lilyofthevalley

Skemcin: It's a brand new site. Normally, I'll just build the site offline, and when it's done, I'll go live with it. But because I was looking for input/help, I originally had a "coming soon" page on the main, and then a /new folder for the project site. I honestly don't remember why I got rid of that coming soon page and just moved it all up one. I've not tried to do a blog offline yet. After this episode, if I do another new site that needs blog content up and ready for the launch, I will most definitely be doing that instead. Like I said, since I already have the links coming in, did it make sense to take things down, as I would most assuredly lose the traffic. The disclaimer is a just a note on the bottom of the main page "This site is a work-in-progress" etc., etc.. It's not a separate under construction page or anything like that.The blog discusses comics. It's not a literary nor artistic focus, mostly just fan. So, while I do take my opinions seriously, I don't consider this site serious in the academic sense. I'm not claiming to be a comics expert on any level.

Good thoughts all around! Thank you. :)I did add a subtle notice (this is so not the blinking sign the size of a watermelon type page), had enough time to edit a placeholder on the blog into another review, and also fixed some links on the left hand column as they now have a home to go to.http://www.comicsgal.comSimple, but true, and letting them know one thing to look forward to, at least, if not two. The update notice in the upper right hand corner should be helpful for return visitors to know whether there's something new to look at, yes?

Since checking where I fit in on the scheme of Google (no meta yet, and haven't even linked to hardly anyone), I thought maybe I should check my stats. Well, it's not just W3Schools folks checking my site anymore. Apparently due to some of the posts I've been building on my blog as I've been working on my new project site, that site is already getting picked up and linked to.I currently have no formal coming soon/under construction notice on my site--and I don't want people to think I'm just a ninny, especially because the latest version is the one w/o absolutes, and I haven't fixed the div spillover problem.Should I:-get rid of the part that mentions AdSense since I haven't even registered for that yet since the site wasn't ready-immediately put up a notice on the main about how this site is a current project in progress, and as such, is really not ready for gp viewing?-Get what exists functional, and just roll with it?HELP! I so wasn't expecting this. Usually my blogs hardly get noticed at all!

Thank you Jonas. Good to know.Akula, I used my GW Guild site like that when I was first experimenting with gif overlay and my first background image. So long as what you learned is still viable, it's not a waste, although I can see how you'd feel that you got nowhere with it.

croatiankid: ok thanks...I'll do that.Prateek:Where are you finding the 500 error? When I go to the site, it seems to be up, blog's up, and of course any pages I haven't built yet just aren't there (*edit* all but two should be 404 on blog with the left hand links), but I'm not seeing the 500 anywhere. I'll check again. Please post the URL to where you're getting the 500.*edit* Ok, figured out the problem...I deleted that version...used to have a coming soon on the main, but it's just up on the main and beyond now. I'll change the link in my first post on the thread.

Ok...I'm getting back around to working on this again. I'm going to take a stab at it with some of the suggestions and post back with how it goes.Thanks for all the tips! Hopefully more positive result input back to ya'll soon.croatiankid: inline meaning in the html, yes? Just want to make sure I'm understanding that right before I attempt to commit it to memory.

Speaking of picky, especially now that it's live, I said it once, I'll say it again about your about tab: should be I'm not seeing a mouseover change using IE 7 on your portfolio page. I know someone else mentioned this before, but I can't see it either.Ok, maybe this is a vocab lack on my part, but what does forms of programs mean in the following on your portfolio page? You mean as in "...all related programs to help you run..."? Or is this a reference to something I'm just not understanding as a wanting to learn more n00b? Other than that...looking good! And I was not familiar with getacoder. I'll look them up sometime.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who responded. :)Ironicly (ironically?), I already kind of did what many suggested--back off for a bit. When I wrote the start of this thread, it was after one of my long haul "Oh wait, maybe this will work" periods when you just sort of forget about sleep for a little longer than is sane. I need to go back to my old rule of never more than 10 hours of just site dev in a day, with breaks just like when I worked union stagecraft, and no meals in front of the screen. *laugh*The good news for me is that I really haven't given up, but gosh at that moment, I was close. I think part of my problem is that I dove head first into Strict XHTML w/ CSS because in my mind, by the time I learned it, it would no longer be the latest and greatest, but I would be leaps and bounds ahead of where I was. *laugh* A larger part, aside from the cross-browser issue, is the fact that there is more than one way to do things. And, at times, when people make suggestions, they are quite valid ones, but I can't always implement what they are suggesting which does put me in a bit of a holding pattern. I have to remember to make a list of "someday try" and push forth with the things I have managed to handle until this test site is complete. (I can get absolute positioning to work at its most base level...but not what other folks have suggested which will prevent the issue at narrower viewing.)My only thought to pass along on the cross browser issue is that until recently, I never cared. Most of my surfers use IE/Netscape and some Firefox & Mac based browsers. Very few use the others. I was looking more into the accessibility issue, but that wasn't until the last year or so that I really was trying to focus on it. With Firefox becoming more popular, and, just to try to be concious of the rest of the world's options, I am now checking on most platforms, although I admit, not Linux--one step at a time there. So really, I've only had browsers other than IE/NS on my computer for a month. That's when I started realizing how rampant the issue of cross browser was. I was worried enough about 800 vs 1040 before, and now this. *ugh*Comicsgal is my tester. I have over a dozen other sites that I maintain, and trust me when I say none of them will validate even in HTML, but they work with IE/Net/and sometimes firefox or opera, depending. I knew that it would be smarter to master a new format first, and then implement that process to the others. And I do not regret that decision at all. I think I would have thrown something through a wall by now otherwise had I not. :blink:My goal, I thought, was simple. Build a site based on Strict XHTML & CSS that would work on the 5 majors (I think Mac browsers are usually pretty good, but not as familiar anymore with them these days), and also try to have the nod to the access issue. Then, I wanted to take that layout and learn/implement the resizing and possible font size info. I'm getting there. I've adjusted my business/projects plan now so that instead of having all the sites changed over by June, I've now given myself the rest of the year. I think that will take a lot of pressure off, especially since I do most of my travel in the first five months of the year.I do have some concerns about the site being live as is, but I don't think that's killing me yet so far as turning off people who find me at random, especially since I haven't started trying to link it anywhere or even added meta tags. (A google for comics gal doesn't show me on the first 5 result pages--ooo but comicsgal shows me on page 1 already--erk--but really, who's going to do that search?)After reading through the responses to my other inquiries, I'll be delving back into the site the rest of this week, a few hours at at time, before a business trip of two weeks, which should be a great break if needed before I come back to it again. Ok, now to personal responses:Jonas: Yes, it was good to vent. I'm just glad everyone was so very nice in responding...as I was worried the next morning it did seem too down. I think part of my problem insofar as the logic of it is that I just need to focus on that logic when things aren't working, as opposed to saying "well it's supposed to work" and just getting frustrated scanning the markup instead of pulling it back apart. When I attempted the basics of li and such, they worked. When I tried to start layering elements and pushing the design further, that's when I seem to be having my worst breaks in my layout. It is tempting to go back to tables, but I know with time, I will get this. (I haven't even begun converting, yet...I'm just sensing the potential issues with my first run which was what I was hinting at.)reportingsjr: No, I am new here, but I have tried a few other forums before feeling at home here, and I always use the same screen name. Maybe you recognize me from one of them. Give me a month or so, and if I really get stuck...I will take you up on your offer!jlhaslip: Yes, the break was needed, and boy did I find a nice book to read in the meantime. I have put queries in, and, as I said in my inital post here, folks have been awesome with their help. That's why I made sure to mention that I wasn't trying to blame anyone involved with this forum other than myself. boen_robot: Good to know...I have this thread bookmarked as there are a lot of helpful nuggets nested within. It has been a bit tricky at times determining what I need to know. I was trying to add some php, but I've now backed off, and I'm back to just the Strict XHTML and CSS. (The php hack was killing my htaccess for my blog--but I'll worry about that another time when it's pertinent.)jesh: I'm working towards the day when it all falls into place. I've actually put a sticky on my monitor now that says "Time for a BREAK?"MrAdam: Just don't let it happen again! Glad justsomeguy came to the rescue with the answer.Skemcin: I have not looked into ColdFusion much--part of the trying to not bite off more than I could chew issue. I originally cut my teeth with php when I was editing the skin and such of my first phpbb. (I had used a different kind prior.) It was tough. At the time, about a year ago, I felt that php devs were micromanagers to the Nth, but now I'm starting to appreciate why they do the things they do. For me, validation is a brass ring, but also a checkpoint. Since I'm trying to learn, if it validates, I must be doing something right, but I will keep what you said in mind. Oh--and as far as my other regular sites...I haven't even touched them yet. Need to keep those working while I learn on something that doesn't matter to the general public yet.Chocolate570: Ultimately, I want my sites to be easier to maintain. But, I also want people to visit them or what's the point of having them, as you stated. The reason I started this current project is I was realizing that many people visiting my sites weren't seeing what I wanted them to see all the time, and I'm talking about issues due to unclosed tags, forgot an & or ; in an which IE will forgive, but Firefox will not. (A friend who uses Firefox was the first to tell me, which was truly the starting point of this adventure.) I think over time, I'll be able to figure out who I will make that time for (the browser look), and who will sadly get left behind.justsomeguy: Hear, hear. There are a few things that I simply cannot understand why the couldn't just let them be. But, I'm also not savy on all the back end in that manner. There's one discussion board I visit sometimes that has pages and pages on this very topic--it's something folks can be very passionate about. I don't consider myself up to speed as far as CSS layout that I could do what you do, but normally, when making a site, I was about there. If the initial home page layout (a unique, not a template I'd already done before) was taking more than 2 hours--I was definitely doing something the hard way.Skemcin: Getting back to the tables-aren't-the-spawn-of-all-that-is-evil idea, now I'd be confused as to whether I had to build the table in the CSS or do regular HTML with it inside.

MR_CHISOL: I'm still not completey versed on all the quriks of the various browsers. Always something new to learn. I will try the negative margin thing again. I think I tried it before, and had trouble, but now I can't remember in which context. I think that was back when I was still mixing up my em and px. Jonas: thanks for the head's up, I will try to look at that info soon. So I guess since you can't apply the styles, it's best to always leave hr usage only for when you want a typical hr. But I'll look at the other info to try to find a way to do what I'm doing!

I've been trying to do more research on this subject. Ultimately, although the img trick works, it does not validate. I have tried to embed the image both as a div, which was a downright disaster, and p-which pushed everything further down on the page, and in both cases, I am not seeing the results I want at all. When I place the image inside the p tag, though, it does validate, which was encouraging.From what I'm reading about divs, the align attribute has been deprecated there as well (so you can't even try to sneak in a justify), and I'm still not completely clear on how styles is replacing that in a way I can use in a case like this. What I am especially frustrated by is that having gone back to W3S, I do see where the hr tag has been deprecated. I have searched quite thoroughly, and I can find no reference to its replacement. This is all I could find:All "presentation attributes" of the hr element were deprecated in HTML 4.01.All "presentation attributes" of the hr element are not supported in XHTML 1.0 Strict DTD.And if you look at the chart here, it clearly states that one must now use styles, but it doesn't say what you can use the styles on---there is no mention of what element akin to hr one might use to replace it. Then they immediately turn around and give you a tutorial on how to insert an hr. It's madness. The other thing I am quite puzzled over is the concept of the img as being a forced block or something along that line, which is why I can't use that element there and validate. All I could find on further developments on the img tag is that it is one of several modules that were specifically designed to assist in the transition. However, I cannot find any references that denote how one might incorporate style and img to try to duplicate the purpose of hr. This was about the closest thing I could find on any info directly pertaining to the compliance project, and here it states that the img is common, and seen as a text content model. So if that is the case, why can we not use the img tag as we would a text tag in a case like this? Why is it forcing the issue of the block element, when it clearly states that an img no longer can be ruled by such things as "width=100%" since they have been deprecated, but, again, there is nothing equal to that sort of absolute positioning that I can find that is what is recommended now. Well, expansion, really, not really positioning.Anyhoo---I've been sitting in front of this glowing box for longer than I care to admit. Now I need to figure out if I'm keeping the img as p, how to move it up into the position that I want it to reside in.If anyone has any further info on this issue than I have found here, please do speak up. Until I learn how to wrangle the CSS positioning a bit better, I believe I will continue to have some issues with trying to make divisionary sections with CSS. Hopefully later today I'll be able to further look into how containers over all play into this, being that divs force the break line between sections, which I think is part of what's giving me trouble.

Okies, I tried the img trick first only because I've played that game before, and I am also now back to fiddling with non-absolute mid columns due to yet another voice piping in that I should tend to that.Netscape liked it and was kind to my floating mid columns, it let me shrink the window vertically far narrower than I thought it would before the design klunkered out.Firefox liked not only the img, but also liked my floating mid columns just fine until I tried to shrink it down somewhat in the neighborhood of 800p, and then all chaos broke loose with the header falling downwards like Humpty Dumpty.IE liked the img, but let my columns overlap from center to right like a winter snow drift.I don't have Opera. I could download it, but I haven't yet.The only issue I have throughout is that the hr is lower than I want it to be on the page, and I am unsure at this moment of how to fix that, but will look into it. I vaguely remember reading something about negative margins or some such. And, of course, the overlap issue. And, since I'm supposed to be putting all the formatting in CSS, shouldn't I be making that img a type of img.class and just call up the div to stay Strict? Or am I wrong on that? I haven't tried to validate it yet. Awww heck, I must have done something goofy. Now I've lost my mid center column altogether in IE. Darnit, must have moved the wrong copy of something, although it is reading right in FF & NS? ok, when moving back to the img version, I somehow grabbed an older CSS, that's fixed now, but the middle is still a'flowing.Mr_CHISOL: I tried your first suggestion, I couldn't get it to do 100% width in IE, though it was closer to the the top of the page like I wanted, but my next check was Netscape, and thin black line, so I tried your next suggestion. In IE, the hr disappeared completely. I thought maybe it was due to the semicolon before the comment, but deleting that didn't help either. I also tried putting the 100% in quotes, but that didn't seem to help, and at that point I gave up.ste: I read your pages, and the pages you linked to with fascination and a touch of admiration. I am hoping I never have to do that much work for a line break to work well.andersmoen: Thank you for bringing me back to something I actually have used in the past and works, apparently from this simple test, quite well.

Roondog: Ok, I totally remember why I did the absolutes. It's spilling all over itself again. I'll go back and see if I saved any references for padding/setting margins to clear that mess apart.

andersmoen: Hee, I wish I had seen your latest post while I was trying to find that element. I saw your response just as I was coming back to say I found the missing link.S@m:I have that site bookmarked already, but at this exact second, I don't remember why I was trying something else. might be a good reason, or it might be a site I simply forgot to go back to. Thanks for bringing it up again.Roondog: I started using absolute positioning when some of the float layouts I tried kept overlapping, despite the padding I was trying to tell them to use. I'll give it a shot again. I might have inadvertently fixed whatever was vexing me before, so it might be ok this time. The header seems to be surviving, so who knows? (So if it's not a cheap plug...what does that make it? I'll definitely try to check it out when I have some time.) jlhaslip: so if IE doesn't recognize the margin 0, why is firefox bumping the center section of my header further town from the top? That puzzles me. As long as I remember what works, I learned something. So time will tell.

This is something that's been on my mind for about a month. I've never thought of myself as a computer whiz. Computers have been a part of my life, but in the last 5 years, my businesses have come to rely on my sites, which is why I knew I needed to make sure they were up to speed.In the last 3-4 months now, I have been trying, diligently, to learn clean XHTML, using CSS. Trouble is, a lot of what I used to be able to get away with in Java script, or tables, or slip-shod type hacks, I now can't by the new rules. More and more, java causes that infamous "boop--do you really trust this site to run a script? It could be perfectly fine, but it could also be malware" which of course I don't want my surfers running into, and that started pushing me towards php, which I finally learned how to get Apache to unravel it right, sometimes, although it seems like sometimes ASP would be better, but I can't with Apache I just found out today, so there went that, not that I know any more about ASP than I do about php. And then there's DOM, but I don't even have a good solid handle just on XHTML and CSS yet to even think about toeing into another form. And I'm stll hesitant about using anything that deals with MySQL, because I just haven't had enough experience with it yet. And since every darn markup/language has its own comment style, this way of doing, that way of doing, there are times when I simply cannot, for the life of me even when I've got a similar example in front of my nose, feel like I'm doing the right thing.In the meantime, I'm getting very frustrated with CSS layout in that everyone seems to think that X way is the right way, and no matter which way I do it, I can't quite seem to get it to look nearly as nice as tables did (or sometimes even close to what I was looking for) with 1/4 of the work before, and then there's all the tweaks that I didn't really have to worry about before. And I'm realizing that a site the small size I've worked on for about 80-90 hours on (research takes time too--and I often lack the vocab to resaech efficiently), I would have finished and been updating in about 30-40 tops. And it would have looked better, although probably not on everyone's browsers, and prolly wouldn't validate as nice either, and a lot of it definitely would be loading slower.I'm starting to worry that I'm spending so much time trying to bring my sites up to speed that the rest of my business end is lagging, but I'm not at a point where I can just hire someone to do it for me, which I don't want to do anyway because I feel like I'm just getting so close to getting a handle one the next step, but despite my quiz results from W3S, I still have doubts.So when...when do you say, "Oh well, I tried," and just either find a happy medium between bad html and good validation, and still have time for the rest of the things a small business needs and some semblence of a social life (and stuff like laundry, sadly)? I'm not saying you just stagnate altogether, but when you realize you've got an awful lot to really get a handle on, how on Earth do you catch up without other things faltering? Or is it just one of those things like laundry that's just always going to need to be done, and you just have to grit your teeth about it when it gets behind and catch up in the hopes that at some point you'll be running with the tide instead of chasing after it? Or do you just say, well, that's that. Either hire a professional or start looking for an X job again.Sorry if this seems negative at all. Folks here have been super great and so very, very helpful, but I'm just so darn frustrated with the amount of time it seems to take to do the simplest things because I have to do it the new way. And I've barely started converting my other sites over, which with one in particular, I know is going to be my personal li nightmare.I mean, on one hand, I'm terribly proud that I have that little site pretty much done with the basics, and the CSS and the Strict XHTML is validating, although apparently wrongly so on a few things. But on the other hand...ick...it's just seems like it's taking forever.Maybe I just need a nap. Maybe it does get easier from the first. I dunno.Thoughts? Anyone? Or is everyone here just super whizzes and I'm always gonna be the one-step-behind n00b?

very cool. thanks! Hee...just saw someone else posted about that recently too, but in the HTML/XHTML forum. Dno't know how I missed it when I did a last quick search today....