CSS Tables

S.M.B.

So I just finished reading Sitepoints Everything You Know About CSS Is Wrong! (I've a lot of time for their series of books) and am interested in knowing if people share the same view as them.

Does anyone develop their sites using CSS tables at the moment or is it too early to really consider?

Should we help promote the upgrading of browsers by providing lesser versions of a web site to those who stick with IE6 & IE7?

Malice

S.M.B. wrote: »

Should we help promote the upgrading of browsers by providing lesser versions of a web site to those who stick with IE6 & IE7?

How does that help you promote a browser upgrade? If you, as the website developer, implement a client site so that it works perfectly in FireFox but the client doesn't use FireFox, surely all that will happen is that the client will simply reject your work on the grounds that "it's broken"? If the client isn't technically minded enough to care about alternative browsers (and the vast majority won't be) then you will have wasted your time. To most people the Internet is the blue 'e' icon that sits on their desktop.

That's before we get onto corporate environments where IT policy moves at a glacial pace and most places are still using IE6 with all it's inherent limitations.

p

I don't think you can use the (incredibly badly named) CSS Table Layout options in IE, can you?

I generally avoid hacks as much as possible when building sites. Haven't read this book though, so would be curious aboutu what it says.

heggie

not until IE 8. So unless your going to have different style sheets, this isn't going to be widely used until 3 - 5 years at a guess.

S.M.B.

Yeah, it's strange that the book has been published already as it's basically about how IE8 will handle CSS tables.

The whole point behind the book is to design your site using CSS tables which does seem to be a lot simpler and then either:

a) Do nothing more resulting in users of IE6 and IE7 viewing a "broken" version of your site.

b) Design a very limited site for your IE6 & IE7 users and inform them that they should upgrade their browser.

or

c) Completely replicate your site for IE6 & IE7 users

Their whole point seems to be that for the past few years everyone was angered with IE for how they handled CSS but now they've done their job it's up to developers and users to push each other to upgrade.

It all makes sense in theory I guess.

Again though, it's odd that the book has been published with IE 8 still a few months away.

Goodshape

S.M.B. wrote: »

It all makes sense in theory I guess.

Indeed. I doubt any of my clients would be happy if I chose options a or b for their sites.

For personal sites though, I'd be inclined toward either the stripped down or just plain 'broken' for IE versions.

It's hugely frustrating knowing what would be possible... if only for that one poxy little browser.

heggie

hopefully for ie7 they can force updates to ie8 with windows update? which should reduce the lag in switchover.

Malice

Goodshape wrote: »

It's hugely frustrating knowing what would be possible... if only for that one poxy little browser.

This is so true. It's just a pity that it still has a massive market share courtesy of being bundled with Windows.