Originally Posted by eric_bobbitt derek.l Ah Derek, what do I say to you. You obviously have a good direction on what you are trying to express, but I feel as though someone's you are just posting in an upset mood on the topic. I would love nothing more for you to keep posting, but as I said to Lord Kalthorn, I think you need to post more facts rather than hearsay. Please do not take that the wrong way, but I think if you research some of things in your last post you will see what I mean.

throughout highschool i was always encouraged to debate things when i saw a point worth bringing up, and through al that and the argumentetive essays (i forget the fancy tchnical term) i think i just developed a very defensive tone i don't notice at first. i don't have any ill feelings, i just like a good debate.

i didn't read much of the other posts because i'd like to discuss the topic, and i'd like to look @ it from different perspectives, so i'll throw some stuff @ you.

forst off, i noticed katharn referncing http and ftp and a few things, and ealier mentioning another set of standards, which questions the point of this topic. as a developer i knew you meant w3 web coding standards, but other points can be made about other standards sets. but i don't know much about them yet, so that fight will wait for another day.

web development coding standards, which i'll now refer to as w3 standards are really a case specific thing, like using flash or php (but w3 standards aren't as lenient).i use w3 standards for all my work because i agree wth the philosphies and theories they represent and i also find it to be good practice, but depending on the situation, the reprocussions will change.

it really depends on what your project is aimed towards. for me, my stuff is aimed at computer specifics. i'm not very concerned about how things will be displayed on other devices, because my audience is computer sites aimed at selling to other computers. in my area, the prime thing to target is downtown like bars and clubs and other entrepeneurs. in that area, coding development is targeted to the web on computers for people to acces through their computer. the upscale banker riding the subway to a board meeting checking his handheld isn't what i would consider their main audience, nor is it mine, so my stuff is optimized for computers. i've never used a handheld, but i don't expect my work to be very optimal for it. i code to w3 standards to keep my code free of clutter, because i deign and code, i cen produce the best combination of both allowing for the most code optimization into the visual experienceas i can reducing bandwidth and storage and desinging to a strict standard set, the work to keep cross browser compatbility is kept to a minimum - i don't optimize for varying devices, but i want to make as many computers as possible able to view my work. if hand held devices can view my work properly that's a great bonus, but it's not a concern of mine.

in my case, i'm aiming @ small to mid sized business and projects, who i don't expect to have a mass audeince of varying technologies. by coding to standards, i can create benefits for them and it keeps me up to date in the event i need to do so.

a large scale development firm dealing with fortune 500 companies i would expect to take a wider audience into consideration. someone like hewlett packard i would expect to want to reach the soccer mom on IE, the web developer on FF or opera, the graphic designer maybe on a mac with safari or IE, the bank rep on the subway going to meeting to downsize the company again and anybody else that could use a printer, monitor, mouse, keyboard.... anything hewlett packard makes. In their case, i would want to make a very felxible, code driven package that can be optimized for as many technologies as possible. i think this is why a lot of fortune 500 companies have a very simplistic look visually, because the development of the project was very sever that it wouldn't be practical any other way. then again, i may have totally mist something and this could all just be a coincidence.

but the impact standards plays in the different situations are indeed different. it's enirely possible the guy on the subway has a friend looking to open a small computer repair/custom shop and needa a web presense done. maybe the guy is going to be small time partner in it and is looking for somoene to create it. he could stumlbe upon my site on the subway. if it doesn't work on his device, i won't be horribly upset, because the guy on the subway isn't my audience - the other guy starting the store is - and if i hear about it, i'll go down and speka with them myself. if they're not located somewhere where i can physically meet with them, they're not a part of my target demograph and i don't expect their business to begin with, so i haven't lost much yet.

if he's looking for a new printer model to populate the office with (say hewlett packard is the bank's supplier) if he can't find a good model and make his descision, i'm sure he'll be pissed and hewlett packard could be out of a great profit. they have a lot more to lose than i do by not reaching a very diverse market than i do.

them following a very strict standrd set for both web development AND front end design is much harsher then any rules i would follow. so they have a lot more to lose if they don't follow a good set of standards.w3 standards have their uses, and depending on the situation, they can have a big impact (like the hp idea) or they can be completely meaningless (like a blog - it could just be a place to bitch about how you life ins't fair =( if nobody else can read it, it might not matter at all) and then there's the inbetween where i like to put myself where computer performance (or hand held) matters but the other doesn't.

now, i've brought up some points about the impact standards have - i didn't research hewleet packard, and i really don't know how hand helds interpret the web vs computers, so if i'm wrong, go a head and correct me - but the standards themselve are not as useful as some might think. like anything else, they can be abused, and to say something is "w3 standards complient" can mean two very different things.

i've made a portfolio that was 90% code driven - it had 3 images in the images folder that were about =>20kb in total, and it still looked fairly interesting visually. it was xhtml strict, and it was coded as anal as i could get it and still keep all the elements. if that wasn't standard complient nothing was. people could go validate it and see if i was right. but that doesn't mean much. validation is supposed to determine whether you followed the standards or not (to a degree, it doesn't yell at you for using html instead of xhtml). if you have an xhtml document and it validates it's supposed to be considered standards complient, but it is really? the validator doesn't know what the page does. instead of css classes and ids, i could style me entire page through the 'style' attribute - which would validate if i typed everything correctly, but i don't think that really follows 'standards'. instead of styling the html and body elements, i coudl make up a bunch of new divs that need to be rendered on top of the default elements and it could validate, but i wouldn't call it standards.

the w3 outlines standards to a point. after that, it's up to the individual to idenfity and set standards which will vary from person to person, which is why i disagree with people saying "follow w3 standards!' like an angry mother. all that really means is use xhtml and css. last time i checked, w3 standards didn't include using anal semantic markup. i do it because it makes sense to me, so i never bothered to check whether it's one of the reccomendations by the w3, because i could care less, i'm doing it either way, so feel free to shed some light on that issue. but, sometimes it's impossible to detemine when something is 'something' and not 'something else'. when you have a list for a menu, and sub categories underneath the parent item, when do the sub categories become an embedded <ul> as opposed to just more <li>'s? they're all list items. or headings; some people consider the website header to be the main heading because it displayes the website title. i personally don't, because i don't consider layout to have headings, but i understand the reasoning behind doing it. how do you determine which one of us is right? are we both? whether i put my image in an <h1> tag, or a <div> are we both right? can one of us be wrong? after determine what you're going to write (and html page for example) and what it will be written in (xhtml hevily controlled by css | tableless) how do tou determine standards? i think my semantic markup, using text formatting elemens on the body (like <h1>, <hr>, <blockquotes>, <ul> and <span>) and using divs (or <ul> for menus) to control the visual layout is considered standards comlient; my code is very clean, it's organized and i optimize it all that i can. i'm not making my header image an background, so whether i go <div><img src="" alt="" /></div> or wrap it in <h1></h1> won't make a difference. am i wrong though? once you break the broad definition, the issue because too specific to really determine a right and wrong way. the standard way might be to use semantic mark up, but to me, unless it's a list of images, only the <div> applies to image layout, but to someone else, using <h1> for headers and <h2> for image titles might be the only way to be semantic (in their mind). how do you determine which way is right? if they're both right, then i can abuse putting my header inside 9 divs (but that's not standards, standards want a little cltter as possible).

personally, i think if you can come up with a reasonable justification for why you do what you do, then it's fine and shouldn't be discussed.