Good design is one of the most time consuming processes I've ever participated in. It really doesn't just flow out from no where. UI Design (the act of slapping widgets on a screen) is quick. Good or Proper UI Design (that act of researching how people use a product, determining the best way (sequence of actions, icon image) to communicate an action or response, etc) is grueling and takes time.
Of course its all OT - the article isn't even about design in the typical sense (pixels on a page)...
I think because the flash version actually overlays the flash on top of the unstyled text. so if you were going to do a find on page search, you'd still find that text. if you used a graphic, you could put the text in the alt tag, but that wouldn't be searchable "on page"
Yeah, I've been an ass before:-) Next time a designer does that to you, call him out on it - trust me when I say that we know when we are doing it. You make a lot of your mark by being just better than the other guy, and that often leads to a perfectionist (read: a$$hole) attitude.
I don't necessarily care about "pixel-perfect," but the design choices I do make don't happen just cause I like the color green (I don't). All I am trying to get at is that there is a lot that goes into design&layout. Like any medium, you have to take the good with the bad in web (or print, or video), and you learn the limitations. Graphics as entire pages is obviously not a solution. But, typically, neither is a page full of plain text waiting for the end user to have a style sheet set up to make it readable.
OK...I've been pulled into this far enough. All I wanted to say was that design is important and that anything that increases my ability to deliver content is pretty OK in my book. I don't like the flash method, but that's just me. I also really like designing, so I get a little offended when I feel that people are putting down design as worthless...
I still disagree about the content being yours, but...I'm done arguing this. I am glad that you enjoy your settings. My mom probably won't enjoy fiddling with hers much, so its good I take the time to research my design choices...you know, for those not-dorks that don't set their own styles.
OK...I've been pulled into this far enough. All I wanted to say was that design is important and that anything that increases my ability to deliver content is pretty OK in my book. I don't like the flash method, but that's just me. I also really like designing, so I get a little offended when I feel that people are putting down design as worthless...
On another note, I don't know if I have ever called anyone a filthy peasant (although it does have a nice ring to it). That's a little harsh.
And I do know my audience base. I design my pages for a certain audience - you can't design properly without knowing who you are designing for. Might people come to my site with an 8-line LCD display? Sure, but they are not my audience, and I really cannot care about them. If they were part of my audience my page would be nothing but text. You design to a page to an audience member. And if that audience member happens to be a filthy peasant, I'll design for them.
OK...I've been pulled into this far enough. All I wanted to say was that design is important and that anything that increases my ability to deliver content is pretty OK in my book. I don't like the flash method, but that's just me. I also really like designing, so I get a little offended when I feel that people are putting down design as worthless...
the design decisions I am talking about are not made in a vacuum, they are based on research and feedback and often times take months to achieve even the slightest amount of progress. To think that a user, untrained in typography or any design methods, would be able to choose the "correct" font based purely on - what? - what they like? is a little ridiculous. That isn't to say that the user shouldn't be able to choose their own font - go ahead, screw up the design and lessen your experience - however, I should be able to specify the exact font that I've determined maximizes content delivery.
Design is not a graphic or a layout or a font. It is the interdependence of each element. In that regard, yes, uniqueness is a virtue in design. Different for the sake of different is not.
Yes sir, you are right. You will not get the same experience, but, assuming I care that you see my content, you should be able to. That is a definite drawback of the flash method and another reason why I won't use it, even though I like what it does. It just goes to further my belief that we need some method of doing this and the only way to now is through graphics or Flash, which is just as useless.
I've gotten far away from my only real point here: design is important and I hate to hear people say that only content matters. content without design (layout, styling) is practically useless.
As a lab administrator that locks down my boxes within an inch of being not usable, I am not a fan of the Flash method. Really, in general I am not in favor of loading an external program to render item in my main display (with the exception of Video). So, please don't take this as a defense of the Flash method.
As a budding web developer, though, I hate to hear things like "good enough." Some site are way over designed. I will grant that. However design as a tool is a very important part of content delivery. And if I can prove that X font will deliver my message more effectively than Y, I would do everything in my power to get X delivered over Y.
I don't know if I agree that what the user wants is more important than what the designer wants. After all, as the user, you are at my page. Shouldn't you in some way agree to my rules? If my rules state that, in order to really understand what is on this page you need to have Neuva Std installed, shouldn't I be able to mandate that?
I think, with the fallbacks in place in CSS, most older browsers are covered. You will not get the same experience as a new browser, but using a new browser delivers my content exactly as I intended for maximum impact.
I don't like the Flash solution, but I applaud the creators for attempting to work around a glaring omission in web design.
How is this any different than what CSS2 currently implements?
I set my font-family, font-size, color, etc in my CSS. Good CSS says you put "serif" or "sans-serif" at the end of a font-family declaration in case none of your other options are available.
If a reader like the page larger, they can choose "Make Text Larger" from the menu ("View" in Safari and IE, at least).
The problem is, when I am designing, I have a specific look in my mind that I'd like to communicate to you. Maybe you think all design is bunk, but without design, your precious content packs far less punch. Good design drives comprehension rates up. Part of good design for textual content is font choices (faces, spacing, bold, etc).
CSS does not provide me with a way to take any font on my machine and use that on the web and be sure that anyone at my site can see it. This flash method does.
This isn't about wanting to make it "look the same on paper as it does on... screen", it is about getting more control over the layout and design of any page to help deliver content, the same way a well-formatted document might. The Flash method keeps the text in the page, and does not break compatibility with browsers that do not have JavaScript or Flash enabled. Its a stupid hack to a problem no one has figured out, but it's not malicious or some harbinger of doom. It's a work around until something better makes it way out there.
But if those fonts are not available on the users machine, they don't show up. Using the flash method, the fonts are embedded into the flash file.
As for people thinking that it should be only user-fed font choices, that's just BS. Content is the only reason to go to a site. But if two sites have the same content (think any news site on the planet), I want to go to the site that provides the information in the easiest to digest manner. That requires good design which, for textual content, is hinged on good font choices (including faces, spacing and sizing).
Design is not meaningless in the face of almighty content - it enhances and improves...
Yes it is...since 6 or 7 at least. It may have been extended since it first debuted, since the "align" window can align the layers to the left, right, center, top bottom as well as distribute items by their left/right/center. Can the new GIMP align do that? I should download it and play. I know and love Photoshop, but there is no real sense in blind devotion, is there?
and I think it should be. Since I can't change the HTML standard, I use xHTML.
I fully understand your point (and excellent analogy, BTW). When I code, I prefer to close all of my tags. With xHTML all I have to do is validate. I don't have to find a custom DTD to validate with. I'm having a hard time understanding what is wrong with that. When I want some choclate ice cream I buy chocolate ice cream. I don't buy vanilla because "all I have to do is add chocolate."
HTML vs XHTML has nothing whatsoever to do with structure versus layout
I'm rereading my posts, but I don't think I said anything about that. I said that, for data structure (perhaps I should say "content"?), which is all HTML and xHTML should be, I prefer xHTML because it forces me to adhear to a set of rules that are slightly more strict than that of HTML.
I suppose you are correct to some extent that I've fallen into the HTML vs xHTML+CSS camp. I never used CSS before I started writing with xHTML and even though I know HTML is fully compatible with CSS, I never did think of it like that. So I will grant you that much prejudice on my part.
I like all of my tags closed. It satisfies my logical center.
Can I close all of my HTML tags, uh, elements with no errors? Absolutely.
If I forget to close one of those and run it through the validator do I get any errors? Nope. Not without a custom DTD. For that reason alone I prefer xHTML.
I agree that HTML is all about data structure, while the CSS should be about the layout. I just feel that xHTML takes it a step further by forcing (in my mind) a better standard. I'm not saying it is a huge leap, but it is something.
The only metaphor I can think of - and it sucks - is writing.
When I finish a sentence, I could very well add a dozen spaces before starting the next sentence. People would realize that one sentence had ended and another began. Instead we use endmarks (.?!). I just feel like the same sort of logic that applies there applies itself equally well to a mandatory closing of end tags.
Yes, but what you are missing is that the vast majority of people using XHTML are doing just that.
I'd like to see that study that verifies your assumption:-)
Once again, for me, making sure to write with proper opening and closing tags just makes sense. It is the natural evolution of the code. The strictness helps to maintain consistancy across different browsers.
In order to properly validate my properly nested and closed tags using HTML4, I would have had to create a custom DTD. Why would I do that when I could just use xHTML?
I have to ask: are the people that are against xHTML also against using <em> instead of <i> and <strong> instead of <b>? HTML is all about defining the data; not formatting it. xHTML makes that more evident, and I think many hand coders appreciate that.
that's my $2.50 (which used to be enough for a gallon of gas....)
I am sure Spartanicus is a web god that I don't know about and as such I will soon be eating my words (and in only like my 4th post here, no less!), but that wasn't really a list of reasons not to use xHTML. It was a rant against using xHTML just to use xHTML. I personally use xHTML because I never coded HTML4 "properly" and having my xHTML fail has taught me how to do things right. Yes, I could have created a custom DTD to validate my poor HTML4. That or use xHTML. Which is easier again?
Yes, CSS can cause people to go crqzy with design and layout and fluff. There was an article once in The Onion about a guy who got a new Photoshop filter and used it on everything. CSS can be a lot like that.
However, CSS is also the future (hell current) of web design. It can cut bandwidth usage and in general make the pages "flow" better. Also, by using CSS (& I hope xHTML, haven't been able to look at SlashCode yet), you seperate content from layout, making it easier to offer Slashdot on other devices (like PDAs or Phones, etc).
Slashcode isn't quite broke, but it probably doesn't work as well as a modern, popular CMS should.
Slashdot Mirror
Good design is one of the most time consuming processes I've ever participated in. It really doesn't just flow out from no where. UI Design (the act of slapping widgets on a screen) is quick. Good or Proper UI Design (that act of researching how people use a product, determining the best way (sequence of actions, icon image) to communicate an action or response, etc) is grueling and takes time.
Of course its all OT - the article isn't even about design in the typical sense (pixels on a page)...
I think because the flash version actually overlays the flash on top of the unstyled text. so if you were going to do a find on page search, you'd still find that text. if you used a graphic, you could put the text in the alt tag, but that wouldn't be searchable "on page"
Yeah, I've been an ass before :-) Next time a designer does that to you, call him out on it - trust me when I say that we know when we are doing it. You make a lot of your mark by being just better than the other guy, and that often leads to a perfectionist (read: a$$hole) attitude.
I don't necessarily care about "pixel-perfect," but the design choices I do make don't happen just cause I like the color green (I don't). All I am trying to get at is that there is a lot that goes into design&layout. Like any medium, you have to take the good with the bad in web (or print, or video), and you learn the limitations. Graphics as entire pages is obviously not a solution. But, typically, neither is a page full of plain text waiting for the end user to have a style sheet set up to make it readable.
OK...I've been pulled into this far enough. All I wanted to say was that design is important and that anything that increases my ability to deliver content is pretty OK in my book. I don't like the flash method, but that's just me. I also really like designing, so I get a little offended when I feel that people are putting down design as worthless... I still disagree about the content being yours, but...I'm done arguing this. I am glad that you enjoy your settings. My mom probably won't enjoy fiddling with hers much, so its good I take the time to research my design choices...you know, for those not-dorks that don't set their own styles.
OK...I've been pulled into this far enough. All I wanted to say was that design is important and that anything that increases my ability to deliver content is pretty OK in my book. I don't like the flash method, but that's just me. I also really like designing, so I get a little offended when I feel that people are putting down design as worthless... On another note, I don't know if I have ever called anyone a filthy peasant (although it does have a nice ring to it). That's a little harsh. And I do know my audience base. I design my pages for a certain audience - you can't design properly without knowing who you are designing for. Might people come to my site with an 8-line LCD display? Sure, but they are not my audience, and I really cannot care about them. If they were part of my audience my page would be nothing but text. You design to a page to an audience member. And if that audience member happens to be a filthy peasant, I'll design for them.
OK...I've been pulled into this far enough. All I wanted to say was that design is important and that anything that increases my ability to deliver content is pretty OK in my book. I don't like the flash method, but that's just me. I also really like designing, so I get a little offended when I feel that people are putting down design as worthless...
we might just have to agree to disagree...
the design decisions I am talking about are not made in a vacuum, they are based on research and feedback and often times take months to achieve even the slightest amount of progress. To think that a user, untrained in typography or any design methods, would be able to choose the "correct" font based purely on - what? - what they like? is a little ridiculous. That isn't to say that the user shouldn't be able to choose their own font - go ahead, screw up the design and lessen your experience - however, I should be able to specify the exact font that I've determined maximizes content delivery.
Design is not a graphic or a layout or a font. It is the interdependence of each element. In that regard, yes, uniqueness is a virtue in design. Different for the sake of different is not.
Yes sir, you are right. You will not get the same experience, but, assuming I care that you see my content, you should be able to. That is a definite drawback of the flash method and another reason why I won't use it, even though I like what it does. It just goes to further my belief that we need some method of doing this and the only way to now is through graphics or Flash, which is just as useless.
I've gotten far away from my only real point here: design is important and I hate to hear people say that only content matters. content without design (layout, styling) is practically useless.
nate
As a lab administrator that locks down my boxes within an inch of being not usable, I am not a fan of the Flash method. Really, in general I am not in favor of loading an external program to render item in my main display (with the exception of Video). So, please don't take this as a defense of the Flash method. As a budding web developer, though, I hate to hear things like "good enough." Some site are way over designed. I will grant that. However design as a tool is a very important part of content delivery. And if I can prove that X font will deliver my message more effectively than Y, I would do everything in my power to get X delivered over Y. I don't know if I agree that what the user wants is more important than what the designer wants. After all, as the user, you are at my page. Shouldn't you in some way agree to my rules? If my rules state that, in order to really understand what is on this page you need to have Neuva Std installed, shouldn't I be able to mandate that? I think, with the fallbacks in place in CSS, most older browsers are covered. You will not get the same experience as a new browser, but using a new browser delivers my content exactly as I intended for maximum impact. I don't like the Flash solution, but I applaud the creators for attempting to work around a glaring omission in web design.
How is this any different than what CSS2 currently implements?
... screen", it is about getting more control over the layout and design of any page to help deliver content, the same way a well-formatted document might. The Flash method keeps the text in the page, and does not break compatibility with browsers that do not have JavaScript or Flash enabled. Its a stupid hack to a problem no one has figured out, but it's not malicious or some harbinger of doom. It's a work around until something better makes it way out there.
I set my font-family, font-size, color, etc in my CSS. Good CSS says you put "serif" or "sans-serif" at the end of a font-family declaration in case none of your other options are available.
If a reader like the page larger, they can choose "Make Text Larger" from the menu ("View" in Safari and IE, at least).
The problem is, when I am designing, I have a specific look in my mind that I'd like to communicate to you. Maybe you think all design is bunk, but without design, your precious content packs far less punch. Good design drives comprehension rates up. Part of good design for textual content is font choices (faces, spacing, bold, etc).
CSS does not provide me with a way to take any font on my machine and use that on the web and be sure that anyone at my site can see it. This flash method does.
This isn't about wanting to make it "look the same on paper as it does on
But if those fonts are not available on the users machine, they don't show up. Using the flash method, the fonts are embedded into the flash file.
As for people thinking that it should be only user-fed font choices, that's just BS. Content is the only reason to go to a site. But if two sites have the same content (think any news site on the planet), I want to go to the site that provides the information in the easiest to digest manner. That requires good design which, for textual content, is hinged on good font choices (including faces, spacing and sizing).
Design is not meaningless in the face of almighty content - it enhances and improves...
Yes it is...since 6 or 7 at least. It may have been extended since it first debuted, since the "align" window can align the layers to the left, right, center, top bottom as well as distribute items by their left/right/center. Can the new GIMP align do that? I should download it and play. I know and love Photoshop, but there is no real sense in blind devotion, is there?
and I think it should be. Since I can't change the HTML standard, I use xHTML.
I fully understand your point (and excellent analogy, BTW). When I code, I prefer to close all of my tags. With xHTML all I have to do is validate. I don't have to find a custom DTD to validate with. I'm having a hard time understanding what is wrong with that. When I want some choclate ice cream I buy chocolate ice cream. I don't buy vanilla because "all I have to do is add chocolate."
I'm rereading my posts, but I don't think I said anything about that. I said that, for data structure (perhaps I should say "content"?), which is all HTML and xHTML should be, I prefer xHTML because it forces me to adhear to a set of rules that are slightly more strict than that of HTML.
I suppose you are correct to some extent that I've fallen into the HTML vs xHTML+CSS camp. I never used CSS before I started writing with xHTML and even though I know HTML is fully compatible with CSS, I never did think of it like that. So I will grant you that much prejudice on my part.
I like all of my tags closed. It satisfies my logical center.
Can I close all of my HTML tags, uh, elements with no errors? Absolutely.
If I forget to close one of those and run it through the validator do I get any errors? Nope. Not without a custom DTD. For that reason alone I prefer xHTML.
I agree that HTML is all about data structure, while the CSS should be about the layout. I just feel that xHTML takes it a step further by forcing (in my mind) a better standard. I'm not saying it is a huge leap, but it is something.
The only metaphor I can think of - and it sucks - is writing.
When I finish a sentence, I could very well add a dozen spaces before starting the next sentence. People would realize that one sentence had ended and another began. Instead we use endmarks (.?!). I just feel like the same sort of logic that applies there applies itself equally well to a mandatory closing of end tags.
I'd like to see that study that verifies your assumption
Once again, for me, making sure to write with proper opening and closing tags just makes sense. It is the natural evolution of the code. The strictness helps to maintain consistancy across different browsers.
In order to properly validate my properly nested and closed tags using HTML4, I would have had to create a custom DTD. Why would I do that when I could just use xHTML?
I have to ask: are the people that are against xHTML also against using <em> instead of <i> and <strong> instead of <b>? HTML is all about defining the data; not formatting it. xHTML makes that more evident, and I think many hand coders appreciate that.
that's my $2.50 (which used to be enough for a gallon of gas....)
I am sure Spartanicus is a web god that I don't know about and as such I will soon be eating my words (and in only like my 4th post here, no less!), but that wasn't really a list of reasons not to use xHTML. It was a rant against using xHTML just to use xHTML. I personally use xHTML because I never coded HTML4 "properly" and having my xHTML fail has taught me how to do things right. Yes, I could have created a custom DTD to validate my poor HTML4. That or use xHTML. Which is easier again?
Yes, CSS can cause people to go crqzy with design and layout and fluff. There was an article once in The Onion about a guy who got a new Photoshop filter and used it on everything. CSS can be a lot like that. However, CSS is also the future (hell current) of web design. It can cut bandwidth usage and in general make the pages "flow" better. Also, by using CSS (& I hope xHTML, haven't been able to look at SlashCode yet), you seperate content from layout, making it easier to offer Slashdot on other devices (like PDAs or Phones, etc). Slashcode isn't quite broke, but it probably doesn't work as well as a modern, popular CMS should.