in reply to Re^5: Web forum markup language and the Monastery ([[...]])
in thread Web forum markup language and the Monastery

Actually, what CSS generally adds is faster downloads (CSS markup is generally smaller than HTML markup),
That I doubt. Perhaps you save a couple of bytes of downloaded content (not that that really matters - the ads on the pages take far more bytes than anything else), it does require an extra request. Beside the page, an additional request for the CSS pages has to be made - even if the response is just a 204 - Not Modified.

As for Firefox, I recently installed it, noticed that using the middle mouse button no longer opened the link in a new window, didn't find a setting or another easy way to open a link in a new window and ditched Firefox. I know people get all excited about tabs, but windows are under the control of my window manager, while tabs aren't. And since I can do important window operations (delete for instance, or cycling) with a single keystroke without having the move the mouse, using separate windows is much faster than tabs.

  • Comment on Re^6: Web forum markup language and the Monastery ([[...]])

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Re^7: Web forum markup language and the Monastery ([[...]])
by Corion (Patriarch) on Jan 17, 2005 at 10:06 UTC

    RTFM (Read the Firefox manual, keyboard shortcuts, mouse shortcuts):

    1. Next tab - ctrl-tab
    2. Previous tab - ctrl-shift-tab
    3. Close tab - ctrl-w or alternatively ctrl-F4

    Also, if you have a special/"multimedia" keyboard, you can assign the extra keys to do fun stuff in Mozilla, like close tabs, etc.. Another huge advantage of Firefox is the Adblock extension, which allows you to selectively disable graphics from loading.

    Still, while Firefox and CSS is a really nice and convenient idea, I don't think that dropping tables and NS4 support is a good idea for PM, as the browsers of mobile phones etc. don't work well without tables.

    Update: Reworded keyboard shortcuts for closing a tab - it requires a chord of two keys to close a tab, but there are two alternatives.

[reply]
      I'm well aware of those commands, thank you very much.

      That's exactly why I prefer to use my window manager. I can cycle between windows using one keystroke instead of one, and delete a windowing using one keystroke instead of four.

      And no, I don't find having to use both the mouse and the keyboard to open a link in a new window convenient.

[reply]

        Again, RTFM - ctrl-enter opens a link in a new tab, and shift-enter opens it in a new window. You still count that as "two" keystrokes, but Firefox is quite usable without a mouse.

        Also, I reworded my above post - you only need one keyboard combo to close a window or a tab (ctrl-w or ctrl-F4 alternatively).

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Re^7: Web forum markup language and the Monastery ([[...]])
by Tanktalus (Canon) on Jan 17, 2005 at 15:43 UTC

    My pages generally dropped in size from about 50k, to 10k. Maybe that's atypical. But it is definitely something in favour of CSS here. And since the CSS is the same on all pages, downloading it once means you don't need to download it again, even if it is an extra connection - a connection can be faster than 5-10K of repeated text, especially on a 28.8k modem...

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Re^7: Web forum markup language and the Monastery ([[...]])
by hardburn (Abbot) on Jan 17, 2005 at 14:37 UTC

    You start saving significant bytes once you say:

    <h1>Heading</h1>

    [download]

    With some CSS for the heading, compared to:

    <p><font size="+2" color="red">Heading</font></p>

    [download]

    On every single heading. On any modern (HTTP/1.1-compliant) HTTP server and client, the connection will be left open, making cost of the extra request for the cache-check nearly zero.

    "There is no shame in being self-taught, only in not trying to learn in the first place." -- Atrus, Myst: The Book of D'ni.

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      Let's see. Just assume the perlmonks.org is the fastest server in the world, and it replies to requests instantly (as we all notice). I still have a roundtrip time to perlmonks of about 100ms. That's the time that's always lost to do a request. (For the sake of the argument, I leave off the processing time of the proxy I'm using). I also get a throughput of about 75kb/s. That means, in 100ms, you could have added an extra 7.5kb. That would be more than 200 of those headings.

      Note that I'm not suggesting to not use CSS. But using CSS to "save bytes" sounds like premature optimization. If you want to save bytes, turn off the nodelets for AMs. Remove the stupid image in the top right hand corner (approx. 60 CSS headers worth of savings). And most of all, turn off the ads. (Well, not for me, I've taken care of that on a much lower level (aka /etc/hosts)).

[reply]
      I do prefer: 
          <h1><font size = "3" color = "red">Heading</font></h1>

      [download]
      over 
          <p><span class = "big-red">Heading</span></p>

      [download]
      with a style sheet that says "big-red" should be displayed in a big red font.

      I do not think that many web authors who didn't use <h1>, but a <font> instead will if they go to CSS, suddenly will use logical markup. They'll just replace their font elements with span elements.

      If I'd get a penny for every CSS enabled webpage that was hard or impossible to read when CSS is turned off in the browser, I'd be rich.

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        I do not think that many web authors who didn't use <h1>, but a <font> instead will if they go to CSS, suddenly will use logical markup.

        CSS isn't aimed at such people. It's aimed at the people who realize that depracating the font tag was a good idea, but still need an alternative. Idiotic developers are going to stay idiotic, but only education can help them.

        If I'd get a penny for every CSS enabled webpage that was hard or impossible to read when CSS is turned off in the browser, I'd be rich.

        HTML is hard to read in notepad. What's your point? And why are you shutting off CSS in the browser? It's not a computationally-complete nightmare like JavaScript.

        "There is no shame in being self-taught, only in not trying to learn in the first place." -- Atrus, Myst: The Book of D'ni.

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