Posted by Jaxtraw on 05/08/06 02:52

Greg N. wrote:
> Jaxtraw wrote:
>
>> The lesson seems to be that every attempt to make CSS do interesting
>> layout is fraught with problems, even by people who "know how to use
>> CSS properly"
>
> I don't think zengarden contributors are prime experts on "how to use
> CSS properly". They're mostly grapics designers. As you observed,
> most of their examples, while looking very nice superficially, lack
> in areas like font selection, font contrast, font size. Most
> notably, pretty much all examples are non-liquid, which is almost
> always a poor design choice.
>
> zengarden has only one purpose: to demonstrate how css alone (as
> opposed to html < 4.01 ) can be used to control the appearance of a
> web site, with respect to colors, fonts, pix, and placement.
>
> It is _not_, however, a tutorial on good web design, just like a
> collection of Chili recipes is not an essay on good nutrition.

I agree- but I think it illustrates how easy it is to get into hot water.
It's particularly disappointing that their main page- not a contributed
design- is neither fluid, nor works well below 800px. It's effectively a
table-like design and shows no advantages whatsoever of CSS.

My point is simple- CSS is, as its name describes, a rules system for
applying styles to documents- to change the style of text basically, and by
extension images, in a document which flows from top to bottom. It's not
suited to layout, and the extensions to make it a layout language are
inadequate, complex, difficult to use and as such poorly conceived. Tables
weren't intended originally for laying out webpages- I agree with that. But
what CSS offers isn't up to the job either.

Most significantly, it has *no means whatsoever* to change the document flow
without hoiking elements out of it altogether by floating, and even then no
means to change the relationship of elements. It cannot manipulate the DOM.
If your menu is in the left column's encapsulating DIV, it's trapped in
there forever unless you rewrite the HTML, so the claim that you can restyle
a site just by modifying the CSS is simply false. As it is, the document
structure is hard coded into the HTML, resulting in DIV soup that's just as
bad as Tables.

My point- we need something better. Until we get it, I see no reason to
evangelise tableless web design as some kind of acme.

Ian

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