[Theforum] evolt-spotting

Shirley Kaiser skaiser1 at skdesigns.com
Tue Feb 5 21:51:12 CST 2002


At 08:39 AM 2/5/2002, you typed:
>[ Converted text/enriched to text/plain ]
>The way it was
>Thursday December 20, 2001
>http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,621057,00.html

Fascinating article! (and I wish I had more time right now to go explore
all those interesting links)

>"If you are particularly miffed at the tyranny of modern web design, stage
>your own personal protest and install an antique browser on your system. The
>Browser Archive at http://browsers.evolt.org maintains a collection of vintage
>browsers, including several incarnations of Mosaic, Navigator and Internet
>Explorer. You will find the original web browser - web inventor Tim
>Berners-Lee's WorldWideWeb for NeXT."
>
>i'd bet the WaSP would just *love* that...

<big chuckle> Well, of course that article is talking about downloading
them for an interesting historical experience, too. And it is interesting
indeed. I downloaded Netscape 1 a week or two ago and had a real trip
trying to view various sites. I also use Lynx all the time to test my pages
to make sure they're accessible. That can be another trip, too....

Back to WaSP, though. WaSP, after all, is trying to show that
standards-based markup can degrade gracefully for older browsers and are
even more accessible. Standards-based markup ought to be even more
accessible to more people. Eliminating all the hacks we've been pretty much
forced to use to make cross-browser, cross-compatible pages will be a good
thing, IMO.

The idea is to
1. get the browser companies to continue to work toward better
standards-compliancy (and they really are making good headway, although
they've still got work to do),

2. get the software companies, such as Adobe for GoLive, Macromedia for
Dreamweaver, and other design- or markup-related software to create
standards-compliant pages,

3. get designers and developers to write standards-compliant pages.

Things are so patchy because of the discrepancies that have become the
norm. So if we keep working towards standards, then it won't matter if
people are using Lynx, Mosaic 1, Tim Berners-Lee's first browser, or
IE8.... they'll still be accessible and readable regardless of the browser
or the version.

And yes, I wouldn't mind blowing up Netscape 4 and banishing it to oblivion
since it lacks so much standards support that gets in the way.

Also, just because it's a major challenge to actually achieve standards
compliancy with the browser and software companies doesn't mean I'll quit
trying. It's more than worth the effort, IMO. How would we deal with light
bulbs today if it wasn't for standards in their industry?!

Well, back to work for me....

Warmly,
Shirley

--
Shirley E. Kaiser, M.A.,  SKDesigns  mailto:skaiser1 at skdesigns.com
Web Site Design, Development     http://www.skdesigns.com/
WebsiteTips: Design Resources   http://www.websitetips.com/
Brainstorms and Raves  http://www.brainstormsandraves.com/




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