Web-site Development Tools

[Thomas Dowling]

> >Here's a test for all you hand-coders.  Suppose you have a web page
> >containing a large table (say a half dozen columns and a score of rows,
> >with some spanned rows and some cells containing nested tables.  Swap
> >columns 2 and 3.
> >
> >That's a 10 sec chore using an HTML editor that understands
> tables (even
> >Microsoft Word).  It's a 10 min. chore using BBEdit.
>
> OK. Now here's a test for all you "wysiwyg" coders. Get your document to
> validate. How long did that take? (stop smirking, HotMetal people!)
>

In a table example particularly, there may be changes made beyone
validation errors.  As I recall, a lot of "wysiwyg" editors
surreptitiously add--or remove--a lot of table-related tags and
attributes.  You may find that your table has suddenly added explicit
width attributes to every cell, lost or misplaced any CAPTION element, or
mishandled elements like COL or COLGROUP, all without telling you.

Thomas Dowling
OhioLINK - Ohio Library and Information Network
tdowling at ohiolink.edu