[Spank-A-Thon]

Originally posted by Fortune

Some web developers simply don't mind if the site is compatible. This doesn't happen for sites of big companies and so on, but mainly for private sites/portfolios/etc...
I use filters as well, but in the splash or in the main page I always write that the page won't be displayed correctly with other browsers. It's a shame many browsers don't support CSS and filters, becuase they're really a great way to solve a lot of troubles regarding web design and graphics.

But the point of the Internet is information first, design second - hence why XML is taking off.

XML allows you to describe your content - and when passed through to HTML, XHTML WML or whatever, the content will still be the same - just the presentation will be different.

As for CSS, it's unfortunate that certain browsers render things differently - but if you stick to W3C's CSS standards then at least you're playing by the rules so if certain browsers are incompatible then it's the broswers fault rather than the web-designers.

Microsoft's CSS filters are another thing though. At the moment they are not endorsed by W3C so if a site relies on these then I can only blame the designer. You should never make the functionality of a web-site proprietry to a certain browser.

Working in web development (HTML, XHTML, XML, PHP, ASP, ColdFusion) for the past 4 years has made me more critical of web-sites (and browsers for that matter) than most people - which is sometimes a bad thing! But that's what comes when you mix hobbies with business.

By the way Fortune, if you do web-design, have you looked into XHTML Tranisitional or XHTML Strict yet? XHTML Strict will change the way you think about web-design! Specifying tables size, image borders and so on have all been depreceated - it's all CSS now. Basically the W3C are trying to separate content from design - which is a good thing. But it takes some getting used to!

- S