(x)html agony aunt

HTML & CSS
1

i’m proposing here a place to gather all the bad work big guns are doing.

why? think about it: big guns like Microsoft, Google, Apple and so on rule the minds of web developers and web users providing free or, worst, for hard cash, browsers and dev tools.

this means many could be fooled in thinking that if the big guns do it so can we! i see danger road ahead, don’t you?

how are they backing up their positions as big guns? are they worthy or are they not of our respect and attention? what and where are they fitting a round peg in a square hole?

this will help us, hopefully, to distinguish for-money-sake-dev from real-standards-conforming-dev!

2

:cool: you got me there ! i was contradicting my self a bit !

3

The earlier examples in this thread of Microsoft web pages makes it obvious that it is possible since presumably whoever wrote that crappy code still has their job.

With small coders who create web sites for people and who don’t them maintain them afterwards it is a matter of the site owner not knowing enough to know that the original code is garbage until they next want changes made and get huge quotes for fixing it (eg. swapping the order of two columns on a properly coded site with hundreds of pages can take a few seconds whereas if it was done using tables for layout then it may be many hours of work with price tags to match). The person who created the site isn’t going to care that it is going to cost the person say $1000 for 20 hours work to swap two columns on all their pages instead of charging them $10 to make the same change on a properly coded site even though the $10 represents an hourly rate of several times what the $1000 represents.

4

with the risk of being bashed: that is something a group school project might look like :slight_smile:

i can’t help but think:

i started this thread with a precise goal: to determine if “à la carte” coding is really necessary. i mean, we all seem to talk about how the code should look like, but we all are talking about it like a group of virgins talk about sex: we don’t know if we’ve experienced it yet! :wink:

browsers will have to comply, like they did in the past, for the next several years at least, and support badly written pages (except xhtml, but we know how this one goes now…). that seems to be the html5 philosophy too: anything goes.

big guns seem to tell us that the most important thing is to make it work.

clients want what they want, and they won’t pay more for a quality which they don’t ask for, they just want results. if the page is looking good, and is cross browser, the heck with the rest.

validations is a lie most of the times and can get in the way of results, so it really isn’t an issue nor with devs nor with clients.

if one started coding in html 3.2 he still can successfully do so nowadays, using html 3.2 alone.

are we to follow results, as a common sense, or are we to keep our pride as devs? will this help any time soon or in the future, or our efforts will only mean something in a small circle?

5

and they don’t have a company wide policy regarding coding. in other pages, like http://translate.google.com, they do close these elements, even if they don’t have attributes attached.

Likely several different people coding different pages.

6

I’d fully agree with that regarding obstacles and Network Policies implemented by certain departments within a medium to large organisation. Also [I agree] it’s not always the Network Administrators or Networking Professionals (department) that are allowed to dictate all “software upgrades/changes” believe it or not.

Although they usually get the arduous task of distribution and network deployment of the software itself. :slight_smile:

7

it doesn’t show… yet :slight_smile: still, that page is a PRODUCT from a commercial company. which means it has a bigger audience, hence a bigger impact. and you are right in what you’ve said before, copy-paste from their page possible. also possible is the high regard many have for the name be a factor in not understanding that that is a bad code. my points all along.

i don’t have a personal target in ie. i wanted examples from all over the net. that said, what if your cereals box or some other wrapping for a product you BUY would have nice images and colours on it but made from unclean improper materials? would you accept that or you would go over and make right? remember, ie is still a product you actually pay for, even if not separate and even if now we have windows eds without it.

8

All right children. Single warning. All of you play nice. Now…

You may choose to disagree, and no matter how disjointed your discussions may be - you may be speaking english, but none are speaking the same language…please be respectful to each other.

9

working for the man we are (where man===$). it’s not always pleasant but who said it would :slight_smile:

10

And yet when IE9 is released alike with EVERY version of the browser, they will redesign the thing to match the upgrade (and probably more standards compliant to match the move), therefore the pages and code you are currently seeing will no longer be as they currently are, making your comments entirely redundant. :slight_smile:

I am not biased. I happen to be a dedicated Chrome user and have never used IE as my default browser (pre-chrome I used Opera exclusively), but as you don’t know a thing about me I wouldn’t expect you to know that I’m not actually pro-Microsoft like you have assumed. I am just sick to death of people complaining about petty things like how a small piece of code on a single page of a website with thousands of pages doesn’t match the specifications exactly or how upgrading a web browser took them so long (which I really don’t understand as I managed to upgrade to the next version of Internet explorer in under 5 minutes with only one reboot required). How about rather than complaining you do something productive that will actually make a difference to people learning to code (or the end users). :slight_smile:

PS: Sorry to say it but if it really took you an entire month to upgrade a piece of software that’s entire process is made up of clicking the “next” and “accept” button (excluding windows updates), you shouldn’t be allowed to operate a computer, let alone be involved in the development of websites and user interfaces.

11

Well, remember the IE Team isn’t the same group as whoever’s coding their crappy web pages. You can say it’s all the same company and is likely to have the same attitude or standards company-wide, but I’m sure the IE Team is always under way more pressure (from us) than the markup-monkeys working there are : )

12

Do we really need yet another thread bashing all of the big companies? What exactly do you think you’re going to get out of this discussion? Threads like this which simply exist to highlight the failings of individuals and businesses don’t actually do anything productive. Complaining doesn’t change the industry and it doesn’t make anyone want to better themselves. I look at the likes of Microsoft and Google and see businesses which have made mistakes (no-ones perfect) but genuinely have made leaps forward which are bettering the state of the Internet for us all. Contrary to your beliefs there are plenty of cases where those businesses have had a significant influence (of a positive nature) toward what will become (or already is) good future standards.

As for your comments, I happen to be one of the people whom has tested the alpha (very soon to be beta) of IE9 and can confirm that the leaps they have made in bettering their standards adoption are nothing short of significant. While it’s fine to agree that the source code of their website could have been better put together I think it’s inaccurate of you to draw conclusions about the next generation of their browser and the way they adopt standards simply on the mistakes you manage to draw from dredging up pages they put online. I VERY much doubt if the developers whom produce IE or Expression Web are the same people who are placed in charge of designing their site. In regards to the quality of their work, I really don’t see any justification to pick apart their code and then proclaim that people in the industry will suddenly think it’s OK to produce bad code on the basis that Microsoft made a mistake on a page. Unless you have significant evidence to back up the claim that people judge the quality of code based on the brand rather than the code itself - your comments are nothing more than un-insightful ramblings which are the result of drawing conclusions based on your opinion and not facts (which seem to be conducive with much of what you’ve put in this thread about IE and Microsoft). :frowning:

13

i have told you: i you feel bad about this post, say it and i’ll ask the mods to close it.

i am a net admin. 5 minutes or clicking “next” and “accept” would not do it for me. our intranet doesn’t work like that :slight_smile:

you still are the most bitter i’ve talked to about ie, and that makes you bias, no matter what dance you do around ch.

i shouldn’t be allowed to operate a computer? no comment on that. you are aiming too low for me to look at.

14

you totally missed the fact that the page is dedicated to their browser: ie. which happens to be ie9 some time in the future. as for this, if they don’t care how they present it, why should they care about the rest? why should ie9 mean less work, for that matter? you are avoiding answers here.

i’ll go further. that’s not ironic, it’s moronic :slight_smile: still, if you see that the code is bad, you’re arguing with me because…?

for a man that had enough “bashing, flaming, trolling and hatred” you sure are full of it. and mud is good for your skin :slight_smile: and also, i’m not behind any one of this big guns. i’m also not against them. i’m just pointing out mistakes that are not excusable: they do it for the money! they HAVE to provide quality!

i still don’t get it: the code is bad and the company has enough defenders already. why are you so against in finding bad code to suggest that things are not just about looking good, and using pretty much power examples to prove it?

one more thing, since you are clearly bias. before questioning my motives regarding ie ALONE, know this: i’ve waisted one and a half month upgrading and tunning ie6 to ie8. there should be a better way for a software we’ve paid good money! and once you’ve been in that position, you’ll be more inclined to criticism.

15

By stating what you did you explicitly drew a correlation where it doesn’t exist between the web browser and the code you found - which is what I objected too as neither are related and shouldn’t have been used within the same list in that context.

I just let their older browsers do that for me: plus, if I expect the worst, I can get pleasantly surprised, which is always nicer than getting disappointed. : )

You expect a company that produces a WYSIWYG editor and created FrontPage to produce high quality code? There’s something deeply ironic in that statement.

Yeah this is Microsoft not Opera Software lawlz. : )

Would be nice if MS were more like Opera that way, but, shrug.

It’ll be a bit more work for me, because that means another Virtual Box on this poor machine : )

16

I don’t let issues with clients fester long enough for them to become complaints. If there’s a problem that needs fixing it’s dealt with immediately upon notification.

Sorry but that totally contradicts what you stated in your second message:

If you examine the above quote directly from what you said, you begin talking about the issues regarding the apparent anomaly in their source code and then begin drawing conclusions which immediately refer to IE9. By stating what you did you explicitly drew a correlation where it doesn’t exist between the web browser and the code you found - which is what I objected too as neither are related and shouldn’t have been used within the same list in that context.

[QUOTE=noonnope,post:18,topic:74336"]
i’m sorry if i don’t find this to be a valid point for justifying the html they have put on that page. i really am.
[/quote]

You expect a company that produces a WYSIWYG editor and created FrontPage to produce high quality code? There’s something deeply ironic in that statement.

I have no bias toward Microsoft or Google or any other firm, there’s no point you producing a straw-man argument to meet your own agenda. The facts are that we don’t need petty “oh look, MS messed up their code” discussions in the industry - we have enough bashing, flaming, and trolling as it is. You explicitly stated this thread was to gather all the “bad work” the big guns are making - which is basically a campaign on your behalf to just sling as much mud as possible.

17

@Sp on SP: right on the money with both :slight_smile:

18

the demystification of the code produced under a powerful name. highlighting a bad code as the way to improve.

yes it does. why else do you think ms is putting so much effort in ie9? but, let me understand this, do you not listen to your clients complaints?

this is a bit too much from your part. i never denied their value, i just pointed out some flaws. and i don’t remember to have been given you a full set of copies pertinent to my beliefs!

my conclusions were not based on the pages they put online.

if you care to mention, i’ve pointed out how difficult is to upgrade to ie7 and ie8, based on my first hand experience. so far, upgrading to ie9 doesn’t look promising. and i fear (exactly, i fear) i would have to work far too much to make it happen. as opossed to their competitors, the upgrade process is a drag.

i’ve based my conclusions based on those written above. the criticism at the code in the page was not related in any way to ie9, but to the fact that the named company produces dev tools for creating such pages. i find it at least odd that they would have such a code, giving these circumstances.

i’m sorry if i don’t find this to be a valid point for justifying the html they have put on that page. i really am.

i don’t have to justify my self because i’m not making a campaign against them. my point is simple, and i’m sorry if you mist it: don’t do what they do, when they are doing it wrong, do what they say you should do. and my point is really based on the fact that, there are occasions when, somebody, industry or not, out of curiosity, will look at the code, and, probably, mimic it. i believe it has happen many times already.

i’m really sorry to see you didn’t find a better way to express your bias view regarding microsoft. i’m not here to ramble, but i am here to present my opinion. i apologise if in the process of doing that you feel any discomfort at all. i really do, i’m not being sarcastic or otherwise quizzical.

to end with this matter: i found a bad code on a page. since it belonged to a big name, and its presenting an ironical situation, i thought it’s at least odd. i thought it might be interesting pointing out that code and that it could help demystify web developing for some. these are mistakes, not disasters, you didn’t see any headlines in my post. also, i’ve reiterated problems and issues i have with ie from ms. these are real day to day problems i have to deal at work, which will continue to be real. that’s significant evidence and these are facts. like it or not.

if the idea doesn’t stick, i have no problem with that. if it’s offending you, i see no reason to keep it live. just say so and i will ask mods to close it down.

19

i am still interested on how big guns understand to tackle web designing and programming. after all, they have all the resources to produce only quality coding, right?

but, since some may question my motives, i’ve decided to change the way i do it: let’s giving them the benefit of a doubt. maybe they know better and i still need to learn (i’m afraid the last part will always be true :)).

so, i found another example. google.

they adopted the html5 DTD, but i’ve notice that, in their web search page, the <html> and <body> are missing their </html> and </body>.

this is true for www.google.com, www.google.fr, www.google.co.uk, www.google.co.nz, www.google.co.au, www.google.cn. is probably true for most of the international versions for their search page, since is served, with some mods, from the same source.

is this serving any purpose?

also, they use a <span id=“main”> as a wrapper for many of the elements in the page, including block elements.

is this also serving a hidden purpose? in html 4.01 <span> is a container for inline elements. html5 made <span> a container for both inline and block elements?

20

I agree with noonope’s point (if I understand it correctly) that large websites of successful companies are often looked at by web developers who don’t know good code from bad code.

However I agree with Alex that the best we can do about it is just educate people and say “That’s crappy code, you can write better, look [here] or [here] for a better version of that” or whatever.