On Sat, 2004-05-15 at 09:25, John Allsopp wrote: > So rather than seeing something like "at times, it may be necessary to > use a non standards based approach to achieve an outcome within > certain constraints, and that is ok" they see "all those standards > zealots really don't know about the real world so everything they say > can safely be ignored." >
One of the things that I find hard to believe in this whole debate is that tables are some how seen as "a non standards based approach". Of course an argument could be made that tables only exist in the standard for legacy reasons, since dropping them would break the whole web. We know better than that, tables still have a place in the standard, by the same token what of the comments about floats and their original purpose, does the fact that we use them for other purposes make it wrong? > > Judging by the comments to your post, you'll see that a lot of people > want to use tables, largely because that is what they know and do now. > They simply don't want to accept the arguments in favour of a > standards based web. That's fine by me, they are quite entitled to do > so. I don't think they are very wise, but while I evangelise web > standards, I don't insist on people using them. > But unfortunately an article like yours is not read by them in the > spirit in which you intended, it is read as a vindication of their > position. "See, Andy Budd agrees with me". There is indeed people who may take Andy's words as an excuse to continue using nested tables as they see fit. But I think most people who read Andy's article understand its general flavour. The advantages to using modern markup and css are quite obvious to most people, esp. those who have an interest in new concepts. These concepts we pride ourselves on are ideal and given a perfect world would stand out alone as the "one way", however in practise and mainly due to IE this is not the case, and its these factors that make it possible for a decent case to maybe working in a table here or there. This is the one single fact that I've taken from all this banter. I would also like to think that most people who use tables for layout are fully aware of the short comings of such a method and that they realise its a choice they've made that others may not have. The development process is not usually so clean cut and from my experience I realise that most developers face a multitude of different variables that can sway these decisions around in the wind. As I imagine you have seen John, its a difficult thing to try and explain to a seasoned table builder how there is another way, an even better way. The acceptance of this process given complete ignorance of the benefits is an uphill battle. The discovery of these ideals by the individual is the best solution. "Look, I know you like tables and it seems easy now, but here read this, and get back to me" hand them a good book on modern markup authoring techniques. If they see the light then great, otherwise .. well tough. The popular response to Andy's article that using the odd table without nesting them, is simple practical advice. I don't really think the odd table is that detrimental to our efforts of advocating web standards. Regards Chris Blown ***************************************************** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list & getting help *****************************************************
