Formatting with CSS Styles

After last week's lecture it has been drummed into me that HTML is a structural language, and CSS is a style language. You can use CSS to specify the font, size, colour and alignment of text on the page. All of a sudden our web pages can be "spruced up".

CSS style elements can be embedded in the HTML file, or can be written in an external file. I think I prefer the latter, as it will keep my HTML code cleaner, and be easy to store all the style rules in one place.

I'm also interested in how you can set up alternate style sheets for different media (eg. screen, print, mobile). I will try to incorporate this into my design.

I have revised my student home page on the UTS server, and will be uploading the weekly practical exercises here. I figure that maintaining my own, albeit very basic, website will be a great way to practice my new skills, and for me to keep everything in one place (as I am working on my PC at home, and also using a USB stick at uni). Click here to check it out.

In light of the transition from XHTML to HTML5, I would like to share the following blogs that I have been reading this week:

HTML5 and the future of the Web
Tim Wright gives an overview of HTML5, and talks about some of the new features. Wright's first point is about the DOCTYPE descriptor, which is html and not html5 (2009). Apparantly this is because html5 would open Quirks Mode in IE6. I'm not completely sure what Quirks Mode is, but it seems to have something to do with backwards compatibility in the browser and you therefore lose some functionality. Anyway, I digress.

Wright mentions some of the new structural elements (such as header, nav, section), and also talks about the benefits of moving to HTML5. It is duly noted that there will be a transition period for programmers (hence, HTLM5 has some "built-in slack" to make it easier) and also the web (apparantly Safari is currently the best testing platform as it supports most of the new elements and application programming interfaces, otherwise known as API's). Read the article to find out more...

CSS code structure for HTML 5: some useful guidelines
I'm starting to feel familiar with the layout of HTML code, and feel that I need some help in knowing where to put things in my CSS file. Therefore, I recommend this post written by Antonio Lupetti, giving a light overview on "how to implement a well organised CSS code structure in view of introduction of HTML5" (2009).


References:
Lupetti, A. (2009), CSS code structure for HTML5: some useful guidelines, Woork blog, viewed 28 August 2009, http://woork.blogspot.com/2009/08/css-code-structure-for-html-5-some.html

Wright, T. (2009), HTML5 and the Future of the Web, Smashing Magazine, viewed 28 August 2009, http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/07/16/html5-and-the-future-of-the-web/