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.
I for one, welcome our new Standards Compliant Overlords.
How does the Slashdot Effect happen given that no slashdotters ever RTFA?
Better rending in Firefox and less dishonesty! What's not to like?
Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
'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'.
"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
"Sorry, links to Bugzilla from Slashdot are disabled."
chickens
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?
Wow, what an exciting life you live.
... slashdot does not work with Netscape 4 when I try it today.
It sucks in Mosaic 1.0 as well.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
Hahahahahaha :)
edit my ass.
Sorry. There's no substitute for diet and exercise.
Show some repect, coward! That's a 2-digit UID you're talking to!
It's turning into a morph of Godwin's Law.
Because it's my law, I will call it MFH's Law:
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
+4 Funny for "Hahahahahaha :)"?!!! Hell, I can beat that. Check it:
:D
"BWWWWWWWWWAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!"
oh and