Posted by Tim Streater on 11/09/07 17:27

In article <cf5cd$47348ca8$40cba7a3$12630@NAXS.COM>,
"Jonathan N. Little" <lws4art@centralva.net> wrote:

> Ed Jensen wrote:
> > dorayme <doraymeRidThis@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> >> Now one more question. What would you imagine about the
> >> appropriateness and quality of the tools if IE could be taken out
> >> of the picture?
> >
> > I'm not really qualified to answer that question for several reasons.
> >
> > First, I'm not really very familiar with any of the tools on the
> > market. The little HTML/CSS/JavaScript that I've written was created
> > entirely by hand.
>
> The way many of us develop. HTML/CSS/JavaScript are the tools.
>
> >
> > Second, I'm not a professional web developer, so I'm not necessarily
> > familiar with best practices (i.e., the "right way" to do things).
> >
> > That's not to say I'm entirely unfamiliar with web development. My
> > wife runs a small business, and I maintain a small web site for her.
> >
> > I tried doing things the Ivory Tower way (i.e., Separate content and
> > layout!, Tables are for tabular data only!, etc.), but I found the
> > experience time consuming and frustrating beyond any measure of good
> > sense.
>
> Maybe because you don't know your tools: HTML/CSS/JavaScript Knowledge
> is power. Why would you expect to "build a house" when you knew nothing
> about carpentry? And expect to be successful? Don't want to learn, then
> do what people do when they what a house but don't want to invest in
> learning carpentry, hire a carpenter.

I have to say I am inclined to sympathise with Ed. Why should the tools
be HTML/CSS/JavaScript? Just because Word, FrontPage etc generate crap
HTML does not invalidate the idea of a WYSISYG approach to generating
web pages (for example).

Ed, along with guys like me, is trying to solve the problem of
generating web pages and none of us sees why we should have to pay
expensive consultants if we don't have to. Let the tools evolve to be
easier to use and to be more efficient at what they generate.

Should I have to bring my C code to you and have you laboriously
generate the machine code by hand? I don't think so. Stop behaving like
those guys who used to operate the linotype machines for typesetting
newsprint. They went the way of the dodo when computers came along. It's
just a jobs-for-the-boys protection racket.

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