CSS for XXX site design?

[SirMoby]

Tables were designed specifically to store data in cells and are perfect for creating a gallery of thumbs. So for the gallery part of our business tables still make a lot of sense.

When it comes to entire page layout CSS offers some great features and webmasters might want to start looking at it though.

Since so many browsers implement CSS differently, webmasters still need to learn some CSS hacks and until those are gone tables will still have a foot hold for page layout.

[Joe Pineapples]

Hmm yeah, I can understand completely for thumb gallery's now you mention it, especially when the auto thumb making software generates tables.

Still dosn't explain the total dominance of tables in actual site design when it comes to the adult business tho. I might be inclined to go with jayeff's explanation.

CSS is a minefield when starting out so if tables work, and can be seen in all rubbish or old browsers then why not carry on with them?
CSS probably isnt quite ready yet or the browser arnt.
When I start seeing CSS more frequently implemented in porn sites thats prob an indication that things are changing.

Hmm Im still not sure which way to go with this new site, although i bending back towards tables, perhaps with some CSS here and there.

thanks for all your input.

[jayeff]

Originally Posted by Joe Pineapples

CSS is a minefield when starting out

To create a display of thumbnails in CSS is basically as simple as stating the width of the thumbs and the box into which you want to "pour" them. Thus instead of

<table><tr><td>linked_image_here</td><td>linked_image_here</td><td>linked_image_here</td></tr></table>

you can have

<div>linked_image_herelinked_image_herelinked_image_here</div>

Not only is the code dramatically less, but if I want to change the number of columns, I just change the width of the div in my stylesheet and I'm done. No messing around deleting or adding td's. Almost everything from Comus to Thumbnailer can be persuaded to use divs instead of tables.

What are the consequences? Im most cases, total code will be reduced by 20%-25%, which means less bandwidth. It also means that when search engines look at your site, the ratio between content and code is improved (by more than the superficial saving, since your stylesheet should be separate and is therefore not seen as part of the page by the SE spiders) and that is good news. Less code also means faster loading, but load speed will be increased further because browsers cannot display tables until they have calculated how they should be displayed.

And there is the rub. As I mentioned in my earlier post, most people do not write good code. If people coded properly, using things such as table-layout:fixed, most sites using tables would load faster than they do. But people leave out dimensions, put things in which aren't needed which may make the browser run through some unnecessary "thinking", etc. But even if table-based designs are coded properly, they cannot load as fast as table-free designs.

It's worth people checking their sites at http://validator.w3.org and if there are a lot of errors, they could be costing you something in terms of visitors and SE scores. If that bothers you enough to want to do something about it, does it make more sense to learn how to code well in old-style HTML or to put the same effort into current coding standards?

[Maj. Stress]

Originally Posted by SirMoby

Since so many browsers implement CSS differently, webmasters still need to learn some CSS hacks and until those are gone tables will still have a foot hold for page layout.

You nailed it with that statement. When you have 1000's of sites out there and a browser updates and hacks no longer work the way they were originally intended, you have one hell of a mess to fix.

I like tableless design myself. The pages load very fast and use little bandwidth. I do use a lot of css on my free sites but I'm staying with tables on them.