Too many tables

[orion_joel]

I think the most important thing that you need to remember in moving from tables to CSS is that when you use tables and a page loads, it loads every <TR><TD> and related properties of those tags. You go to the next page on your site and it loads them all again. When you do it with CSS the browser gets the css file, and stores it to cache. So each time that file is called by your site, it isn't truly loading it again, it knows what is there. Where as you may think each of your pages has the same layout with tables, but every page is a different file the browser does not know they have anything to do with one another except they are part of the same site as far as a web browser is concerned they would be two entirely different websites because they have a different file name.

[nealrm]

Feel free to post the code or link to the page in question if it's online. I'm sure someone can figure out a way to help make it work.

So that I didn't highjack this thread I posted the request here.

[vangogh]

Good point Joel. Of course that only works if your css is in an external file, but that's generally the case. It's another way css speeds up the load time of a website where a table slows it down.

[orion_joel]

To use inline CSS is probably just about as bad as using tables, it duplicates the code that displays the page to much, to the point that you lose any gain, i believe

[rezzy]

Right on Joel. Inline css, as I mentioned in a previous post is one thing that doesnt make much since. It defeats alot of the reasons for using CSS.

[Spider]

Thanks for your comments, guys - most interesting. I'm afraid I might have missed or misunderstood some of the information, though. Considering that I am not a web developer/designer and don't create websites day in and day out, I have little need, for example, for a coding method that makes multiple page revisions quick and easy. Because I never have to revise multiple pages - I might do a pages now and again.

So, the reasons I saw for css being 'better' than tables were very good reasons for a designer-business but not so necessary for someone who just likes to potter around with his own site. Horses for courses, right?

Am I correct in understanding from you all that serp positiong is not affected by whether the code is css or tables? That's what I understood from this or maybe another thread in this forum. (Same participants, different location!)

Also, Thank you, VG, for the mini-course on getting started in css. I had been thinking I ought to learn css and would, when I get round to it, but you sticking that information under my nose, so to speak, may have actually got the ball rolling for me. So, thanks for posting it.

[rezzy]

Spider, using css is a best practice. Of course there are many ways to skin a cat, but which one is the most humane and socially accepted.

CSS is great because like you mentioned (I think) it allows sweeping changes to be made to a site.

What could be better? Change one file and everything else is modified to look the same, consistency is always best in making a site.

[vangogh]

Frederick, I think there are more advantages to css than the maintenance and being able to make revisions easily, but just sticking with that one thing, I've known many people who said they would never change their site and then later did. You may or may not make those kind of changes, but if you decide one day you do want to make those changes wouldn't it be nice to your site is set up in a way to make those changes easy?

Personally I like doing things that will work well now and in the future even if I don't know what I plan to do in the future. Just something to consider. Also even a change to a single page now and again is usually easier with css than tables. Depends on the change of course.

With css and ranking it was probably me who said it wasn't a big deal to use css. I think it was in another thread. A couple things to know.

There's plenty of debate about whether or not css leads to better SERPs. Some people swear by it and others think it has no effect. My thoughts are that search engines are interested in ranking content and not code. I think someone who understand search engine optimization can build a site with either tables or css that pleases search engine spiders. And a poor developer could create a site with either that cause problems.

You can make coding mistakes that do trip up search spiders to the degree that they can't find your content or see it in a way that wasn't intended causing it to rank poorly.

Generally css ends up with leaner code. Tables tend to create a more complex structure which increases the odds of making mistakes that trip up search engines. A greater probability doesn't mean you'll make those mistakes of course, which is why I think css doesn't automatically lead to better SERPs.

Still most people who develop sites and know seo will choose to create a site using an all css layout, including myself. If a search engine was going to prefer one or the other now or in the future I would think they'd sooner prefer css.

Ultimately I don't think using a table-based layout will automatically hurt your rankings, but you can probably do more things using css that will help your ranking. CSS gives you greater control over a lot of things.

Glad to help with the mini-tutorial, especially if it gets you started learning css. The basics of css are no more difficult to learn than tables. The hardest part is probably the all css layout. The best way to start would be to learn the syntax and change some basic presentational things. Play around with colors through css, change your font-size and style with css. That sort of thing. You can still use a table based layout and use css to control many things.

It'll likely be easier to get started with css that way instead of trying to work on the all css layouts. Once you feel more comfortable styling individual elements you can move into using css for the layout of an entire page or site.

[Spider]

Thanks, VG. At this point in time. I think I'd be more likely to try it the other way round - wrapping some css around existing tabled content to see what happens. Maybe that would be a disaster, but we'll find out.

One of the reasons I like tables is the very reason that pro designers don't, I suppose - the one-page at a time. I have become quite proficient with tables and I often find that ooching a column a little wider on one page accommodates certain text better without the pages looking any different - I mean, who (being visitors) can tell if a column is 200 px wide or 202px wide. Looks the same, right, but isn't and text with some long words might fit better if that one page's column is a teeny-bit bigger.

But now I have some beginning css code, I will give it a try. Who knows, next year I might be on here extolling the virtues of css.

[orion_joel]

I thought it might have been said here, and it probably was you rezzy. Just did not have the time to go back and look when i posted.

You are probably to some extend correct in saying that people visually cannot notice a 2px difference. (Although i have noticed myself what appears to be a 1px misalignment of two elements on the wordpress new post admin page. But i can be kind of picky and find some really strange little things at times.)

Where you will really find that CSS works great is in the sites where you might have 30 pages you want the same layout and appearance just different content. Where if you change the font color for the <H1> tag, it changes it on every page, and maybe you want it centered as well. So you set these properties for the H1 tag in the CSS file, then rather then every page including those properties, all they have is the H1 tag which is modified by the CSS file. So you can find some good benefits in using CSS even if you don't initially do the layout in CSS you can move a lot of the other page settings off the individual page.