Comments on: CSS – what is the current starting point?

By: Rafael

Rafael — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 04:23:39 +0000

Most places that provide syntax highlighting for code, it seems, still use for colours. I’ve noticed Dean Edwards is an exception (uses span with inline styles) and the PHP manual (spans with no inline styles). Gmail uses , which I thought was a bit odd, since their layout is tableless.

By: viebone

viebone — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 17:46:21 +0000

In my opinion, the natural way to teach webdisign is showing html and css as a team, as partners. The one is nothing without the other. Then differences between the usage of font tags and css only will confuse new students but maybe is a good help for old school who needs to leave bad habits

By: Richard Curtis

Richard Curtis — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 14:11:35 +0000

I published a website a few years ago for a local charity at http://www.crocusministries.org.uk using FrontPage Express and didn’t know anything about CSS. Now I’m having a life-changing experience and learning CSS from the ground up. For me, the comparison with etc. is useful but now I’m trying to remember body {font-family: Arial sans serif;} et al.

By: Erwin Heiser

Erwin Heiser — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 00:56:14 +0000

I think the starting points should be:
writing good markup
understanding the separation between content and presentation
understanding document flow and the difference between block and inline elements
Grok all this and you’re off to a very good start!

By: prisca

prisca — Sun, 05 Nov 2006 12:42:49 +0000

teaching webdesign – I found it quite tricky to find what would be a suitable starting point, mainly though when I have people in my class who have already dabbled in webdesign using DW, for example. In this case it’s a matter of dropping bad habits and adopting the new clean working method with CSS. It can be very confusing for people entirely new if I talk about things like the font tags etc – it becomes almost too much information to handle…
When I have only newcomers to webdesign in my class – this becomes an easier topic to approach and I start with the bascis of coding and discuss the box model as soon as my students understand the basic syntax. This then becomes a more digestable content to understand

By: miguel

miguel — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 22:24:33 +0000

I really have my doubts whether this is an appropriate starting point. May be this is more important for those who have been coding only with html for many years. Those who work with wysiwyg programmes may be don´t care about it too much. Nonetheless I think it is useful to mention the difference between the font tag and the css-text style approach at some point in the book.
I am a great fan of “The CSS Anthology” and I would like to buy a book which teaches CSS offering still more information on how to position elements and which includes a practical part about how to design your own WordPress Theme.

By: Pixel Surfers » Blog Archive » Light Reading From WSG

Pixel Surfers » Blog Archive » Light Reading From WSG — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 14:53:01 +0000

[...] CSS – what is the current starting point? [...]

By: Meryl K. Evans

Meryl K. Evans — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 14:40:28 +0000

I’ve been trying to educate those new to creating web pages (not necessarily designers, but people doing personal stuff and even -ack- myspace).

I noticed my 12-year-old replying to a myspace comment and she used the font tag (I bit my tongue). I wish she could’ve learned CSS from the start instead of font tags and made it a habit. It’s going to be hard to get her to change at this point.

I think it’s time to teach inline CSS for stuff like this. Most CSS focus has been on external CSS and internal CSS. Maybe people need to learn inline just like they learned font tag.

By: tony crockford

tony crockford — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 08:05:26 +0000

Isn’t it about the target audience for the book? if you were writing for existing designers who wanted to use CSS then the starting point would be different to a book for beginners to design.

is the book for complete newbies or switchers?

I’ve carved out a niche business just from building pages for designers using CSS and (x)html and most of them tell me they’re okay with using CSS for styling, but not for layout (probably due to all those books that focus on styling) If I were writing a book on CSS for the market that I observer it would be based on how to mark up a PSD using semantic html and CSS and getting it to work cross browser. So my starting point for “about CSS” would be how to use it for layout.

Hmm, not quite what you meant really, but hopefully it’s a helpful comment ;o)

By: Mark Baber

Mark Baber — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 07:38:18 +0000

I suspect this will prompt a shudder amongst many, but I think the box model is the perfect starting point. Probably the most complex component to get one’s head around, it’s easy to “rehabilitate” the manual html coder or to educate the novice by demonstrating the power of boxes and divs. For an immediate visceral effect, it allows a site-builder to change colors, fonts, sizes, and page organisation in one hit.
Class and id follow naturally.
Lists immediately after.
Tables can be reserved for implementing real tables.
This approach puts the emphasis on the separation of content and presentation, and brings the novice straight to the most important part of page construction: Design. It also mirrors word processor use, showing useful things like header/footer/margin/justification concepts which so many are familiar with. My tuppence …