Re: [WSG] It's times like this you remember how far you've come
I have the task of writing the database/dynamic stuff behind an e-commerce site. The design work and static pages are done by a professional design web dev house in Brisbane, and yesterday I got hold of their work. My job now is to merge their stuff with the shopping cart and other components I've written. [snip] Heh, I feel your pain. I don't think it's city-related though, it's about the size and culture of the company. The really big shops are probably the worst (repeat) offenders since they are so well established their clients often don't question their work. This is especially the case for firms that started in print then tacked on web to their service list (usually by throwing the job at their junior staff). Some firms know their code is bad but they are quite happy to leave it that way since the client is stuck getting them to maintain it, slowly and at great expense. The client probably doesn't realise they're not getting the best possible result so it's an easy way to develop ongoing work. The vendors of major CMS/portal technology follow the pattern too - their clients can't/won't go elsewhere, so they don't care that their code is crap. Naturally not all large firms are crap, but the large size of some firms does seem to encourage complacency. -- --- http://www.200ok.com.au/ --- The future has arrived; it's just not --- evenly distributed. - William Gibson *** List Guidelines: http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm Unsubscribe: http://webstandardsgroup.org/join/unsubscribe.cfm Help: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***
Re: [WSG] It's times like this you remember how far you've come
On 3/4/07, Lea de Groot [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: You should be approaching your client and explaining that you have some problems with the markup thats been supplied to you and its going to take longer than you anticipated, because you had assumed that the other contractor would be supplying professional work. Hey Mike - it's annoying when things like this happen. I've had similar things happen in the past and I usually tell the client that the other company's work is sub-standard, but also say that they should take it back to the other company and ask for a new version that is: a) W3C standards-compliant b) bandwidth-efficient c) in line with current best practices This does two things: it tells the client you're not just bad-mouthing the other company to try and get the work yourself, and also spreads the word to the other company that it's time to stop partying like it's 1999. Whatever you decide to do, you should definitely NOT be recoding their work without being paid for it. -- Kay Smoljak business: www.cleverstarfish.com standards: kay.zombiecoder.com coldfusion: kay.smoljak.com personal: goatlady.wordpress.com *** List Guidelines: http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm Unsubscribe: http://webstandardsgroup.org/join/unsubscribe.cfm Help: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***
Re: [WSG] It's times like this you remember how far you've come
Well just so you know Michael, you're not the only one who's had dealings with some Brisbane web dev cowboys. :( On Sun, 04 Mar 2007 14:44:13 +1000, Michael Kear [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have the task of writing the database/dynamic stuff behind an e-commerce site. The design work and static pages are done by a professional design web dev house in Brisbane, and yesterday I got hold of their work. My job now is to merge their stuff with the shopping cart and other components I've written. And it's now I see how far I've come with my web dev techniques. This professional design and web dev house has pages that features the following: 1. every page contains the CSS in text in the head tag, not in a linked style sheet. 2. every page uses tables for layout. 3. all the tables are nested to multiple levels 4. many of the cells or tr tags have styles inline, or they use the bgcolor attribute (not consistently either way) 5. javascript is both typed at the top of the page in the head and also inline, scattered throughout the page. 6. no ULs anywhere. The navigation is also nested tables. 7. there is no doctype. 8. the code is scattered all over the page which tells me this professional dev studio doesn’t look at their code at all, only uses wysiwyg tools. 9. they uploaded the code so EVERYTHING goes in the root level of the site, no folders at all except they did put the images into an images folder, so you have to give them half a point for that. Now I have to work my own stuff into this site, and it's proving much more difficult than with my own work. My own code is organised, it's laid out on the page, commented and indented, I use includes to keep the elements of code separated and easy to find, and I don’t have any nested tables anywhere. In fact I haven’t used tables for anything except tabular data for 18 months now. This code just looks old fashioned and amateur. It's inaccessible, and difficult to maintain. Their page weight is about three times what it needs to be because the javascript and styles are downloaded with each page view, and the nested tables add enormously to the code weight. I resent the fact that this professional design house has accepted cash-type money from my client to design the public side of the web site and produced such a shoddy job. Not only that, I have to work inside it, to make all my work function in this dogs-breakfast of a mess. Now I see how far I have come in my development. My own sites have much smaller pages for the same content, they load faster, they're far more efficient, accessible, and easy to maintain than this pile of spaghetti. Now I have to decide whether I want to spend some of my own time now redoing their work, thereby easing the road for myself down the track, or because I wont get paid for that, just go along with it and work with it. Just venting. Thanks for being patient with me. Cheers Mike Kear Windsor, NSW, Australia Adobe Certified Advanced ColdFusion Developer AFP Webworks Pty Ltd http://afpwebworks.com Full Scale ColdFusion hosting from A$15/month -- Tyssen Design www.tyssendesign.com.au Ph: (07) 3300 3303 Mb: 0405 678 590 *** List Guidelines: http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm Unsubscribe: http://webstandardsgroup.org/join/unsubscribe.cfm Help: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***
Re: [WSG] It's times like this you remember how far you've come
On Sun, 04 Mar 2007 15:47:15 +1000, John Faulds wrote: Well just so you know Michael, you're not the only one who's had dealings with some Brisbane web dev cowboys. :( Now, now - don't slag the city for the actions of a few :-P John, I realise you am just venting, but you should not be reworking someone else's markup on your own time. You should be approaching your client and explaining that you have some problems with the markup thats been supplied to you and its going to take longer than you anticipated, because you had assumed that the other contractor would be supplying professional work. No problem, but you'll need more $$ (or whatever the deal is for) Be professional, but my favourite metaphor involves something about a model-T Ford and a modern Camry :) warmly, Lea -- Lea de Groot Elysian Systems *cough*Brisbane*cough*, Australia *** List Guidelines: http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm Unsubscribe: http://webstandardsgroup.org/join/unsubscribe.cfm Help: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***
RE: [WSG] It's times like this you remember how far you've come
In fact, I'd say this is a common experience. HOWEVER, I have found that tackling it head-on, correcting the shoddy work and demonstrating the benefits to the client DOES pay off. I have acquired at least four monthly-retainer-paying type clients that way, one of whom has been with me for five years now. I have also had a few clients who've said they don't really care about it, and that's their call. None of them have turned into long term clients. Ricky Onsman -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of John Faulds Sent: Sunday, 4 March 2007 4:47 PM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org Subject: Re: [WSG] It's times like this you remember how far you've come Well just so you know Michael, you're not the only one who's had dealings with some Brisbane web dev cowboys. :( On Sun, 04 Mar 2007 14:44:13 +1000, Michael Kear [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have the task of writing the database/dynamic stuff behind an e-commerce site. The design work and static pages are done by a professional design web dev house in Brisbane, and yesterday I got hold of their work. My job now is to merge their stuff with the shopping cart and other components I've written. And it's now I see how far I've come with my web dev techniques. *** List Guidelines: http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm Unsubscribe: http://webstandardsgroup.org/join/unsubscribe.cfm Help: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***
Re: [WSG] It's times like this you remember how far you've come
On 04/03/2007, at 3:44 PM, Michael Kear wrote: I resent the fact that this professional design house has accepted cash-type money from my client to design the public side of the web site and produced such a shoddy job. Not only that, I have to work inside it, to make all my work function in this dogs-breakfast of a mess. I am continually amazed at the poor level of knowledge of standards (and more importantly IMHO, semantics) in Australian web houses - especially from corporate shops. Something I realized while working at a medium-sized dev house was that a lot of the time simple tasks like HTML/CSS work are given to students or people without a lot of experience in the field. I suppose it simple and cost effective to have Joe Web Wizzard Bloggs to chop up a site in Dreamweaver and pass it off as finished work, and stakeholders often won't recognize (or care) if the layout was written like you described so long as it works in IE6. In fact, i've actually worked on apps that used Java println statements to output large parts of the app into tables, when most of the existing code is handled completely differently. It's is a pity when you have to fix these kinds of things :) My pet peeve is starting work on an application thats been in development for years with the hands of oh, maybe 20 different programmers that all use different coding styles, strange unstandard methods of doing things (for example, using Javascript to submit forms when a normal submit would work fine.). Oh, and Hi to everyone on the list, I've been reading it for a few weeks now and thought I might join the conversation, if thats okay with you guys :) Have a good weekend, -- Jake Tracey http://www.jaketracey.com p. +61410676643 e. [EMAIL PROTECTED] skype. jaketracey *** List Guidelines: http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm Unsubscribe: http://webstandardsgroup.org/join/unsubscribe.cfm Help: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***
