John,
http://www.blog.sellitbuyit.ca

Perhaps if the ‘table’ tag was named ‘grid’, purists wouldn’t have such a problem with using it.

As a side note, Firefox does seem to implement the CSS tables as described above.

What do I mean? Simple: CSS is either too loose or too strict. HTML tables require too much code if the table is long and you’re not using styles. The best way to manage this is a marriage of the two using IDs and classes.

Simple.

I definitely agree with Slideri812 in that the separation of content and presentation is key to portability, and I look forward to its practical application (I use my PocketPC phone EXTENSIVELY while away from my lappy).

Cheers!

CSS tables would be a boon! Perhaps the basic table structure is a tad more verbose than HTML, but when HTML tables have to repeat designations for every single cell, that’s REAL code-bloat. CSS tables would reference the style sheet for non-default font specs — at most you’d need a class or ID reference for non-conforming cells. I agree that much of the response to this thread has been on the thoughtless side.

CSS isn’t perfect — the non-intuitive “inheritance” and the agonies of positioning make me want to hoot and screech sometimes — but it’s nevertheless the only sane way to design pages that one may wish to edit and revise occasionally. I hold with those who feel that a page should be intelligible and readable when viewed as source code — just one look at a page generated by Microsoft FrontPage should convince anyone of that! ;-D

One difference, Microsoft had Windows as a vehicle to push IE – something that FireFox does not have. And NS4 was so bad that IE was a really needed, but this is not the case with IE6 vs. FireFox.

…

Yes, IE6 has rendering bugs and the FF plug ins are cool, but most people don’t care what browser they use. I think IE (for the next few years at least) will dominate.

Thanxs for the glimps into the future. I agree that the CSS tables look like they could bloat a page quickly. But the up side would be true cross platform compatibility (think wireless handhelds and small displays). Beside, tables are hard (i.e. fixed or static) and CSS is soft (can easily be changed and manipulated) so this concept of CSS tables will likey take 2 to 3 years before it is a tool that we can really use, but wow, what tool.

Note to the doom sayers of CSS and browser compatibility: FIREFOX!

Why do so many people forget there were browser wars in the early and mid 90’s. IE has not always been the top dog and, IE will likely fall to the way side as better products become more widely addopted. Really think about it Firefix is going to beat IE using the same core concept that IE used to beat down NS; make it better and give it away for free. Simple no?

One last note: we usee CSS to control all aspects of tables used for content presentation. It takes some extra work, but the control that we have over tabled sites is mind blowing. Mix in as much as possible and use tables only when needed and you can create some great hi-breed sites with real seperation of content and presentation. But like with all other things, you need to know HOW to use the tool available, it just takes time.

“seems like almost just as much code to use CSS tables as it would regular HTML tables.”

Actually I would go a step further and say HTML table code is cleaner and less verbose. That said, I think the major advantage that CSS tables would bring to the plate is the separation of structure from presentation while still being able to leverage grid layouts.

In essence CSS tables would give us tables without any of the negatives … do keep in mind I don’t buy the less code bloat argument.

Comment about Flash plugin: at least in that case (unlike with the browsers,) the user can easily download a functional version of the plugin – not the case with the browsers.

Thanks.

Further, the course of the “discussion” after the article seems a bit ridiculous, and Stefan is right; the web standards aren’t “standards” because not one browser maker has implemented them 100% correctly, nor have they updated their browsers to complete what wasn’t finished in the initial releases. I personally loathe the FACT that I have to either maintain two separate pages or use a dynamic scripting language to identically display the same code in different browsers… seems stupid to me.

Even the “platform independent” technologies don’t live up to spec… in many, many situations Flash/ActionScript behaves differently for different plugins; it makes no sense WHATSOEVER that the runtime on your computer does not work exactly the same as the player in the browser plugins. And let’s not forget that we have tell JavaScript how to interact with the various document models when it’s not really rocket science to conceive of passing JS what you want and letting the JS engine handle the appropriate modelling (IE vs. NS)… No takers on that one?

Anyway, I appreciate the article Stefan, though I’ll admit that It seems like almost just as much code to use CSS tables as it would regular HTML tables. Thanks for sharing.