Comments on: Business of the Web Part 3 : What does valid code mean to me? http://www.amberweinberg.com/business-of-the-web-part-3-what-does-valid-code-mean-to-me/ Design, Development and Freelance Articles and Tutorials Mon, 06 Feb 2012 21:01:26 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Amberhttp://www.amberweinberg.com/business-of-the-web-part-3-what-does-valid-code-mean-to-me/#comment-7 Amber Thu, 17 Sep 2009 18:21:35 +0000 http://www.amberweinberg.com/blog/?p=22#comment-7 Yea I always validated in XHTML 1.0 Strict unless it's Wordpress (I don't want to go through their mountains of code) whereas I use 1.0 Transitional. Sometimes it's hard to keep up though, as you never know when they come out with a new validation...wish they would pick a way and stick to it ;) Yea I always validated in XHTML 1.0 Strict unless it’s WordPress (I don’t want to go through their mountains of code) whereas I use 1.0 Transitional. Sometimes it’s hard to keep up though, as you never know when they come out with a new validation…wish they would pick a way and stick to it ;)

]]> By: Dave Brimlowhttp://www.amberweinberg.com/business-of-the-web-part-3-what-does-valid-code-mean-to-me/#comment-6 Dave Brimlow Thu, 17 Sep 2009 17:38:15 +0000 http://www.amberweinberg.com/blog/?p=22#comment-6 Good for you, Amber!I thought I was the only one out here gnashing teeth when encountering all the bad invalid code online. I mean, how bad do you have to be to get even a transitional doctype wrong!!There is really no such thing as "valid" transitional markup; it is an oxy-moron. "Valid" implies that the doctype used is compliant to the specification of the markup - in the case of any current XHTML (served using the text/html mime type) that would be HTML 4.01 strict.Transitional doctypes were necessary to serve previously spec valid markup, for those of us who had hundreds or thousands pages using deprecated code, while we "transitioned" it over to spec compliant markup. It was supposed to be a temporary reprieve. It wasn't meant to be a standalone "valid" version of the markup spec itself. Which is why it is a step backward.Beginners still use the tag!!!! beginners still use !!!Why? We can't blame Microsoft anymore. It is an overall ignorance that's even carried over into the books or online template/libraries.And the state of things today only looks like it is getting worse. It seems as if all of the inroads made in standards compliance, usability, semantic tagging and valid markup over the last five years are being destroyed by the current inappropriate horrors perpetrated on the world as mangled Ajax.It boggles the mind how the Ajax "faddies" can follow convoluted conditional programming logic, but can't understand why two floated "divs" don't inherit equal heights or why they can't auto center a block using position:absolute.Dave Good for you, Amber!

I thought I was the only one out here gnashing teeth when encountering all the bad invalid code online. I mean, how bad do you have to be to get even a transitional doctype wrong!!

There is really no such thing as “valid” transitional markup; it is an oxy-moron. “Valid” implies that the doctype used is compliant to the specification of the markup – in the case of any current XHTML (served using the text/html mime type) that would be HTML 4.01 strict.

Transitional doctypes were necessary to serve previously spec valid markup, for those of us who had hundreds or thousands pages using deprecated code, while we “transitioned” it over to spec compliant markup. It was supposed to be a temporary reprieve. It wasn’t meant to be a standalone “valid” version of the markup spec itself. Which is why it is a step backward.

Beginners still use the tag!!!! beginners still use !!!

Why? We can’t blame Microsoft anymore. It is an overall ignorance that’s even carried over into the books or online template/libraries.

And the state of things today only looks like it is getting worse. It seems as if all of the inroads made in standards compliance, usability, semantic tagging and valid markup over the last five years are being destroyed by the current inappropriate horrors perpetrated on the world as mangled Ajax.

It boggles the mind how the Ajax “faddies” can follow convoluted conditional programming logic, but can’t understand why two floated “divs” don’t inherit equal heights or why they can’t auto center a block using position:absolute.

Dave

]]> By: Colin McCormickhttp://www.amberweinberg.com/business-of-the-web-part-3-what-does-valid-code-mean-to-me/#comment-5 Colin McCormick Wed, 16 Sep 2009 23:04:50 +0000 http://www.amberweinberg.com/blog/?p=22#comment-5 It's true. Generally people don't appreciate code, never mind the validity of the code. That’s down to ignorance. So it's our duty as code loving developers to educate clients about valid code and the benefits of it, during our development meetings and through blog posts such as this.There are two things I really love about this post. The first, is the emphasis on the professionalism that valid code suggests. The second, is the questions that you should ask a developer. I just want to add that any developer worth their salt will not only be able to answer the question, but to explain the question in "non-geek" speak.Just one point about the post I'm not sure I agree with and that is always validating as xhtml strict. There are some instances where this might not be possible. For example, if you embed a googlemap from the link on the googlemaps, you are actually embedding an iframe, which obviously wouldn't validate in strict. You would need to use transitional (I'm not even mentioning frameset, it was a bad idea ;) ). I think the developer should always aim to create a website which validates as strict (at least until html5 is released) but be aware that there are some situations where transitional may need to be used. And if the client asks about strict validation, again any developer worth their salt will be able to justify the reason for not doing so.Overall great post. Keep it up :) It’s true. Generally people don’t appreciate code, never mind the validity of the code. That’s down to ignorance. So it’s our duty as code loving developers to educate clients about valid code and the benefits of it, during our development meetings and through blog posts such as this.

There are two things I really love about this post. The first, is the emphasis on the professionalism that valid code suggests. The second, is the questions that you should ask a developer. I just want to add that any developer worth their salt will not only be able to answer the question, but to explain the question in “non-geek” speak.

Just one point about the post I’m not sure I agree with and that is always validating as xhtml strict. There are some instances where this might not be possible. For example, if you embed a googlemap from the link on the googlemaps, you are actually embedding an iframe, which obviously wouldn’t validate in strict. You would need to use transitional (I’m not even mentioning frameset, it was a bad idea ;) ). I think the developer should always aim to create a website which validates as strict (at least until html5 is released) but be aware that there are some situations where transitional may need to be used. And if the client asks about strict validation, again any developer worth their salt will be able to justify the reason for not doing so.

Overall great post. Keep it up :)

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