the future, but it has to come from the top. The thing that I found most amazing was that the IT people in charge of the networks had the say over the people delivering the courses. It was actually the network administrators that stymied the efforts of the lecturers by denying access to better browsers and tools. You would have thought that IT professionals would be far more aware of the benefits of using compliant browsers and be implementing these in our educational institutions. Regards, Ric Michael Nelson wrote: Ric Raftis wrote: It was interesting reading your post James because it seems that TAFEs across the country may vary widely despite courses supposedly being drawn from a national based syllabus and providing national accreditation. Related to this, I reckon one of the biggest problems causing a lack of standards in Web design education is a lack of collaboration. Each facilitator/lecturor is re-inventing the wheel with activities and resources largely due to IP restrictions within their workplace. In reality, many facilitators just end up re-using the same resources that's been used for the last 5 years because on their own they don't have time to update both their own skills and the resources they use. The ironic thing is that (nearly) all the best info on Web Design topics is being shared freely by professional designers on their blogs/sites! ... I mean, with excellent sites like http:// webdesignfromscratch.com/ and http://maxdesign.com.au/ published by professionals, what is the role of an educator? My take is that if lecturors and facilitators were able to collaboratively create and update flexible learning pathways from all the great free stuff out there, we'd be in a better position to help the uptake of standards in Web design education. (Plug) : 'cause of this, I've started setting up a WebDesign Wikibook over at: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Web_Design http://en.wikibooks.org/ wiki/Web_Design Really it's just ordering and grouping all the great resources out there created by you professionals into some sort of learning pathway with ideas for activities... Feel free to contribute :) -- Michael Nelson http://liveandletlearn.net/ ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** ** 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] Web design education
Your comments reminded me that I had neglected to mention something else regarding my TAFE experiences. Perhaps I should mention that I am 50 years of age and attended as a mature age student and not someone out of high school, however despite all amounts of agitating and lobbying, the Bendigo TAFE refused to provide access to Firefox or Opera or any other browser apart from IE. That was the only browser that you could use to access the outside world. You couldn't install or run your own versions locally, so consequently Firefox and the Web Developer Extension were not available to test your sites or ensure that code was valid. Maybe this will change in the future, but it has to come from the top. The thing that I found most amazing was that the IT people in charge of the networks had the say over the people delivering the courses. It was actually the network administrators that stymied the efforts of the lecturers by denying access to better browsers and tools. You would have thought that IT professionals would be far more aware of the benefits of using compliant browsers and be implementing these in our educational institutions. Regards, Ric Michael Nelson wrote: Ric Raftis wrote: It was interesting reading your post James because it seems that TAFEs across the country may vary widely despite courses supposedly being drawn from a national based syllabus and providing national accreditation. Related to this, I reckon one of the biggest problems causing a lack of standards in Web design education is a lack of collaboration. Each facilitator/lecturor is re-inventing the wheel with activities and resources largely due to IP restrictions within their workplace. In reality, many facilitators just end up re-using the same resources that's been used for the last 5 years because on their own they don't have time to update both their own skills and the resources they use. The ironic thing is that (nearly) all the best info on Web Design topics is being shared freely by professional designers on their blogs/sites! ... I mean, with excellent sites like http://webdesignfromscratch.com/ and http://maxdesign.com.au/ published by professionals, what is the role of an educator? My take is that if lecturors and facilitators were able to collaboratively create and update flexible learning pathways from all the great free stuff out there, we'd be in a better position to help the uptake of standards in Web design education. (Plug) : 'cause of this, I've started setting up a WebDesign Wikibook over at: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Web_Design http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Web_Design Really it's just ordering and grouping all the great resources out there created by you professionals into some sort of learning pathway with ideas for activities... Feel free to contribute :) -- Michael Nelson http://liveandletlearn.net/ ** 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] Web design education
Wow, I seem to have kicked off quite a ruckus. From what has been said I believe the situation isn't as bad as I thought, certainly no worse than in business/industry. There is still a long way to go, but we're getting there. So, points to note: 1) Syllabus documents may be out of date, or just not quite in line with what's actually being taught. Lesson: don't believe everything you read, and believe the best until proven otherwise. 2) Some educators are resistant to change, just as some finance directors/marketing departments/project managers are. Lesson: You can lead a horse to water... 3) Many academic institutions are teaching and advocating web standards to their students. Lesson: use the people doing it right as examples, maybe a how web standards has improved our web design course document would be useful. And some things that I've been mulling over for quite a while. Is there an international web design accreditation scheme, or some web master driving licence? Is that one of the aims of a web designers association/guild? And finally, what associations/guilds are you part of? http://www.hwg.org/, http://www.gawds.org/, http://www.iwanet.org/, and http://www.ukwda.org/ are the ones I'm aware of (there are others, I'm sure). thanks Chris ** 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] Web design education
Chris, I've conducted several courses in CSS at a local community college where CSS-based designs are emphasized. The faculty and students embrace Web Standards, and understand the inherit value of using standard's technologies. All is not lost :) Respectfully yours, Mario S. Cisneros A large university here in the UK offers web design courses. But I don't hold out much hope for the future when they have things like this in their syllabus: Without the use of tables, all web pages would have to be presented in purely linear form. Many creative uses of the screen would be impossible to achieve. Although tables are a little trickier than other effects used in basic web design, it is mainly a matter of remembering that HTML's first purpose is to structure the page; tables are just an extension of this basic idea. Once you have mastered the basics, you can get some very sophisticated effects with table tags. (Taken from http://www.leeds.ac.uk/acom/webdesign/materials/lesson4.html) Has anyone attended this course? Is it really as bad as all that? To what extent can students do it the right way without being penalised from straying from the Official Course Documentation? And, a larger question for us all: what are we as web standards and accessibility evangelists to do about the continued ingorance and apathy towards this vital subject, especially in academia? Let's hope that the recent Target website court case in the US highlights the cause. Chris Taylor www.stillbreathing.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 ** ** 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] Web design education
That's a major reason why I didn't go to university, you don't learn nuffink(sic. :) ) useful. and have to pay around £10,000 for the privilege Stephen On 13 Feb 2006, at 15:24, Chris Taylor wrote: A large university here in the UK offers web design courses. But I don't hold out much hope for the future when they have things like this in their syllabus: Without the use of tables, all web pages would have to be presented in purely linear form. Many creative uses of the screen would be impossible to achieve. Although tables are a little trickier than other effects used in basic web design, it is mainly a matter of remembering that HTML's first purpose is to structure the page; tables are just an extension of this basic idea. Once you have mastered the basics, you can get some very sophisticated effects with table tags. (Taken from http://www.leeds.ac.uk/acom/webdesign/materials/lesson4.html) Has anyone attended this course? Is it really as bad as all that? To what extent can students do it the right way without being penalised from straying from the Official Course Documentation? And, a larger question for us all: what are we as web standards and accessibility evangelists to do about the continued ingorance and apathy towards this vital subject, especially in academia? Let's hope that the recent Target website court case in the US highlights the cause. Chris Taylor www.stillbreathing.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 ** ** 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] Web design education
Hello, On 13 Feb 2006 at 15:24, Chris Taylor wrote: Without the use of tables, all web pages would have to be presented in purely linear form. thanks about such a sequence (or joke?). Ok, I read the same on the 'lesson4.html', there this is not a joke. But it's interesting to read such a statement 2006 (or 2004). I think, we should send them a lot of links with pages created without any table and showing more non-linear elements. Tables are excellent showing tabular data. Regards, Juergen Auer Jürgen Auer, http://www.sql-und-xml.de/ Web-Datenbanken zum Mieten Friedenstr. 37, 10 249 Berlin Tel.: (030) 420 20 060 Fax: (030) 420 19 819 [EMAIL PROTECTED] ** 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] Web design education
I personally believe as "Accessibility Evangelists," part of our responsibilities is to bring this to their attention. These are web designing instructors, they are teaching more and more people to design the "tables" way, which is the exact way that we are trying eliminate.Stephen Stagg [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a major reason why I didn't go to university, you don't learn nuffink(sic. :) ) useful. and have to pay around £10,000 for the privilegeStephenOn 13 Feb 2006, at 15:24, Chris Taylor wrote: A large university here in the UK offers web design courses. But I don't hold out much hope for the future when they have things like this in their syllabus: "Without the use of tables, all web pages would have to be presented in purely linear form. Many creative uses of the screen would be impossible to achieve. Although tables are a little trickier than other effects used in basic web design, it is mainly a matter of remembering that HTML's first purpose is to structure the page; tables are just an extension of this basic idea. Once you have mastered the basics, you can get some very sophisticated effects with table tags." (Taken from http://www.leeds.ac.uk/acom/webdesign/materials/lesson4.html) Has anyone attended this course? Is it really as bad as all that? To what extent can students do it "the right way" without being penalised from straying from the Official Course Documentation? And, a larger question for us all: what are we as web standards and accessibility evangelists to do about the continued ingorance and apathy towards this vital subject, especially in academia? Let's hope that the recent Target website court case in the US highlights the cause. Chris Taylor www.stillbreathing.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 The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfmfor some hints on posting to the list getting help** Yahoo! Mail Use Photomail to share photos without annoying attachments.
Re: [WSG] Web design education
Minh D. Tran wrote: I personally believe as Accessibility Evangelists, part of our responsibilities is to bring this to their attention. These are web designing instructors, they are teaching more and more people to design the tables way, which is the exact way that we are trying eliminate. This is the exact same reason for my main argument in my thread on Calling for a scalable business case for web standards for small business. My point was, and still is, that groups like WaSP and WSG need to take more of an advocacy role on in the larger community. Yes it makes sense to convert the people who have gone through these programs but if business demanded that sites be standards based and accessible then schools who teach otherwise will stop graduating people into nested table hell. Don't tell me to join a WSG in my local area. Don't tell me that we should just keep doing the work. We need to get up on our soap boxes and convert business, thought leaders and educators that standards matter and that building a broken web is bad for everyone. I know that there are members of WaSP who are trying to get educators on board but there is still a bunch of people out there who are ex graphic designers or visual developers who know only Dreamweaver or StopDead (GoLive) who are asked to teach because they have won some prize or worked for a big company. All the best, Jay -- Jay Gilmore Developer / Consultant SmashingRed Web Marketing P] 902.529.0651 E] [EMAIL PROTECTED] U] http://www.smashingred.com B] http://www.smashingred.com/blog ** 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] Web design education
One of our responsibility as a member of the WSG is to "Promote "web standards" within the development community," so here is our chance. If we don't do anything about this, than that totallydefeats the purpose of WSG's existence. Where do we start?Jay Gilmore [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Minh D. Tran wrote: I personally believe as "Accessibility Evangelists," part of our responsibilities is to bring this to their attention. These are web designing instructors, they are teaching more and more people to design the "tables" way, which is the exact way that we are trying eliminate. This is the exact same reason for my main argument in my thread on Calling for a scalable business case for web standards for small business. My point was, and still is, that groups like WaSP and WSG need to take more of an advocacy role on in the larger community. Yes it makes sense to convert the people who have gone through these programs but if business demanded that sites be standards based and accessible then schools who teach otherwise will stop graduating people into nested table hell.Don't tell me to join a WSG in my local area. Don't tell me that we should just keep doing the work. We need to get up on our soap boxes and convert business, thought leaders and educators that standards matter and that building a broken web is bad for everyone.I know that there are members of WaSP who are trying to get educators on board but there is still a bunch of people out there who are ex graphic designers or visual developers who know only Dreamweaver or StopDead (GoLive) who are asked to teach because they have won some prize or worked for a big company.All the best,Jay-- Jay GilmoreDeveloper / ConsultantSmashingRed Web MarketingP] 902.529.0651E] [EMAIL PROTECTED]U] http://www.smashingred.comB] http://www.smashingred.com/blog**The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfmfor some hints on posting to the list getting help**__Do You Yahoo!?Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
Re: [WSG] Web design education
Minh D. Tran wrote: One of our responsibility as a member of the WSG is to Promote web standards within the development community, so here is our chance. If we don't do anything about this, than that totally defeats the purpose of WSG's existence. Where do we start? Well, as a start, I emailed Drew (course leader on that particular course) pointing at the web-based mail archive for this list. Small moves, small moves. P -- Patrick H. Lauke __ re·dux (adj.): brought back; returned. used postpositively [latin : re-, re- + dux, leader; see duke.] www.splintered.co.uk | www.photographia.co.uk http://redux.deviantart.com __ Web Standards Project (WaSP) Accessibility Task Force http://webstandards.org/ __ ** 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] Web design education
On 2/13/06 3:23 PM, Patrick H. Lauke [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Minh D. Tran wrote: One of our responsibility as a member of the WSG is to Promote web standards within the development community, so here is our chance. If we don't do anything about this, than that totally defeats the purpose of WSG's existence. Where do we start? Any chance their course description has just not been updated since 1995? Just going with the benefit of the doubt, you know? -- Tom Livingston Senior Multimedia Artist Media Logic www.mlinc.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] Web design education
Chris Taylor wrote: And, a larger question for us all: what are we as web standards and accessibility evangelists to do about the continued ingorance and apathy towards this vital subject, especially in academia? Let's hope that the recent Target website court case in the US highlights the cause. I feel it is worth pointing out that not all educational institutions are still teaching table based design. As an educator I feel I am in a great position to make a difference at a 'grass roots' level. Students studying web design at our college (Ultimo TAFE) are exposed to about as much evangelism as they can take! There is a brief mention of tables for design, but as a primer for what they may find themselves working with in industry. Every site that they design should validate to a strict doctype (they choose between HTML and XHMTL after being presented with the arguments for and against) and use CSS for all aspects of layout. They spend an hour and a half per week studying usability and accessibility, they have access to multiple browsers, operating systems, and even JAWS (until recently :( ). First lesson they are directed to join this list! Past teachers have been such luminaries as Lisa Herrod and Roger Hudson, and, at the end of semester when they are dizzy from this barrage of evangalism, they get a good talking to from people such as Russ Weakley, Lindsay Evans, Peter Ottery, Lisa Herrod and Roger Hudson (not all on the same bill, unfortunately). I know of other TAFE's (particularly Blue Mountains) that have a similar approach toward standards. Unfortunately it often comes down to the teachers at the educational institution to promote this viewpoint, as syllabus documents are normally vague and hopelessly out of date. We are currently working of a training package that was first developed around 1997 (may have been 1999, but hell, it's old). It mentions tables for layout etc. I am sure that other institutions would be taking a similar approach to web design as us If not, hopefully the word will get out and the course will either drop off or modify its content. We do have mailing lists for educators in TAFE to try to disseminate the knowledge and facilitate discussion. I agree that there can be an apathy in educational institutions - often as a result of the institutional structure - but it is not necessarily the case. Just wanted to point that out ;) ** 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] Web design education
Great! Please keep us up to date as I am very interested in hearing about it. Also, let me know if there's anything I can do. Thank you."Patrick H. Lauke" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Minh D. Tran wrote: One of our responsibility as a member of the WSG is to "Promote "web standards" within the development community," so here is our chance. If we don't do anything about this, than that totally defeats the purpose of WSG's existence. Where do we start?Well, as a start, I emailed Drew (course leader on that particular course) pointing at the web-based mail archive for this list. Small moves, small moves.P-- Patrick H. Lauke__re·dux (adj.): brought back; returned. used postpositively[latin : re-, re- + dux, leader; see duke.]www.splintered.co.uk | www.photographia.co.ukhttp://redux.deviantart.com__Web Standards Project (WaSP) Accessibility Task Forcehttp://webstandards.org/__**The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfmfor some hints on posting to the list getting help** Relax. Yahoo! Mail virus scanning helps detect nasty viruses!
Re: [WSG] Web design education
Minh D. Tran wrote: Great! Please keep us up to date as I am very interested in hearing about it. Also, let me know if there's anything I can do. Thank you. I got an auto-reply telling me he left Leads to work at Manchester Uni. I forwarded the email to the two alternate contacts the email mentioned. Incidentally, the (C) at the bottom of the pages is 2004...this may or may not be old content that just hasn't been removed. P -- Patrick H. Lauke __ re·dux (adj.): brought back; returned. used postpositively [latin : re-, re- + dux, leader; see duke.] www.splintered.co.uk | www.photographia.co.uk http://redux.deviantart.com __ Web Standards Project (WaSP) Accessibility Task Force http://webstandards.org/ __ ** 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] Web design education
:) good work Jimmy G, and thanks for the good press! looking forward to coming out there... you know if there was ever a chance to teach the usability I'd jump at it! lisa -Original Message- From: James Gollan [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, 14 February 2006 8:00 AM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org; Russ Weakly Subject: Re: [WSG] Web design education Chris Taylor wrote: And, a larger question for us all: what are we as web standards and accessibility evangelists to do about the continued ingorance and apathy towards this vital subject, especially in academia? Let's hope that the recent Target website court case in the US highlights the cause. I feel it is worth pointing out that not all educational institutions are still teaching table based design. As an educator I feel I am in a great position to make a difference at a 'grass roots' level. Students studying web design at our college (Ultimo TAFE) are exposed to about as much evangelism as they can take! There is a brief mention of tables for design, but as a primer for what they may find themselves working with in industry. Every site that they design should validate to a strict doctype (they choose between HTML and XHMTL after being presented with the arguments for and against) and use CSS for all aspects of layout. They spend an hour and a half per week studying usability and accessibility, they have access to multiple browsers, operating systems, and even JAWS (until recently :( ). First lesson they are directed to join this list! Past teachers have been such luminaries as Lisa Herrod and Roger Hudson, and, at the end of semester when they are dizzy from this barrage of evangalism, they get a good talking to from people such as Russ Weakley, Lindsay Evans, Peter Ottery, Lisa Herrod and Roger Hudson (not all on the same bill, unfortunately). I know of other TAFE's (particularly Blue Mountains) that have a similar approach toward standards. Unfortunately it often comes down to the teachers at the educational institution to promote this viewpoint, as syllabus documents are normally vague and hopelessly out of date. We are currently working of a training package that was first developed around 1997 (may have been 1999, but hell, it's old). It mentions tables for layout etc. I am sure that other institutions would be taking a similar approach to web design as us If not, hopefully the word will get out and the course will either drop off or modify its content. We do have mailing lists for educators in TAFE to try to disseminate the knowledge and facilitate discussion. I agree that there can be an apathy in educational institutions - often as a result of the institutional structure - but it is not necessarily the case. Just wanted to point that out ;) ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** ** 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] Web design education
James Gollan wrote: I feel it is worth pointing out that not all educational institutions are still teaching table based design. As an educator I feel I am in a great position to make a difference at a 'grass roots' level. Students studying web design at our college (Ultimo TAFE) are exposed to about as much evangelism as they can take! .. It was interesting reading your post James because it seems that TAFEs across the country may vary widely despite courses supposedly being drawn from a national based syllabus and providing national accreditation. I recently completed a Certificate IV in Web Design at the Bendigo TAFE (BRIT) and my experience was anything but what you describe. Students were permitted to design their final assignment, a total web site of their choosing, in any layout they wished, even Frames! Yes, they were expected to validate both their xhtml and css, but only to low levels. Tables seemed to be the most popular layout used. Personally, I did the course to learn more about css layouts and I achieved this. Some help was achieved through contact with one particular lecturer who was enthusiastic, but out of date and teaching deprecated tags at times. However, to his credit, he was willing to do the research and admit his shortcomings. Most of my learning regarding structure of css sites came from active participation in a forum at www.htmlforums.com where the moderators are certainly evangelists for css layouts. Regards, Ric ** 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] Web design education
On 2/13/06, James Gollan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Chris Taylor wrote: And, a larger question for us all: what are we as web standards and accessibility evangelists to do about the continued ingorance and apathy towards this vital subject, especially in academia? Let's hope that the recent Target website court case in the US highlights the cause. I feel it is worth pointing out that not all educational institutions are still teaching table based design. Yes, we know. I've told the list before that the classes I take at Cornell teach standards based design with CSS, and it's exciting to know that all my peers are standardistas like me. But it is very easy for professors to go against change and keep teaching the same methods... and if the sites they use are Google-Amazon-Ebay, they might not even notice that anything has changed. And, unfortunately, a professor like this one has far more influence than any big-name-design-firm. Far more. -- -- Christian Montoya christianmontoya.com ... rdpdesign.com ... cssliquid.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] Web design education
At least we know now that that class "designing with tables" is not being taught as we're speaking..."Patrick H. Lauke" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Minh D. Tran wrote: Great! Please keep us up to date as I am very interested in hearing about it. Also, let me know if there's anything I can do. Thank you.I got an auto-reply telling me he left Leads to work at Manchester Uni. I forwarded the email to the two alternate contacts the email mentioned.Incidentally, the (C) at the bottom of the pages is 2004...this may or may not be old content that just hasn't been removed.P-- Patrick H. Lauke__re·dux (adj.): brought back; returned. used postpositively[latin : re-, re- + dux, leader; see duke.]www.splintered.co.uk | www.photographia.co.ukhttp://redux.deviantart.com__Web Standards Project (WaSP) Accessibility Task Forcehttp://webstandards.org/__**The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfmfor some hints on posting to the list getting help** Yahoo! Autos. Looking for a sweet ride? Get pricing, reviews, & more on new and used cars.
Re: [WSG] Web design education
Christian Montoya wrote: On 2/13/06, James Gollan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Chris Taylor wrote: And, a larger question for us all: what are we as web standards and accessibility evangelists to do about the continued ingorance and apathy towards this vital subject, especially in academia? Let's hope that the recent Target website court case in the US highlights the cause. I feel it is worth pointing out that not all educational institutions are still teaching table based design. Yes, we know. I've told the list before that the classes I take at Cornell teach standards based design with CSS, and it's exciting to know that all my peers are standardistas like me. But it is very easy for professors to go against change and keep teaching the same methods... and if the sites they use are Google-Amazon-Ebay, they might not even notice that anything has changed. Absolutely agree that the institution can provide a fairly protected environment for those who want to use it that way - the inertia generated by tenure and impending retirement is often insurmountable! Encouraging student feedback seems to be one of the only ways of change in this situation. ** 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] Web design education
FWIW. Here's an interesting item. Using the Syllabus Finder at the Center for History New Media, I searched for web design. The search returned about 189,000 results. As I looked through the first couple of pages of listings, I was struck by the range of departments in the web design ed biz and the number of web standards folks. Perhaps things are not as bad as first impressions might suggest. If you're interested, Syllabus Finder is available at: http://chnm.gmu.edu/tools/syllabi/ Best, Paula Paula Petrik Professor Department of History Art History Associate Director Center for History New Media George Mason University http://www.archiva.net On Feb 13, 2006, at 10:24 AM, Chris Taylor wrote: A large university here in the UK offers web design courses. But I don't hold out much hope for the future when they have things like this in their syllabus: Without the use of tables, all web pages would have to be presented in purely linear form. Many creative uses of the screen would be impossible to achieve. Although tables are a little trickier than other effects used in basic web design, it is mainly a matter of remembering that HTML's first purpose is to structure the page; tables are just an extension of this basic idea. Once you have mastered the basics, you can get some very sophisticated effects with table tags. (Taken from http://www.leeds.ac.uk/acom/webdesign/materials/lesson4.html) Has anyone attended this course? Is it really as bad as all that? To what extent can students do it the right way without being penalised from straying from the Official Course Documentation? And, a larger question for us all: what are we as web standards and accessibility evangelists to do about the continued ingorance and apathy towards this vital subject, especially in academia? Let's hope that the recent Target website court case in the US highlights the cause. Chris Taylor www.stillbreathing.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 ** ** 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] Web design education
Ric Raftis wrote: James Gollan wrote: I feel it is worth pointing out that not all educational institutions are still teaching table based design. As an educator I feel I am in a great position to make a difference at a 'grass roots' level. Students studying web design at our college (Ultimo TAFE) are exposed to about as much evangelism as they can take! .. It was interesting reading your post James because it seems that TAFEs across the country may vary widely despite courses supposedly being drawn from a national based syllabus and providing national accreditation. As I mentioned - we work of syllabus documents based on industry developed training packages that are often close to 10 years old. In IT that is an absurd situation. If the individual is working in isolation based on these documents it would be possible (and 'valid' from an assessment point of view) to deliver frames and table-based layout. We typically stretch or reinterpret the outcomes to make them relevant to current industry practice, but for the aforementioned reasons there is no guarantee that each TAFE will deliver the same content - even if you do identical modules. TAFE is working reasonably hard on the concept of assessment validation - the goal being that every student will be trained to to the same level and assessed to this level regardless of college location. This has been difficult to achieve without using centralised assessments - an expensive and cumbersome approach with many problems of its own, including a real lack of flexibility. I am sorry to hear that your experience of TAFE was less that optimal, but it is great to hear that they were willing to listen, and that you achieved what you wanted through the course. In many ways this is part of the education process, with your tutor taking on the role of a facilitator for your learning rather than the more classical lecturer/teacher role. ** 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] Web design education
Ric Raftis wrote:It was interesting reading your post James because it seems that TAFEs across the country may vary widely despite courses supposedly being drawn from a national based syllabus and providing national accreditation. Related to this, I reckon one of the biggest problems causing a lack of standards in Web design education is a lack of collaboration. Each facilitator/lecturor is re-inventing the wheel with activities and resources largely due to IP restrictions within their workplace. In reality, many facilitators just end up re-using the same resources that's been used for the last 5 years because on their own they don't have time to update both their own skills and the resources they use. The ironic thing is that (nearly) all the best info on Web Design topics is being shared freely by professional designers on their blogs/sites! ... I mean, with excellent sites like http://webdesignfromscratch.com/ and http://maxdesign.com.au/ published by professionals, what is the role of an educator? My take is that if lecturors and facilitators were able to collaboratively create and update flexible learning pathways from all the great free stuff out there, we'd be in a better position to help the uptake of standards in Web design education. (Plug) : 'cause of this, I've started setting up a WebDesign Wikibook over at: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Web_Design Really it's just ordering and grouping all the great resources out there created by you professionals into some sort of learning pathway with ideas for activities... Feel free to contribute :) -- Michael Nelsonhttp://liveandletlearn.net/
