Div Vs Table
Div Tags vs Tables
Since I started designing websites in 1996 I have knew nothing other than for any of my web page layouts. But now 11 years on it seems im having to learn it all again. Theres no other job I can think of that has you learning something new every day, and I do mean everyday guaranteed.
The world of web design and website programming is changing vastly, it seems every time I turn the computer on i have at least 5 or 6 different emails about how Google is changing or how XHTML and web 2.0 is the way forward, every day theres something new. Thats why i like my job as a web designer.
The tag it seems is almost obsolete and that goes for it’s sub tags such as or , these tags make pages bloated and full of information that is useless to the search engines, and lets face it, if your site doesn’t rank high in search engines it needn’t exist at all on the Internet. It seem much better to use a tag such as and assign a class to it such as , this way your page is more structured, easier to index and less bloated, you would certainly shave a few kb off the size of your main page thus getting quicker loading times and better results in the likes of Google or Yahoo.
But what about the information that contained? The sizes, borders, fonts and margins? Well that’s where a Cascading Stylesheet is effective. Remember the tag above?, well the class can be defined in your style sheet, an external file that is solely for the use of layout. Web 2.0 uses stylesheet like such, which enables you create fluid like pages, images and text can flow together and be cross browser compatible.
To keep up with standards it is now common to create all pages compliant with XHTML Strict 1.1 which uses and CSS, and it is always best practice to make a site comply to www.w3c.org standards. It is also thought that your website being compliant could help with search engine rankings, true?, well I’m not sure but it certainly wouldn’t harm to make your pages compliant with todays standards.
Is Div better than Table? Well i do actually believe the div tag is better but i think it’s a matter of personal preference more than anything else. The div tag to me seems a lot cleaner, more structured and certainly more modern.
Written by Lee Grears, a freelance website designer and SEO expert. Lee can be contacted from his site at http://webvolorem.com Cumbria website designer
Article Source
