[WEB4LIB] CSS vs. Tables

[Brandon Dennis]

Sarah -
 
There are two primary benefits (plenty of minor ones too :) to switching
to a CSS design as opposed to a table design:
1.  For consistency and ease of coordinating design, CSS separates
content from presentation.  So if your patrons (or boss) don't like the
font, you can change it across the board with one or two lines (as
opposed to going through every file).  As well as most other
presentation decisions.
2.  Using Style Sheets (and separating presentation from content) means
that the browser only has to load the .css file that those pages use
once.  It *will* just use the same presentation once it's loaded.  So if
you are interested for a honest comparison, you would need to strip all
the HTML files on your site and then compare the total size.  Usually,
even if a visitor only goes to a couple of pages, it makes up for the
difference.  And if it doesn't, for a variety of other reasons, it's
worth the difference to have converted your site to CSS.
 
Best of luck!  (I'm getting ready to do the same thing)
Brandon
 

	-----Original Message----- 
	From: Smith, Sarah [mailto:sarah.smith at fresnolibrary.org] 
	Sent: Fri 3/4/2005 5:00 PM 
	To: Multiple recipients of list 
	Cc: 
	Subject: [WEB4LIB] 
	
	

	I'm tinkering around with converting a website from a table
layout to a
	div layout, and I've managed to get identical appearance. The
div and
	table based html files are identical in line length, and the CSS
file
	for the div based layout is longer than the CSS file for table
based
	layout. I only noticed because I ran a "Speed Report" from the
Firefox
	Web Developer's toolbar and it said my CSS file was twice the
	recommended size.
	My question is: does/should separating content from layout
reduce the
	number of lines of coding needed? Size of files? Etc...
	TIA,
	Sarah A Smith