Bad Coding
I don't suppose I will win any friends, and will probably make lots of enemy's for it. But I am just busting to make this post.
I’ve seen several “why dose my site not Google” posts. I can tell you why!.
The new Google-bot can not only read your text, it can also evaluate your code. All of this effects your search engine position on Google.
It seems that a lot of people are jumping on CSS, without even learning how to make a basic page. I check a lot of sites through W3C, and WDG, a lot of them fail miserably.
It seems some don’t know the difference in strict, and transitional, or HTML 4.01, and XHTML. They have no Doctype, titles, descriptions, or keywords in their page code. Some don’t know how to close a html tag properly. Others get the head, and body tags reversed. How they come out looking as well as they do, is beyond me.
But one thing for certain they will not SEO very well.
So if you are going to build a web site ----- Please learn how to make a web-page first.
Busy posted this at 10:50 — 21st June 2006.
He has: 6,151 posts
Joined: May 2001
While not directed directly at your comment, but a version or two ago, some browsers had a DOM problem, the way around this was not to use a DOC tag, or use an abbreviated one.
The messy code/unordered code is usually the result of an editor (HTML editor), changing between them and/or different versions of them. Some bad WYSIWYG editors like frontpage adds (or used) a whole set of the main HTML (html, head, title ...) tags if you try add and remove something in the head section of the page, or just not knowing what they are doing.
The reason people are jumping on CSS without knowing HTML is because CSS is being pushed as the new HTML, they believe CSS is XHTML, when in fact CSS has nothing to do with XHTML - it's an addition to it.
You can NOT have a 100% CSS page anyway as the page must contain the principal (x)HTML tags - html, head, body. Look at any CSS tutorial site, none mention this, is taken for granted - assumed people know this already. If it wasn't for the crappy editors like frontpage they probably wouldn't even have the basic tags included. And because of IE the pages will still display without them.
It's not right to blame the people that make these bad sites for these mistakes, blame people that have the "CSS following". They are the ones leading people astray, not educating people properly.
Greg K posted this at 18:44 — 21st June 2006.
He has: 2,145 posts
Joined: Nov 2003
While I don't think it is IE only, I do agree this is a horrible crutch for the web industry that is hindering instead of helping. I remember back in 1998 or something reading an article that said 50% of the size of the browsers was to deal with figuring out how to display bad web pages
I'm all for browsers that says comes up and says "Hey this page doesn't validate to the standards you specify, we can't display it". (Yeah fantasy land here that all browsers would properly folow standards themselves). This would put a big slowdown on slop pages being generated, force people to either hire someone who knows of force them to learn the right way.
That being said, I'll admit that when I started out my code wasn't exactly right. It wasn't until I stumbled unto Dr. HTML validator that I knew you had to close most all tags. Ones like ,
-Greg
Megan posted this at 12:46 — 21st June 2006.
She has: 11,421 posts
Joined: Jun 1999
Oh that's a load of bullshit. You're saying that because someone advocates CSS-based sites they can be blamed for people who haven't learned HTML properly ??? WHat-ever. It is true that there is a lack of beginner CSS resources out there, but that can't be blamed on the leaders in the CSS movement. Their role is not to teach to the newbies. Someone else has got to step up and do that.
I think one of the real problems with people not learning things properly is the lack of new resources directed to the beginner-intermediate web site designer. A lot of them probably pick up HTML from tutorials written 8 years ago or use a mish mash of borrowed code and stuff copied from Word. There's no bridge between the newbies and the experts anymore. It's not the experts' role to do that - their time is better spent teaching to those who already understand. It's like blaming university professors because students didn't learn things correctly in high school.
And really, I don't think a purely CSS is really the point of well written code as far as SEO goes. Getting a better content to code ratio with proper structural mark-up on text is the point. CSS can help there but that doesn't mean it has to be used full out for layout and everything. That's a bit over the heads of the people we're talking about here anyway.
____________________________________
To add to what Steve said - It seems to me that a lot of people come to believe that building a web page is easy and if they do a lot of SEO on it then they'll get visitors and therfore money. I can't belive the number of bad sites I see both posted for SEO help and in the google adsense. They have no content, they have no idea of what their site is supposed to be doing, they have an appalling lack of attention to design and usability, they have no business sense. I think that what most SEO experts are realizing is that SEO can only be an assitant to a site with good content or a good product to sell. If there's nothing of value on the site then having a good SE ranking isn't going to make a difference - people will just leave after 2 seconds anyway.
So, overall it is a very broad lack of understanding of what a website is and how to make a successful one.
Megan
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steve40 posted this at 15:31 — 21st June 2006.
He has: 490 posts
Joined: May 2005
Megan.
I was not pointing a finger at this forum, or its leaders. I know it is no ones responsibility to teach, that is an over stressed word. You cannot teach anyone anything, unless they want to learn first. SEO is, and will become more importnt as time moves on. I have no argument with good content, that is a must. But fancy houses built on bad foundations crumble, when the wind blows.
I really don't know what % Google looks at as far as good markup goes, but I know that the new bot does. My point was to learn before you leap, and take a little pride in your coding. After all someone is going to look at it. When you leave Doctypes off your page, the spiders don't even know how to evaluate it. I checked one last night that even had the Doctype before the HTML (this is right), and after the (very wrong).
Point being; a basic page layout is a basic page layout, even if the information is 10 years old. There are a lot of ways to learn. You can download a validator (free). Then you can learn offline, until you have it at least half right.
I went through my learning phase, at a point in my life when learning had not become as easy, as 25 years previous. I even just started to beat CSS, into this 66 year old head a short while ago. BUT I did know how to layout a basic page, and the proper use of HTML first.
Again don't cry when something does not work, and ask others to figure it out for you. I know we all will run into a problem sometimes, we need help with. I have done it, but not about some basic HTML elements. I should have known about from the start. All I am saying is; learn to construct a basic layout before adding content, CSS, or anything else to it. It cant hurt, and can only help in the long run.
Megan posted this at 16:16 — 21st June 2006.
She has: 11,421 posts
Joined: Jun 1999
I was responding to BUsy there, not to you, and I don't believe he was talking about anyone around here, but all of the CSS experts out there. You make a good point about people not wanting to learn - I think they could learn to make a proper page if they bothered to do some reasearch instead of diving in head first and hoping to come up with something that works. It is good to see that the SEO community is really starting to recognize the importance of proper coding (and good content).
I am in agreement with your points - what I said below that line was meant as an addition to that. "Overall it is a very broad lack of understanding of what a website is and how to make a successful one" - includes basic knowledge of how to create a simple web page as you described.
Megan
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Busy posted this at 22:57 — 21st June 2006.
He has: 6,151 posts
Joined: May 2001
The web is about the only place where you can run with the big dogs before you start pooping like a puppy.
You go try do a level 3 course in anything, if you havent done 1 and 2 you can't, you go become a builder, build mutli million dollars homes, if you haven't done the basics they aren't going to leave you to it.
You say it's not the leaders who are responsible, I totally disagree, it is their responsibilty to ensure Joe Bloggs can understand the basics before jumping in the deep end. They are the ones pushing people in their direction, they are the ones trying to lead the future. To me it's bad leadership. A real leader looks after the people they are leading.
Imagine going on a hike, you're a newbie at it and the leader is a pro, is it his fault you dont know how to keep up, how to stay hydrated and end up lost and maybe eaten by bears?
Sidenote, that bs word should of been replaced
steve40 posted this at 23:34 — 21st June 2006.
He has: 490 posts
Joined: May 2005
HTML 4.01 was developed as a transition between XHTML, and html. And allows the use of some of the older HTML tags. You are right Megan you do not have to close all tags in 4.01 like you do in XHTML. For instance does not have to be closed, but in the case of a blocking element coming up in the code, it is a good idea to do it. is also another tag that does not have to be closed, like it does in XHTML for instance. However does have to be close in 4.01 . Where as in XHTML it can be closed like so
This thread turned out to be quite a conversation piece.
Megan posted this at 18:49 — 21st June 2006.
She has: 11,421 posts
Joined: Jun 1999
Sidenote: Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you have to close all tags under HTML 4??? I'm pretty sure that was something new with either HTML 4.01 or xHTML. (although it's a good idea to author HTML pages now as if you were writing xHTML...). Will have to check that...
Okay, checked -This page passes HTML 4.01 transitional and strict with no closing on lists, paragraphs, or tables.
So, back in the day when many of us learned HTML it wasn't actually incorrect to author this way. I do see a lot of people who didn't realize that HTML has changed and still author that way.
Megan
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DaveyBoy posted this at 00:19 — 22nd June 2006.
They have: 453 posts
Joined: Feb 2003
Tables 4eva
Megan posted this at 12:46 — 22nd June 2006.
She has: 11,421 posts
Joined: Jun 1999
I honestly don't think that tables matter that much in the context of this discussion. There are way worse things people are doing, like copying stuff from Word for example, or a complete lack of understanding of how the code works. Tables for layout are a minor offense IMO. I've seen things like multiple tags for example, or head elements includied in the body, things like that.
My point there was that those of us who learned in the 90s weren't incorrect when we didn't close tags (at the time). You're right in that you don't have to but shoud. The at the end is incorrect though - any block level element should have some content in it. If you had to include an empty div there would be some problem with the code. THe closing slash is only used for tags like (which is depreciated in xHTML 2.0 BTW), or![]()
where there is no enclosed content.
Busy - I can see your point there. I do agree that some of the experts could be a little more concerned with how the masses are learning. However, I would be really disappointed if they stopped writing to an advanced audience. These are the people I am learning from - if they started targeting a more beginner audience I would have no place to get my information from. Better for someone like me to start passing that wisdom down the line
And that's where a site like TWF comes in 
If you're a newbie you shouldn't be joinning an advanced hike in the first place
Really, I do think that it would be your fault because you got into something that was too advanced for you. Join a beginner hike instead. And there's no reason why the greatest expert needs to be leading the beginner's hike. The intermediate expert can do that very competently. The problem here is that the intermediate experts aren't stepping up and creating content. And that's something we plan to do here 
Megan
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steve40 posted this at 22:20 — 22nd June 2006.
He has: 490 posts
Joined: May 2005
I have used to provide a break at the top of a page, created in tables. Firefox automatically sees one, but Explorer does not. If you use , or Firefox sees two spaces to explorers one. But Firefox ignores the where Explorer sees it as a paragraph, now the top space is the same in both.
I know the proper way is to use margins, but the division makes a good hack otherwise. That is if you are not using CSS. But if you are coding for 4.01 it has to be the former works only for XHTML. And it will validate, believe it or not.
DaveyBoy posted this at 22:46 — 22nd June 2006.
They have: 453 posts
Joined: Feb 2003
I hate how sometimes firebox creates more space above a than IE but if you use the tag instead it doesn't i've found.
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