At 9:08 AM -0400 5/23/09, Robert Cummings wrote:
Ya know... the people over at HTML standards design cold have saved the
world a large number of headaches by just adding a new attribute to
tables:
<table type="layout">
Then everyone layout table out there would have been valid by the simple
addition of this attribue, backward compatible with older browsers,
understandable by future screen readers, and much less hassle in
general. But, I guess they were lacking some insight there. Instead we
got a CSS spec to support table layouts that depended on the asshats
over at Microsoft adding support, required all browsers at the time be
upgraded, and today is pretty much useless in a global perspective. I'm
all for standards, we could have even overlapped this system with CSS
support so that when the browser support ultimately came, the switch
would be simple. But no, simplicity would have been far too easy for
everyone to swallow.
Rob:
Ain't that the truth.
On one side, people who had very little programming skills took
advantage of the HTML language through WYSIWYG editors and created
something that solved their needs.
On the other side, the same people who didn't foresee the problem
when they created the language ignores the obvious need for layout
and then further complicates the issue by redefining tables and
requiring a css solution. They could have easily sought a simple
solution such as what you suggested.
I often think there should be a "grid" of some sort to allow people
to construct a layout without having to consider the more problematic
css positioning and float rules. What better solves that layout
problem than a table? Opportunities lost.
Ps. sorry for disappearing from this thread, I had a funeral to attend
and had no internet for a week... yes I'm still shaking from
withdrawal ;)
Sorry about the funeral -- I hope there was nothing seriously wrong. :-)
Cheers,
tedd
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