[thelist] CSS Question

aardvark roselli at earthlink.net
Wed Mar 13 23:41:01 CST 2002


> From: Mark Howells <mark at mountain.ch>
[...]
> > Let's assume that 1% of users are visiting their website with that
> > browser. Is the value of using CSS for positioning really more
> > valuable to a company than creating accessable pages to that 1% of
> > its population?
>
> That depends on your definition of accessible. If a site is put
> together using tables and 1px spacer gifs, it's likely to be
> inaccessible (or at least dreadful or unusable) in a text browser or
> in a browser with images turned off. That's before we even start

i disagree... using tables and 1px spacer .gifs does *not* automatically mean
a site is inaccessible...

CSS does *not* automatically mean a site will be accessible...

doing things like not relying on client-side scripting, specific browser features,
or platform widgets will go a long way to making a site accessible...
linearization is key, too...

somehow i've been able to build accessible sites for *years* using tabled
layouts for blind and physically handicapped users that conform to levels A
through AAA of the WAI -- all tabled layouts...

i actually get more bang for the buck with a tabled layout because i get a
consistent look across *all* browsers (and a lot of disabled users use old
browsers because they got them to *work* with their add-on apps), which
actually equates to better browser support than the CSS-only layout that
shuts out pre 5.x browsers... and the clients who don't want to shut out those
users (because they are a chunk of the audience) don't need to be bothered
with what they see as a personal campaign to get people to upgrade...

> talking about users with mobile devices, non-visual browsers and TV

same goes for these browsers...

> browsers. Accessibility is about letting /all/ your visitors get at
> the content, without having to code twenty sets of templates for
> different browsers just so you can get the same layout across all of
> them.

if you're coding multiple templates, you're probably a poor coder...

one template, all devices, all content...  it can happen... i do it all the time...

IOW, depending on your coding skills, make the decision... you can still write
valid HTML using tabled layouts, and you can still make your pages linearize
with tabled layouts...  if you go the CSS route, do it by hand, don't use DW or
anything that prevents you from seeing when your content is in the wrong
order in your code, meaning it won't linearize well...

and don't forget the audience or the client, they often don't care about your
personal preferences, just that stuff works (audience) and looks the way they
want (client)...




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