Example

Writing CSS is very much like having sex. Not everyone does it the same way and there is no particular “right” way to do it. I guess for me the similarities actually end there, seeing as writing CSS is something I do every day whereas having sex is…anyway I digress. The W3C have set the standards but beyond this, writing CSS is down to an individual’s preferences. Here are 5 little tips and ideas I’ve adopted in the last 6 months that you can use to make your CSS more streamlined, maintainable and easy to read. Written by Jon Disclaimer: The CSS example files are exactly that. They are not meant to be fully functional CSS documents. Class names in the CSS files are named merely so that you may visualise the document in your head (because there is no accompanying html), not because I condone the naming convention in them.

1) Make a table of contents At the top of your CSS document, write out a table of contents. For example, you could outline the different areas that your CSS document is styling (header, main, footer etc). Then, use a large, obvious section break to separate the areas. Not only does this make your CSS look neater, but when it comes to making quick adjustments to certain areas of your website at a later date, finding the corresponding area in your CSS will be much easier. View Example File 1

3) Isolate single properties that you are likely to reuse a lot If you find yourself using a single property a lot, isolate it to save yourself repeating it over and over again and also enabling you to change the display of all parts of the site that use it. View Example File 3

When it comes to understanding the world of standards based design, you have to think medieval. Creating a web site in CSS is like building a manor. You are a lord, setting aside land for specific purposes, hoping the user rotates their content appropriately. Most of you will build villages attracting only a few peasants to comment on various decrees, some of you will build castles and a very small number will build what I can only describe as cathedrals—structures that warrant pilgrimages from thousands across the globe.

You've heard the buzz about the seperation of style from content, but you are stuck in the world of nested tables and deprecated markup. If so, you have come to the right place! Using CSS to style your (X)HTML files, will benefit you and your visitors in many ways.

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In November 2005 I presented on pro.html.it a three-part article on creating CSS layouts using techniques like negative margins, any order columns and in some case opposite floats. The main goal of the article was getting the maximum number of layouts based on the same markup, each with valid CSS and HTML, without hacks nor workaround and a good cross-browser compatibility. The result is a set of 40 layouts that we've thought worth sharing: on each of them you'll find also a download link (if you want, you can download the entire collection, 40 HTML pages in a single zip file). Further details can be found below the gallery.

var rate87=new rateit(87, "26", "090%") rate87.displaytext("26") 4.5 CSS Gradient Shadow var rate74=new rateit(74, "72", "078%") rate74.displaytext("72") 3.9 CSS Thick Tabs var rate47=new rateit(47, "71", "080%") rate47.displaytext("71") 4 SuckerTree Vertical Menu (v1.1) var rate52=new rateit(52, "60", "074%") rate52.displaytext("60") 3.7 Overlapping horizontal tabs var rate51=new rateit(51, "128", "080%") rate51.displaytext("128") 4 Animated link underlines var rate50=new rateit(50, "78", "075%") rate50.displaytext("78") 3.8 SuckerTree Horizontal Menu <!-- <rdf:RDF xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#" xm