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yb2
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 13:36:03
you're mixing up standards with content. McDonalds may not serve high class food, but they do have high standards of cleanliness etc.
And why should a web browser be served anything other than HTML?? Use a style sheet (CSS or XSL) to transform the content (XML) into the right sort of html for the consumer. I don't see why the user should get xml unless they specifically request it.
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spitfire
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 14:25:49
yb2
I rather hoped I would enjoy your post until you said this:
quote:
There's more to the W3C than the eye, methinks... (communists? :) and this:
quote:
If a screen-reader announced itself as a screen reader on connection then it could be served with proper content.
Microsoft is a member of W3C and an active member of the Web Standards Project. Now you've got me doing stoopid underlines to enforce a point.
Browsers may announce themselves but a screen-reader is not a browser. It takes its cue from how a browser (which has to be IE at the moment) renders a page. It has to sit on top of the browser, it does not actually interrogate the code (or so the UK distributors tell me). Therefore, rubbish rendering=rubbish content if you have no option but to have the page read aloud to you. And I'm sorry to say nested layout tables can produce the bestest, rubbishiest, rubbish you've ever had to listen to.
Even if a screen-reader announced itself on connection, how many coders would throw their hands up in horror and say, "Isn't it enough we have to code for several browsers? Now you tell me we also have to code for loadsa of screen-readers? ".
And why should anyone do anything about the html protocol if, as you say "This one-size fits all approach is from the wrong direction."
Do you mean you can't turn a light off by unscrewing it (unscrewing what? the bulb or the light switch?) with your bare hands. Either way, I am disappointed in you, thought you were made of sterner stuff 
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Tailslide
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 15:38:05
It's simple - We all operate to the same standard - using standard markup. Then screen-reader manufacturers can build their machines with confidence. We can build our sites with confidence. Users get faster, better looking websites that have more functionality (XML). I want to be able to offer my clients more but I can't because I have to build to what will work on IE - which is a shame.
Or
We can all do different things and you've got anarchy like back in the mid 90s.
Or
We can all do it Microsoft's way and here halts progress on the interenet until MS decides there's profit in it.
The W3C is trying (and thankfully, very slowly starting to suceed) in bringing some order to the chaos. IE7 isn't great but it's slightly better than IE6 and will allow me to offer my clients slightly more than I do now.
What we need is basic rules that everyone adheres to and then creativity can flourish from it. We also need more competition from OSs - please please please let Apple release a PC version of OSX - then maybe we'll have an interesting fight.
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yb2
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 15:41:46
How does offering a different version of the same content using a stylesheet tailored to the demands of the client produce anarchy?
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Tailslide
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 15:57:31
quote:
ORIGINAL: yb2
How does offering a different version of the same content using a stylesheet tailored to the demands of the client produce anarchy?
Why would I need multiple stylesheets? Screenreaders aren't interested in the stylesheets they're interested in the markup (was that point directed at screenreaders?).
I don't want to offer a different version of my content for people with good browsers - that's not right. Everyone gets the same - pretty much. All dumbed down to IE's level.
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Little Blue Plane Web Design | Blood, Sweat & Rust - A Land Rover restoration project
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yb2
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 16:04:29
quote:
Why would I need multiple stylesheets?
To transform your XML (the seperated content) into something tailored to the client (via an XSL or CSS stylesheet).
quote:
I don't want to offer a different version of my content for people with good browsers
I thought you were interested in accessibilty? Obviously something is more accessible if it is tailored directly to the client.
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spitfire
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 16:21:19
quote:
I thought you were interested in accessibilty? Obviously something is more accessible if it is tailored directly to the client.
I know this was directed at Tail but my clients are my site visitors. They have a wide variety of visual, mobility or cognitive problems that make it difficult for them to use a computer in the same way as other people. I can tailor my site directly to meet all their needs and the ones who think they are "normal" with one stylesheet (or whatever acronym you want to use) plus one stylesheet to deal with various versions of IE - mind you I only go back to V5. So following your logic or not grokking what you say most of the time, I also, clearly, have not been interested in accessibility for the past 10 years huh?
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yb2
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 16:31:43
The main point behind xhtml is the seperation of content from presentation. So if you keep your content in xml format, making it readily accessible to a variety of other technologies, then you can serve up that content in any fashion you wish through the use of stylesheets (CSS and XSL can be used as stylesheets with XML).
If there is a problem accessing a building for wheelchairs you could provide a ramp that everyone uses, or give some people stairs, a lift, a ramp, an escalator...
...or you can just provide a ramp that everyone uses. If you seperate the content from the presentation then it allows you to choose how many different formats you provide. You could still use one stylesheet that produced a one size fits all xhtml markup + content.
More choice, more accessible, cleaner and easier to maintain (change the relevant stylesheet and it only affects that type of client).
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spitfire
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/4/2006 16:39:40
The words:
eggs - suck - grandparent - teaching - your - to
come to mind.
Rearrange howsoever you will in whichever one (or more) of your acronyms that take your fancy.
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Tailslide
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/23/2006 5:06:31
I actually don't understand his argument - in my view if used properly, the presentation and content are separated. Using an external stylesheet the layout of different pages on a site can be completely different even if the structure of the markup is the same.
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d a v e
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/23/2006 5:51:22
quote:
Using an external stylesheet the layout of different pages on a site can be completely different even if the structure of the markup is the same.
e.g . http://www.csszengarden.com/
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Gekko web design
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Tailslide
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/23/2006 9:32:03
I still don't get the argument (I'm not being deliberately obtuse I really don't understand what the guy's getting at). Complicated or simple, used properly CSS layouts separate presentation from content and allow for flexibility in how a page is presented - it would seem self evident.
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Little Blue Plane Web Design | Blood, Sweat & Rust - A Land Rover restoration project
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d a v e
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/23/2006 10:03:07
the guy in the article doesn't convince me at all
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yb2
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/23/2006 10:03:29
I think the point is, that what you say is true to an extent, but it isn't truly seperate and never can be due to the nature of the languages used.
A good contrast is XML and XSLT. CSS is an extension of the HTML language and needs to know about the mark up. It's the HTML that decides what is on the page and where, CSS can only affect this, but not control it. XSLT can transform/control presentation, and as the author points out, many desktop publishing packages work in a "transforming" way, with true control over presentation.
The idea that the user can run their own style sheet helps illuminate the point also (and is slightly spurious in practice), because for most CSS to work (for the viewer) you have to know about the HTML in advance. Not that it is HTML, but the actual form the HTML will take.
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Currently listening to: L'Enfer Des Formes by Stereolab
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Tailslide
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RE: MS New "FrontPage" and More - 4/23/2006 10:29:47
Ok I think I get part of your answer (more enlightening that his article!). With XML where you can make up your own tags, would not the attached stylesheet have to have knowledge of that particular page's tags - is that not similar to CSS stylesheets understanding what a <p> tag is for example? I'm not sure if I understand whether the type of knowledge is different entirely. Would CSS accompanying a properly served (application/xml) XHTML document be more separate?
From my point of view, building websites day to day and taking into account the odd annoyance with browser differences, I still find CSS layouts easier to deal with than table layouts (shock horror, yes I used to use tables although not for clients' sites). I don't (with a couple of minor exceptions that I won't bore you with) include presentational markup in with the content - and I love the fact that I can switch the sidebar from the left of a page to the right of the page if I fancy, in about 30 seconds, site-wide.
If as this article says, CSS isn't actually separate from the content in a technical definition, it certainly is in a functional, day to day way.
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"My strategy is so simple an idiot could have devised it"
Little Blue Plane Web Design | Blood, Sweat & Rust - A Land Rover restoration project
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