[WEB4LIB] CSS, HTML4, and DHTML4

[John Little]

Don:

In my opinion the primary reason ("purpose") the contracts should adhere to
your standards is because you asked them to.  A contractor that is unable to
produce a product as requested (which is my suspicion) should have said so
in advance.  Now your contractor is in an unenviable position of hoping to
get paid for something you didn't ask for.


Other issues include accessibility, portability, and standards (or why use
CSS, or HTML 4, or any standard).

Accessibility:
* You likely have a broad user base whose computer platform and browser
versions are equally broad.
* Likely, it is your library's tradition to provide information with as few
barriers as possible.
** CSS is one way to break down those barriers and to focus on information
delivery to a broad user base.

Portability and standards:
* Basically the standards are written so that the web can be used across a
range of understood platforms and situations.  Not the least of these issues
is that you may use a different contractor next time.  If the first
contractor uses standards then the next contractor, ideally, will have an
easier time of updating or modifying the HTML.  A lot could be written here.
(Maybe Thomas Dowling will write in.)  But for me the bottom line about
standards is that a professional will know when to break or bend the rules.
Perfect adherence to standards is a great goal.  While it may not always be
desirable or even possible to attain the holy grail of complete standards
adherence it strikes me as odd that you would have to defend the use of
standards to a contractor.

I would suggest that adherence to HTML4 may be easier said than done.  But
the use of CSS should be commonplace at this point.

The other aspect of design which should be thought of in advance is
usability.  Jakob Nielsen's web site, <http://www.useit.com/>, is mentioned
often in Web4Lib so I won't go into detail.  But usability should get equal
billing with standards when it comes to web site design.

/
John.Little at Duke.edu
Web Development Librarian
Duke University


> -----Original Message-----
>
> We recently contracted with a local multimedia design company to
> update the look and function of our Web site.  Based on what
> I've learned by reading the conversations on this list, I asked
> that the new site use cascading style sheets, that W3C standards
> for HTML4 be followed, and that the code be validated as well
> as run through Bobby.  When the new pages were shown to us last
> week, none of these things happened.  I immediately asked them why
> not.
> ... ... ...
>
> > We can make some of the changes you requested, by removing some
> > of the tag information, however, converting the pages completely
> > to CSS will take quite a bit of work. My question is, what is
> > the purpose of this? What is the issue here? Are you looking at
> > creating a set of DHTML 4.0 standards and why?
>