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I got an invite to Pownce today (didn’t really want it, but I felt I should play the alpha-tester game) and I decided to test it out by posting an event. After I posted it, this is what I saw in FF 2.0 on Vista:
Clearly, the floats dropped. This doesn’t happen in IE 7, but I know why the problem exists in Firefox (and it’s a simple thing to fix). Here’s the CSS for this:
dl.note-event dt {
font-weight: bold;
float: left;
font-size: 85%;
padding-top: 2px;
}
dl.note-event dd {
margin-left: 5em;
}All I had to do to fix this (editing live with the Firefox Web Developer Extension) was add the following two lines:
dl.note-event dt {
clear:left;
}
dl.note-event dd {
padding-top:2px;
}That’s all… 2 simple lines that make the styling look perfect.
Now I knew how to fix this because I’ve done a lot of work with CSS and I’ve actually used something like this a couple times before. I’m just wondering why an error like this would be in such a high-profile design (and Pownce isn’t the first website where I have seen mistakes like this). I don’t mean to put down the people making these mistakes, but I’m starting to think one of 2 things:
- Not many people are testing the CSS they give to clients thoroughly enough. A problem like this can be solved by simply doing a spot check in a handful of browsers.
- CSS still isn’t being taken seriously enough. Someone who works with CSS very often would know that you should always clear floats if you don’t want the content that follows them to end up beside them. I haven’t, however, met many people who work with CSS often.
CSS has never been the “cool” thing to do, and I can’t think of more than a handful of people who would call it one of their “specialties.” Calling it mine was not something I did to join the “in” crowd. Problem is, as CSS becomes more and more common on the web, the need for CSS as an expertise is growing. It needs to be taken more seriously by educators and a strong knowledge of it needs to be valued more by designers and clients. After all, this is very similar to seeing a typo in print design, and when a lot of people are making typos, it indicates that something is not right in the industry. Maybe that illustrates the issue well.
Slightly related note: I have 6 Pownce invites to give away, but I won’t give them to people who don’t make honest comments on this topic. And, if the first 6 people who leave comments ask for them, consider them all gone.
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12 Comments
Responses to my articleI’d never really thought about CSS not being “cool”. To me it is! And to a few of my fellow nerds it is too. But to most dabblers in webdesign it’s a pain in the butt, but few of them realise that the pain is the browsers, not the CSS:
But you’re right, too many people don’t test their design in any browser except for the one they use. Sad but true.
And on the subject of the Pownce invite I don’t really need it, thanks anyway
It’s always seemed silly to me that it’s so tricky to make designs “work” in all (any) browser. Editing tools have been available in most browsers that have existed, but the language in which one is able to describe page layout hasn’t changed significantly in over half a decade (I’m talking about in existing browsers, not in existing “standards” or drafts). There still isn’t a spectacular website out there that takes a project-oriented approach to developing websites, like “HTML Goodies” did (unfortunately without giving thought to standards). HTML Dog is close, but the writing on that site is just bland. I can’t imagine anyone getting started on HTML with that website unless they’re really motivated, but my opinion is that the resources and tools available should give you motivation, not suck it from you.
Invite, please!
I agree with you that people do not “stress-test” their CSS.
I work with several individuals who say, “Well the client only uses IE and that’s all I’m looking at”. I always tell them develop it in FF and fix for IE and kill two birds with one stone.
Interestingly enough, Kevin Rose’s digg was not very cross-browser friendly when v2 came out. Even after several iterations, some items still hadn’t been fixed.
Pownce its not very usable at this time, at least for me, 50% of the time is about staring at the ugly bug image.
CSS is the heart and soul of the web. It is what makes sites interesting to visit and easy to use (or not). There is no question that any web developer is spending almost a third of their time on CSS or layout related business. I believe that any developer not making this effort is not meeting the grade. Furthermore, floating is concept that has been around a long time… What’s going on Pownce?
So was kramtark the only one that wanted an invite? If so, I have 5 invites left to give away…
“There is no question that any web developer is spending almost a third of their time on CSS or layout related business.”
Really? Um… that should not be the case except for certain types of websites, e.g., “portfolio”-type websites. I should hope that anyone doing web development would spend most of their time on server-side issues, to ensure that the website is reliable, secure, fast, and easy to use. Switching from table-based layouts to div-based layouts doesn’t give the amazing order-of-magnitude speed increases that simple server-side optimizations give.
The point of being “invite only” is to catch these problems before they “go live”. It’s all very well complaining about it in your blog, but did you submit a bug report?
Give ‘em a chance, they’re barely two weeks old and little things like this always slip through.
Obligatory fanboy comment: I think your mistake was probably using Vista. Hur hur.
(Don’t need an invite.)
Not only did I submit a bug report, Rich, but I submitted the fix too.
I reckon CSS is not being taken seriously…
Were I work part time this is the case and I have reason to believe it is the case elsewhere as well.
I have just started to teach myself web development and have already decided I will learn CSS (I’m currently starting with html). The way it was explained to me is html is your 2X4’s and css is your drywall, paint, and marble counter tops.
I’ll take an invite if you still have some left.
Mike: I like that explanation. Invite is on its way.
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