Re: CSS and Netscape

----- Original Message -----
From: "ed nixon" <ed.nixon@lynnparkplace.org>
To: "Thor Larholm" <public-evangelist-w3@jscript.dk>
Cc: <Mike.Steckel@SEMATECH.Org>; <public-evangelist@w3.org>;
<list@webdesign-L.com>
Sent: Friday, August 30, 2002 1:43 PM
Subject: Re: CSS and Netscape


[Treating NN4 as a text-browser]
> If this approach is a non-starter for your people, then I'd say you have
> a very difficult and, more importantly, very expensive project on your
> hands because virtually everything will have to be done twice, the Bv4
> (BeforeVersion4) and the Av6 (Version 6 and beyond.)

This argument that developing websites that work in Netscape 4 results in
double development time is a straw-man argument. It automatically assumes
that there is duplication involved in the entire workstream of the website
creation process.

We all know how important it is to separate content from presentation, and
Netscape 4 friendliness is no exception. The only duplicate work items are
the initial creation of templates, and the testing of those templates. The
content should always be separate from the presentation, so this would be a
non-duplicated process.

On delivery, either deliver a dynamic website that delivers full compliant
markup to all user agents except those identifying themselves as Netscape 4,
or run it through an html preprocessor and generate two websites.

The duplication is only imaginary, thus the "very expensive project"
argument equally illusory.

Received on Monday, 2 September 2002 06:03:42 UTC