Is this bad practice?

[aqw]

Hi!

I wopuld like to know if putting inline elements directly in Divs is bad practice or not? Or should I prefer:

<div id="test"><p>text comes here</p></div>

Wait a minute... why not just make:

<p id="test">text comes here</p>

Is this last line of code bad practice if the <p is floated left or right? (I mean, should floats only be applied on divs and so on? and never on <p>s?)

Thanks

[AutisticCuckoo]

Is this last line of code bad practice if the <p is floated left or right? (I mean, should floats only be applied on divs and so on? and never on <p>s?)

It's not bad practice. In fact, it's excellent practice!

Keep the markup as clean as possible. DIVs are last resorts; something you use when all other options have been exhausted. CSS can be applied to any HTML element.

[aqw]

Thanks!

[Buddy Bradley]

DIVs are last resorts; something you use when all other options have been exhausted.

You should add "for applying a certain styling using CSS" to that sentence. There's nothing wrong with DIVs from a markup point-of-view.

[Tyssen]

should floats only be applied on divs and so on?

Floats can be applied to whatever you like.

[AutisticCuckoo]

You should add "for applying a certain styling using CSS" to that sentence. There's nothing wrong with DIVs from a markup point-of-view.

Except that they don't convey much semantics, other than 'a division of the page'.

You don't use <div class="page-heading"> when <h1> would suffice.

What I tried to say was that you only resort to DIVs when there is no semantically correct element type available.

[Buddy Bradley]

Except that they don't convey much semantics, other than 'a division of the page'.

You could say the same about any other HTML element.

[AutisticCuckoo]

You could say the same about any other HTML element.

Au contraire. The only element type with weaker semantics than DIV is SPAN. Everything else has clearly (well...) defined semantics.

P is a paragraph of text (one or more sentences dealing with a certain thought).
UL is a unordered list: a list where the order of the items does not impact the meaning of the list as a whole.
OL is an ordered list: a list where you cannot change the order of the items without changing the meaning of the entire list.
TABLE is a table of data that has relations in two or more dimensions.
ADDRESS is contact information of the page (or a part thereof).
EM signifies emphasis.
Etc. etc. etc.

[Ed Seedhouse]

<div id="test"><p>text comes here</p></div>

Wait a minute... why not just make:

<p id="test">text comes here</p>

Is this last line of code bad practice if the <p is floated left or right? (I mean, should floats only be applied on divs and so on? and never on <p>s?)

To the contrary the first way, using a meaningless and unnecessary DIV, is bad style. You should only use elements that are required and they should be the elements that best describe your content.

DIVs are handy for putting several elements in a group for a purpose such as positioning, but by themselves are largely semantically meaningless and to be avoided unless no more appropriate element is available.