Slashdot HTML 4.01 and CSS

After 8 years of my nasty, crufty, hodge podged together HTML, last night we finally switched over to clean HTML 4.01 with a full complement of CSS. While there are a handful of bugs and some lesser used functionality isn't quite done yet, the transition has gone very smoothly. You can use our sourceforge project page to submit bugs and we'd really appreciate the feedback. Thanks to Tim Vroom for putting the HTML in place, Wes Moran for writing the HTML in the first place, and Pudge for writing the code to convert 900k users, 60k stories, and 13 million comments to comply. And for the brave, download the stylesheet and start experimenting with new themes and designs for Slashdot: some sort of official contest to re-design Slashdot is coming soon, so you can get a head start now.

Response to some reader notes in the forum:

• There are a handful of validation errors. Some will be fixed in the next day or so. Others are external HTML that is out of our hands. We may never toally validate with zero errors. yes we're comfortable with that.
• We're not going to XHTML for the same reasons as above- we control almost all of our HTML, but some of it (like the ads, and imports from other sites) just isn't ours to muck about with. We could go to XHTML, and someday we might, but today we're happy to just get to HTML 4.01 and CSS.
• Light Mode will be back in some form or another. The problem is that light mode served two purposes: Low Bandwidth, and Simplified Design. The later will probably be handled with a CSS theme (we have a handheld theme already). Low Bandwidth is a little trickier, but we will resolve that soon.
• All of our code is beta tested on www.slashcode.com and use.perl.org. Unfortunately there's always a few issues from those tiny tiny sites and the giant bohemoth that is Slashdot itself.

Comments

Let me be the first to say ...

[YankeeInExile]

I for one, welcome our new Standards Compliant Overlords.

Re:Let me be the first to say ...

[suwain_2]

Standards Compliant Overloads?

S.C.O.?

*shudders*

Re:Let me be the first to say ...

[Martin Blank]

Think about it. Slashdot has updated its code. It moves fast, and it's standards compliant.

Face it. The end has come, and IBM will soon fall, as McBride stumbles across a smoking gun and gains control of IBM's board.

We're all doomed. If you're not in the bunker yet, it's probably too late.

Re:Let me be the first to say ...

[Captain Splendid]

Sweet! That means DNF should be out this Christmas season!

Re:Let me be the first to say ...

[Gleng]

Well, this year, Slashdot updates it's code, Debian Sarge is released, and Apple switches to x86.

If DNF comes out as well...

Let's just say that that would be the fourth horseman.

Re:Let me be the first to say ...

[troon]

It's OK, you've restored order by continuing to misuse the humble apostrophe.

Wrong date?!

[NoSuchGuy]

April's Fool day again?

Re:Wrong date?!

[geoffspear]

I noticed that when I was asked to metamoderate this morning, I wasn't given the false promise I'd be more likely to receive mod points.

Better rending in Firefox and less dishonesty! What's not to like?

Re:Wrong date?!

[Anonymous Coward]

I didn't notice nothing differnt about slashdot this morning. It still looks the same. They haven't done anything like DHTML or menus at the top with drop down effect. They're also still using Perl instead of PHP. The shuold be moving to PHP since that's what all other sites are doing now. THey also havn't changed their icons in like forever. And the green Slashdot logo needs to go. There's also no background graphic to give the site a more polished magazine like feel. If they knew anything about design, they'd be following the lead of sites like Wired.com and Playboy.com. After all Slashdot is really just an online magazine at this point. You guys should also consider a print version of Slashdot. I think if you combine the look of Wired, Playboy and MacOS X you'd have a winning UI. You should also force user's browsers to open a new window devoid of any browser menus/widgets/buttons. That way you could then create a true UI for Slashdot and make it like a magazine application. A navigation bar at the top with Aqua-esque buttons would be grand. There should also be application sounds. Clicking on buttons should play different sounds. Like if you click on the link for apple.slashdot.org, you should hear the Mac startup sound. Or if you click on yro.slashdot.org, you should hear a gavel pounding on a desk. Or if you click on bsd.slashdot.org, you should hear a death rattle. There should also be a live Slashdot cam that shows us what you guys are up to at any time of the day. Kind of like Jennicam used to be, only like heavily censored so we don't see private stuff. Maybe the cameras could have moderation so that the highest modded images go on the front page in the upper left corner. Another thing. There is this program/standard file format called Flash. It can really spice up a site and make it feel more like an application. You could also embed some Java apps too, but Flash is the way of the future for all web sites. It's the tool most creatives prefer. So can anywone tell me what is actually different about Slashdot today than it has been since like the 1980s when it was called Usenet?

Re:Wrong date?!

[Seraph]

edit my ass.

Sorry. There's no substitute for diet and exercise.

Re:Mod points?

[Omnieiunium]

I would mod you up for that comment but...

Well

[chrisgeleven]

Time to get on the Duke Nukem watch...

Aha!

[GreatDrok]

So that's what is wrong with it. I have been looking at the page all day thinking there was something weird going on and now I know!

Well Done.

[feargal]

After eight years, this news website has finally gotten around to using proper HTML.

So, will it be another eight years before this news website gets around to using some proper editors?

Getting with the Times New Roman

[ishnaf]

'Times New Roman' is so 27BC. It'd only take one line of css to get something with class. Like 'Comic Sans MS'. Everyone loves 'Comic Sans MS'.

Re: Just looking at the source

[MexicanMenace]

"Just looking at the source doesn't give me a headache anymore though, which is a massive improvement."

Yeah, all I see now is blonde, brunette, redhead.

Wait a minute, that's not /.!

Re:Kudos on a great upgrade!

[muszek]

"Sorry, links to Bugzilla from Slashdot are disabled."

chickens

Re:Testing process

[Mr. Underbridge]

Why don't you guys have a formal testing process in place for slashcode?

They do, we're it.

Clean Green Reaming Machine

[Doc Ruby]

Now that pages take so much less time to render in browsers, Slashdot.org has reduced the overall computational load on the Web. So much less heat generated by browsing computers, so much less power consumed, foreign oil and coal burned. Of course, now we'll more swiftly move from the Front Page directly to Slashdotting some poor server unwittingly mentioned in the story. Maybe the smoke from burning servers will make up for our horde of cleaner-running Slashdotters.

Re:WOW

[Anonymous Coward]

What kind of news is this anyways?

It's both; News for Nerds _and_ Stuff that matters.(TM)

What a combo!

Re:HTML 4.01?!

[wwwojtek]

about your sig:
There are 11 types of people in the world: those who can count in binary, and those who can't.
and you are the missing third type: people who suggest that they can count in binary but really can't

That explains it

[DoddyUK]

I was wondering why Slashdot looked all screwed under IE5.0 at school.

Listen fellas this is great and all that...

[ellem]

but is this getting us any closer to the new Duke Nuk'em? Shouldn't you boys be working on that?

Re:Kudos on a great upgrade!

[Anonymous Coward]

Me too... I blogged this earlier today, and briefly (first impression) journal'd it too, and would love to comment now on some more technical aspects

Wow, what an exciting life you live.

Re:So that is why

[nacturation]

... slashdot does not work with Netscape 4 when I try it today.

It sucks in Mosaic 1.0 as well.

Re:I disagree

[jamie]

Hahahahahaha :)

Re:Kudos on a great upgrade!

[bioteq]

Definitly congrats on the upgrade. Slashdot opens so much smother for me now.

I do believe you guys are up for a case of beer or two.

Re:Kudos on a great upgrade!

[chrisxkelley]

Last but not least, the "Politics" and "Apple" sections look as nice as ever,
 
of course the apple section looks nice as ever. thats just how things are :) apple is pretty, and most of the rest just dont cut it.

Re:Kudos on a great upgrade!

[mattgarnsey]

Show some repect, coward! That's a 2-digit UID you're talking to!

Bohemoth

[14erCleaner]

Your typo has created a new word, and I like it!

bohemoth n: A bohemian behemoth.

I'm visualizing a 300-pound beatnik. ooo, that's nasty...OK, maybe that's a typical slashdot member...

Re:HTML 4.01?!

[joib]

I would recommend XHTML over any flavour of HTML simply because XHTML forces the developer to restrict his markup to semantically meaningful elements

Ahem: HOWTO Spot a Wannabe Web Standards Advocate.

Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a winner!

MFH's Law

[mfh]

What's more lame is parent saved a really old comment URL that I made, just so he could be petty and vindictive. That he saved that trivia in his puny mind, where the answer to tomorrow's lottery numbers could be stored instead -- that he wasted the time of every reader on Slashdot just to point out the trivia is confounding and inappropriate.

It's turning into a morph of Godwin's Law.

Because it's my law, I will call it MFH's Law:

The likelihood that someone will mention MFH(56)'s Slashdot account being purchased on Ebay approaches 100% as the moderation of MFH(56)'s comments increase.

Re:MFH's Law

[Bertie]

You might only have two digits, pal, but mine's palindromic. Therefore my dad could beat your dad in a fight.

(I'll now sit here and wait for UID #314159 to turn up and swing his dick about)

Re:I disagree

[ki4iib]

+4 Funny for "Hahahahahaha :)"?!!! Hell, I can beat that. Check it:

"BWWWWWWWWWAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!"

oh and :D

Re:I disagree

[minus9]

"Now, I know that Slashcode is inherently badly written, but I've got to assume that it's still dynamically driven, making the actual amount of HTML across all of Slashdot tiny, actually."

Yet you still come here everyday to complain. You're like Stadtler and Waldorf all rolled into one.

Cue the Muppets theme tune...

Re:Kudos on a great upgrade!

[Kjella]

Oh, and UID 0 is always the current user

So, does that mean every user on Slashdot has root or something? >:-)

Re:Kudos on a great upgrade!

[David Rolfe]

I have a journal about this, kinda. Most of those users seem to have fled, or don't post anymore. :-)

I don't see how I always get suckered into 'low UID' threads (somehow they always get modded up past my threshold). Oh, and to all you haters: I did not buy this UID on eBay :-D what is a 2-digit ID worth? I saw from upthread that people must actually sell them. What will people pay for them?