Posts Tagged ‘css style sheets’
June 17th, 2009 | 
Author: Cascading Style Sheets are used to make the Web page attractive in the eyes of the visitors. Moreover, CSS style sheets have made Web pages much easier to deal with during web designing. Cascading Style sheets also allow you to make changes in a single location instead of editing the entire website. So, there is no need for you to visit each of the Web pages in your website and edit them.
CSS saves a lot of your valuable time and energy. Cascading Style Sheets, as the name suggests, determine a specific style for your Web pages based on a priority list commonly referred to as a “cascade”. Besides this, it also permits you to manage the various elements in the Web pages of your web site. A single CSS style sheet can manage the font, formatting, text size, positioning, style and color of an entire Website. Although Cascading sheets can modify the presentation and outlook of your website, however, it is completely different from website designing.
CSS can help a webmaster in many ways. A website with a CSS-based layout is highly appreciated by the online visitors as it generates the “wow” feeling among them. Even the Internet search engines like Yahoo, Google and MSN prefer CSS-based websites when it comes to assigning ranks to them on the search engine index. The significance of CSS for the webmasters has been discussed below: -
Separation of the design from the website content: -
You can gain lot of control over the design and appearance of your website with the help of Cascading Style Sheets as it allows you to link your style sheets to your website text and documents. So, in case you feel like editing a segment of your Web page, all you need to do is to modify only the external CSS style sheet for editing your entire website. This process is not only flexible but also time-saving. However, if you opt for normal HTML tables for overall layout, you shall be deprived of this flexibility. Cascading Style Sheets bear font, text, style information, colors and many other attributes of a website.
Increase the download speed of your website: –
As the Cascading Style sheets are very light in weight and uses less bandwidth, so it increases the downloading speed of your website. The primary reason for this is increase in speed is because table layouts are not necessary in case of CSS-based Style sheets for the positioning of the items. As text documents get loaded very fast so the Web pages will appear within a flash of seconds and this will surely make the online visitors happy when they are browsing through your Website. It has been estimated that a website loads about seven times faster if it uses CSS-based style sheets.
Helps you to attain a higher rank in the search engine lists: –
With the help of CSS, you can easily change the position of your website elements. You can move the position of your menu button from left to the right or to any other place you want. The real purpose behind positioning of the elements is to ensure that the search engine spider crawls through the main content of your website. You must position your menu button and logo text at the bottom of your HTML document for a better result.
Compatibility of CSS with modern browsers: –
As there are many browsers nowadays apart from Internet Explorer, so it becomes difficult for the webmasters to test their websites in each and every browser on the Internet. Sticking to the standard CSS-based layout is the best solution for you in this case.
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Article Source: What is the significance of CSS.
I am an old time web designer that has been creating websites before CSS Style sheets and DIV tags became popular. Until recently, I resisted the urge to have all my fonts and site formatting controlled by an external CSS Style sheet or CSS File.
One of my clients insisted that I do everything possible to make his site as SEO compatible. After my research was completed I learned that CSS could be a valuable tool for my own website.
Here is what I have learned.
Use your CSS File to control all of your website formatting.
Font styles, colours and sizes.
Table definitions.
Background colours & photos.
Put all the photos that you can into the CSS Style Sheet because to the search engines, text content is what matters and not photos. Google will sometimes penalize you if you have too many photos, or photos that are too large.
Use meaningful names for your CSS style classes and other definitions. When you have a whole site completed and you look back at your site, style89 won’t mean anything to you.
Put all of your website content (text) into your website pages without formatting. All formatting should be in an external stylesheet. Your html web page should contain your text content only if possible.
Tables – never use tables for formatting. Never use imbedded tables. Google will penalize for content located in imbedded tables. Replace tables with DIV’s wherever possible. Keep your JavaScripts as a separate .js file to be included on each page.
Putting my new skills to test, our new design process will be as follows:
Create PhotoShop version of template for client approval.
Create html version of template on Dreamweaver using only the external style sheet feature.
Go through the Dreamweaver version using a simple text editor and take out any extra unnecessary code. Make sure all tags are opened and closed properly.
Put every formatting options possible into my CSS Files using meaningful style names.
Create the rest of the site based on the template approved by the client.
Test your website on Explorer, FireFox, Safari and Opera. I found that even though the browsers are supposed to be 100% compatible, they all act differently and sometimes produce unexpected results.
About the Author
Evan Freedman is an author for The Computer Geek Custom Web Page Design and for CSSZafco.com, distributor of computers and accessories. Please visit the site to view a huge assortment of Computer Technology.
Article Source: My Journey into CSS and DIV Tags
When it comes to your website, extra attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally and serves its purpose. Here is the first of ten important rules of thumb to make sure your website performs well.
Do not use splash pages
Splash pages are the first pages you see when you arrive at a website. They normally have a very beautiful image with words like “welcome” or “click here to enter”. They became popular back in the days when most people were on a dial-up Internet connection, and visitors had a tendency to click away if the site took too long to load. The argument was that if the page loaded quickly, impatient visitors would be more likely to stick around. That may have been so in the past, but things have moved on since then.
Today, with fast connections becoming the norm this argument no longer holds true. Research as shown there are only a finite number of times a prospect is prepared to click links on your website – particularly if it’s a sales website – and that number is getting lower all the time. That extra click from your splash page to your main page, could mean the difference between a prospect clicking on the “buy now” or “go to checkout” link, or getting frustrated and clicking away.
It’s best to give visitors the value of your site up front without the splash page. If you have a long sales letter, try using CSS style sheets to make the page load faster.
In my opinion, you should especially avoid Flash splash pages. Even on a fast connection they can take ages to load. If you must use a Flash intro, give the visitor the option of skipping it.
Shaun Pearce is a video maker and webmaster. You can find out more about running a website at http://www.yourwebsiteacademy.com
Article Source: 10 Golden Rules in Website Design: Rule # 1