Information about CSS Web Sites!

As you know, the internet is constantly changing!  Here is some basic information on why you should have your web site redesigned in CSS – a faster and more search engine friendly programming language!  It is our aim to ensure our clients have the best web sites on the internet that are up to date and optimised for the search engines!

Not long ago, fax machines were the best way to deliver business documents fast.  But now it’s so easy to scan and email documents, the fax machine is quickly going the way of the typewriter.  With email, recipients can choose to read and archive the message online, or print it out themselves on their own desktop printer.  No need for individual telephone lines for the fax machine, taking up desk space, replacing toner, uncurling fax paper and listening to screeching fax machine tones!

Tables-based HTML websites are like the fax machine.  At one time tables were the best way to render information on the Web.  But like curled paper and fading ink, tables left something to be desired.  Designers were constrained by tables that allowed data to be rendered only in tabular form.  The clean, professional and creative layouts today’s best designers create with Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) could never be achieved with tables-based HTML. 

Fast download time

CSS downloads faster than tables because:

• Browsers read through tables twice before displaying their contents, once to work out their structure and once to determine their content
• Tables appear on the screen all in one go - no part of the table will appear until the entire table is downloaded and rendered
• Tables encourage the use of spacer images to aid with positioning
• CSS generally requires less code than cumbersome tables
• All code to do with the layout can be placed in an external CSS document, which will be called up just once and then cached (stored) on the user's computer; table layout, stored in each HTML document, must be loaded up each time a new page downloads

More accessible

The number of users browsing the web through handheld devices is growing massively. In 2008 alone an estimated 58 million PDAs will be sold (source: eTForecast3) and one third of the world's population will own a wireless device (source: ClickZ4).

More search engine-friendly

Search engines can often spider CSS-driven web pages more easily as they usually have simpler, better structured HTML code. The search engine can then make a more educated guess as to what the web page is about, so all other things being equal, your web pages will appear higher in the search rankings with a CSS layout.

We hope you find this information useful and chose to update your website to the new and improved CSS style!

The Team at GCweb.com.au