Good evening mates, First, thanks to all for the excellent advice and direction!
I was successful in creating a table less form, albeit simple, that renders perfectly in IE6 (hard to believe), and damn good in FF1 and Opera7.4. If interested, the page is located at the following URL: http://www.waltermortgage.com/contactus.stm Both the XHTML (transitional) and CSS validate with no errors or warnings found! This particular client who is extremely computer literate completely embraced the conversion to a standards-based site, and I wanted it right. Although I�ve been designing for 7+ years and working with standards for 15 months I always consider my cup half-full therefore please do not hesitate to let me know if I missed something. Here's the CSS if interested: #contactform {width: 645px; font: 12px verdana, helvetica, arial, sans-serif; color: #000; margin: 5% 0 2% 7.5%;} #contactform fieldset {border: 1px solid #090; padding: 0 15px;} #contactform legend {font: bold 14px arial, helvetica, sans-serif; color: #fff; background: #009900; border: 1px solid #ccc; border-bottom-color: #666; border-right-color: #666; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 4px 8px;} #contactform p {clear: left; margin: 0; padding: 5px 0 10px 0; font-weight: bold;} #contactform p label {float: left; width: 30%; font-weight: bold;} .input {background: #E8F2D7;} .btn {color: #fff; background: #009900; border: 1px solid #ccc; border-bottom-color: #666; border-right-color: #666; margin-bottom: 5px;} Very appreciatively yours, Mario > G'day folks > > Firstly, apologies to Chris for not noticing that he'd already referred > Mario to Cameron's article > > Secondly, Drew's points: > > > It may make styling easier but incorporating form controls in labels > has a > > different meaning than associating a label and a form control. For > one thing, it isn't usable for those choosing a table layout for > forms. > Nor is > > it possible to use an incorporated form control with multiple labels. > > Both very good points. Obviously incorporating form controls and labels > wouldn't make sense for a typical tabular form layout. On the other > hand, I don't know why you'd want to use tables for layout when you > could style the elements themselves > > I guess there could be some cases where you NEED multiple inputs to be > associated with each other as tabular data - perhaps an editable data > grid or the like? In which case, not being able to assign multiple > labels to each input would also be an issue > > I don't see standard web forms (ie detail-gathering for shopping, > membership registration, feedback etc) as requiring a table structure. > Those sort of forms inevitably have simpler internal relationships > > Back to the multiple labels: Again, there are definitely scenarios (such > as the one above) where they could be put to good use. However, I've > never actually done it. Every time I've come across a potential use for > multiple labels, I've realised that my form simply needs better > specification > > Obviously all of the above is completely subjective. Maybe I'm the only > one who has never needed to do either of the things Drew mentioned. As > he said: > > Use what you want, but use it correctly. > > For my money, incorporating form controls inside labels is my default > construction for form HTML. Occasionally, I've needed to consider other > options, but each time some creative CSS has produced the required > layout and saved me changing the HTML > > Oh, and I still use the FOR attribute, regardless of implicit > associations > > Cheers, > Lachlan > ****************************************************** > 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 ******************************************************
