new design up

Tuesday Apr 3rd 2007

This is techy, so it’s an extended entry.

Ordinarily I’m not akin to using icons, however, everyone uses them in whatever operating system you use. Doesn’t matter if it’s Windows, Mac or Linux. Having a GUI is the standard.

My blog, as of this writing (because who knows, it may change again), is in Pirillo-esque format. When I saw his design, I liked how it was put in basic columns that were justified to the left. I also liked the icons he uses, but didn’t like the fact they were “stuck” on the right. To me, icons should be as easy to get to as possible with minimal effort, so I placed mine on the left.

Also, I purposely designed my site to fit a 1024×768 display. Chris’ site is readable at that res, but the third column on the right “jumps” down. Maybe it’s designed that way on purpose. I dunno. But I don’t like jumpy columns, so I used position: absolute for mine and only used two. I entertained the idea of using three, but it just seemed like too much.

Part of the reason my site changes its look so much is because I continually struggle between what I like and what would be best for my readers. With corporate design, that’s easy, but with personal design it’s like with anything else - you are your own worst critic. Part of me screams CENTER! Everything must be in the CENTER of the screen! Another part digs the good ol’ left-justified thing all web pages used to have (which is what I have now). And yet another part screams What about mobile users?! Those Blackberry browsers sometimes display web pages a little funky! Make your code digestible for them, too! But then I think Fuck that. Why coddle to those? Web sites were originally meant for traditional computer screens anyway.

In the end I always decide on using something I personally like, while at the same time viewable on 99% of the browsers out there. I make sure the design works in IE 6, 7 and Firefox 1.5. As long as it displays proper in those - I don’t worry about it. :-)

But there is one thing I do which is somewhat rebellious: I don’t give a flying fuck whether my code is valid or not. If you dared try to validate this code, that lil’ app would instantly shoot back No HTML declaration! Bad site! Baaaaaaaad site! My opinion? Couldn’t care less. I know not of a single soul who gives a shit whether something is W3 compliant or not and neither do I.

If your code truly mattered, browsers would be more strict about the way they display web pages. But they’re not. You can miss things like </td> and even </table> and a browser will still display a table. If you place a color element in CSS but forget to use a background element, the browser doesn’t care.

And call me crazy, but search engines seem to like “bad” code. Were I to guess, I think it’s because the engines find it easier to “read”. Some are of the opinion that better code = better search results. I disagree with that entirely because I get indexed just fine with my oh-so-crappy code.

Okay, I’m done. :-)

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