Anyone here knowledeable in HTML/XHTML/CSS?

[lfmusiclover]

As the title says, I am looking for some help from someone who has some knowledge in HTMl/XHTML/CSS, preferrable someone with a at the very least a decent amount of knowledge. Here's why: I am trying to spruce up the code of all the sites pages, but with so many,that's quite a monumental task for one person. Add to that my minimal (at best) knowledge of XHTML and CSS, and that makes for a very arduous task.

If you Google HTML validation, and plug my URL into the first site on the list (the W3C's HTML checker), it'll spit out a list of errors on each page of the site. What I need is for someone to help me correct these problems. I'm hoping that two people working at it can get the job done relatively quickly. I will give you a batch of pages,and when your done, you can send them back to me, and we'll repeat the process until all are done. I too will be working on pages (in fact, I've already completed a few), so my hope is that we can get a decent amount done in a short time.

If anyone here is sufficiently knowledgeable ad would like to help, let me know.

[beanboy89]

I could try (I originally designed all the pages), but it probably involve me rewriting every page from scratch to improve the code and get it up to code, so to speak.

[lfmusiclover]

That's right, you did create them.

Hmmm...that sounds like a pretty big undertaking. Question: must the site be in XHTML? Would it be advisable to switch to plain HTML 4.01 instead? I ask because as I write this I am checking out weather.com's source code and their site adhere's to the HTML 4.01Strict standard, but no CSS, XHTML, or anything like that. Are there particular drawbacks or advantages of one or the other?

[beanboy89]

That's right, you did create them.

Hmmm...that sounds like a pretty big undertaking. Question: must the site be in XHTML? Would it be advisable to switch to plain HTML 4.01 instead? I ask because as I write this I am checking out weather.com's source code and their site adhere's to the HTML 4.01Strict standard, but no CSS, XHTML, or anything like that. Are there particular drawbacks or advantages of one or the other?

They don't have to be in XHTML. I decided to use XHTML because that what I learned in school (but I know HTML 4.01, too). The differences between XHTML 1.0 and HTML 4.01 are minor (just a few differences in tags, and the fact XML can be integrated in the code using XHTML), but generally HTML 4.01 is more common just because it's been around for so long.

[lfmusiclover]

That's right, you did create them.

Hmmm...that sounds like a pretty big undertaking. Question: must the site be in XHTML? Would it be advisable to switch to plain HTML 4.01 instead? I ask because as I write this I am checking out weather.com's source code and their site adhere's to the HTML 4.01Strict standard, but no CSS, XHTML, or anything like that. Are there particular drawbacks or advantages of one or the other?

They don't have to be in XHTML. I decided to use XHTML because that what I learned in school (but I know HTML 4.01, too). The differences between XHTML 1.0 and HTML 4.01 are minor (just a few differences in tags, and the fact XML can be integrated in the code using XHTML), but generally HTML 4.01 is more common just because it's been around for so long.

I see....

At this point I'm wondering if it would be easier to just revert back to plain ol' HTML. I'm very well versed in that, so getting the site up to code by myself would not be a problem. That's the biggest concern-I really don't want to have to drag you or anyone else into a tedious, arduous, time-consuming task if its not necessary.

Consequently, I just plugged weather.com into the W3C code validator, and their site has more errors than mine! I guess then that having perfect code isn't a very big concern. 

[beanboy89]

I see....

At this point I'm wondering if it would be easier to just revert back to plain ol' HTML. I'm very well versed in that, so getting the site up to code by myself would not be a problem. That's the biggest concern-I really don't want to have to drag you or anyone else into a tedious, arduous, time-consuming task if its not necessary.

Consequently, I just plugged weather.com into the W3C code validator, and their site has more errors than mine! I guess then that having perfect code isn't a very big concern. 

I wouldn't loose sleep over what the W3C Validator says. It tends to be very picky about what code you can and can't use, and that's an understatement. As long as the code is semi clean, has no huge errors, and works in the major browsers, it should be fine.

[lfmusiclover]

I see....

At this point I'm wondering if it would be easier to just revert back to plain ol' HTML. I'm very well versed in that, so getting the site up to code by myself would not be a problem. That's the biggest concern-I really don't want to have to drag you or anyone else into a tedious, arduous, time-consuming task if its not necessary.

Consequently, I just plugged weather.com into the W3C code validator, and their site has more errors than mine! I guess then that having perfect code isn't a very big concern. 

I wouldn't loose sleep over what the W3C Validator says. It tends to be very picky about what code you can and can't use, and that's an understatement. As long as the code is semi clean, has no huge errors, and works in the major browsers, it should be fine.

I think it meets those criteria. 

Yeah I think I'll just leave it as it is.  :sunglasses:

[twcclassics]

Following HTML coding standards and making sure your site validates is mainly about accessibility (making sure the browser displays your website the way you intended it to be). The W3C sets standards to help you out so that no matter what the visitor's setup is (OS, browser, monitor size, etc), it will display properly.

Basically, your browser takes the doctype listed in the page's HTML and displays the page based on the standards set in that doctype. If the code is poorly written, then the page might not display properly. If no doctype is specfied, (I believe) it guesses based on the rest of the html.

With personal sites, it doesn't really matter. But for large, heavily trafficked sites like weather.com, it's very important. Not sure why weather.com doesn't have a correct doctype statement. But then again, Google doesn't even have a doctype (let alone a correct one), and there's no excuse for that.

[tpirfan28]

If this ever comes up again, I'd be willing to help...I'm going to school for this sort of thing.

[lfmusiclover]

Thanks for that explanation Matt, it was very helpful! It is peculiar that the big sites you mentioned don't have a doctype statement. You'd think sites like that would adhere to the specifications very strictly.  :shocked:

Other Matt, it may indeed come up again. But I've been learning this stuff for years, is I'd really like to try and do it myself, if I bother with it at all. After reading the other Matt's statement I may not worry about it. After all, I'm pretty sure that all my code is relatively clean. It has, after all, been my goal since day one to make this website as widely viewable as possible.

And when I think about it, when I validated my code, the errors it returned were very minor in nature, mostly tags I used that are no longer in the HTML specifications. I really didn't see anything that shoulda thrown up a red flag.

One last thing I should mention...Billy, I hope you aren't offended by my sudden interest in the site's coding. I trust very much that you did a fine job. My interest is not in finding problems with the code. Rather, I'm just trying to do every little thing I can do to make sure nothing stands in the way of this site's growth. 

[Gil]

Gil is good at HTML. You might also want to look into PHP or something.

[lfmusiclover]

Don't need any PHP.  

[Gil]

Don't need any PHP.  

Sorry

[Spring Rubber]

Basically, the big corporations simply don't care enough to make their sites compliant; apparently they feel it's not worth their time. I've been an advocate of W3C for years now thanks to the influence of a web design board I used to frequent. I think it's a good thing for cross-browser compatibility, but I agree, it can be a pain to code it properly, and going from scratch would be the only way pretty much for this site.