Advanced HTML
I guess we're not the only ones teaching web design at Cornell:
Thanks to Dean for taking this picture. If you look at the left side of it, you'll see a list of workshops being offered at the library here. Here's the order:
- HTML 1: Creating a Web Page
- HTML 2: Intermediate HTML
- HTML 3: Tables and Introduction to Frames, Advanced Web Design, Dreamweaver 1 & 2
Tables? Frames? These must be new technologies I've never heard of. Seriously. As for Dreamweaver, I have no idea what that is, but I've been having weird dreams lately… maybe my roommate has been using it.
I decided to drive down the information superhighway and visit the website for these workshops. Check it out: Fall 2006 Workshop Series. The "Tables and Introduction to Frames" has such gems as:
<table border="5" bordercolor="#8b3a3a"
width = "50%" cellpadding = "10"
cellspacing = "10"bgcolor = "#FC96A9">
Then you have the "Advanced Web Design" course, with an — get this — HTML 4.00 Doctype. If I remember correctly, the cavemen used HTML 4.00 to style their stone tablets. They had stone tablets. They were advanced.
No wonder the "Advanced Web Design" page talks about CSS behaving differently in different browsers… when you don't use a "Strict" Doctype, you trigger quirks mode in just about every browser, which produces, well, a lot of quirks. More quirks than that A/V geek back in high middle school (see comment #4).
I think I should talk to the library staff. Clearly there's no need for real web design courses that teach real web technologies at Cornell if we already have these bleeding-edge workshops. And by bleeding-edge, I mean the bleeding-edge of a prehistoric hatchet wedged in the carcass of a dinosaur, because I'm pretty sure they were still alive when frames were cool.
I guess now I see why those of us in-the-know of web design only make up a small minority of all the web designers out there. When everyone can just take a few workshops on HTML and learn the ins-and-outs in a matter of hours, who needs a full-fledged course?
Update 11-11: One of the student instructors for our web design course attended the HTML 3 course last weekend. Apparently she was only able to stay for about half an hour before she couldn't take it anymore. What a trooper!
p.s.: This is a sarcastic post, in case anyone didn't notice, but it is a huge contradiction on the university's part to have a standards-based information science curriculum and outdated "workshop" courses on the side.
I'd just like to note that I'm fairly certain all those sub-headings as well as the copy at the top are in Comic Sans. Yay professionalism!
Dean, Comic Sans is fun and trendy. Don't bring your stuffy, boring attitude in here!
(yes, I was being sarcastic)
Frames! Great! Those new stupid web design tutorials never teach them. It must be because they're too complicated for these geeks to understand.
We had an A/V geek at our high school?
Having been the A/V geek in middle school (ah, the perks of being a library aide), I almost resent that.
Jenn: Thanks for correcting me, I fixed it
Went I first became interested in web design a couple of years ago, that was how I thought it was done. There's so many outdated tutorials and stuff out there. It's only over the past few months that I've began learning about CSS, and div based layouts.
mahud: It's true, and unfortunately those outdated tutorials are still very popular!
Have you seen the thing about MIT teaching "web science"?
Sam: I haven't heard of it, but it doesn't sound surprising. MIT is the center for the W3C in the U.S.
I've been web designing on and off for a number of years, and only during the last few months when I've been doing it professionally have I undergone the full conversion to CSS based layouts.
My experience in adopting new approaches has been that I find I'm immediately inclined to look down on those who are using the approach that I've just abandoned. Imagine that transition to a large power and you have a whole lot of sneering from those using css, directed at those still using frames/tables.
Whilst it is easy to be condescending and patronising to people not fully up to date with current web design knowledge, it is not at all helpful.
Best practice in web design is important in most situations, but not necessary in all.
Yes, this course is not exactly ideal, but talking down to those who have put their own time and resources into preparing it and writing it is not the answer.
Mike, a sarcastic post on my own weblog is hardly any form of talking down to the people running these courses. I myself have been one to help people learn standards-based design in the past and I would love to do whatever in my power to help others. I'm just making jokes.
As for the university, however, there is a lot of disparity between the information science dept., which enforces standards-based practices, and the library system, which offers these courses. That's a big mistake on Cornell's part and while I am grateful for the people teaching these workshops (who are likely getting paid for it), I am not grateful for the university allowing them to teach outdated practices. The onus is on the University to clean up these loose ends, not on the individuals.
That's fair enough. If the courses are the University's responsibility, then yes they should be encouraging standards-based practices.
One of the difficulties of text based communication, particularly when the author and reader live in different communities (I live in the UK), is that a lot of the nuance in the tone of an article and it's context is lost to the reader.
Trust me, I've noticed. I may need to start tagging my posts with "sarcasm" to warn people. Even still, it's funny and interesting sometimes to see the reactions people have when they misunderstand the tone of a post; sometimes it brings to light things we wouldn't have thought of otherwise.
Now I do resent that!
Whoops!
you should give courses at the library then. Dont forget to bring a book under you arm, let them start easy:
http://www.csswebdevelopment.com/
Johan: I do wish I had the time! I'm just too busy with my studies and working (which includes blogs by the way). Maybe next semester, if I have more time, I can teach some classes, but to be honest I really prefer teaching people through a full-fledged course anyway.