subject: Rise Of Css From Table Web Designs [print this page] What is CSS? CSS, or Cascading Style Sheets, is a styling language used in the construction of websites. The advantage of using a style sheet language is that it allows developers to separate the content of the website from its design, or separation of the document content and document presentation.
But did you know that before CSS became a popular trend among web professionals, there was first a popular method which used HTML codes to manipulate the design of a website? This is with the use of Table HTML Tag.
Before the Style Sheet Language Era
The Internet was first used as a way to share scientific documents and research papers online. However, according to much web design Manila experts, as the Internet expanded from the academic and research world into the mainstream in the mid-1990s, and became more media oriented, graphic designers sought ways to control the visual appearance of the Web pages presented to end users.
This was the time in which style sheet languages were introduced, which enables web developers to control and manipulate the design of their website. It was also in this time when CSS was introduced.
However, due to the limitation at the time of CSS support in major browsers, new web designers' lack of familiarity with CSS, as well as the lack of knowledge of its benefits, a new method was introduced which is much easier compared to the use of style sheet languages such as CSS. This is when Table Web Designs were introduced.
Disadvantages of Table Web Designs
However, though less complicated compared to the use of styling languages, particularly when WYSIWYG editors that supported this was introduced, the use of Table Web Design caused a number of problems. Many Web pages have been designed with tables nested within tables, resulting in large HTML documents which use more bandwidth than documents with simpler formatting.
Since then, web professionals sought for ways on how to manipulate the design of their websites without the use of Table HTML Tags, or a Tableless Web Design. This is when style sheet languages such as CSS were re-introduced in the market.
Advantages of using Tableless Web Designs
Because of the separation of the document content from the document presentation, websites were able to use lesser bandwidth. In addition to that, websites had become even more accessible, which is unlike that of using Table HTML Tags.
However, according to web developer Philippines experts, what made CSS and other styling languages even more popular is that it made it easier for web developers to maintain their website. If a change is to be done, it can be easily achieved by only accessing its content or its presentation which can be easily achieved separately.