fbords — Tue, 29 Jul 2003 17:15:01 +0000

I think the site looks very clean and crisp. I can't really complain as far as the design goes.

Usability looks good. I seemed to be able to find everything pretty easily.

My only suggestion, as mentioned above, is that its not optimized for search engines. My suggestion, since I'm sure you want to keep the cleanliness of the homepage, is to add some more copy to other pages, or add some type of other content page. As of right now, you aren;t really helping yourself get ranked. since you use plain text links on your pages, they should all crawl well, but I would add some more SEO text to your about page. However, if you do that, keep in mind, your about page will probably be the one that gets indexed, not your homepage.

Overall....great job!

mmi — Mon, 28 Jul 2003 21:39:15 +0000

I agree code should be well-written and validate as much as is reasonable. I expect the membership in this forum would go along with that.

I'd argue that checking cross-browser and cross-platform displays for problems that do not involve non-standard code is even more important.

I'm only an amateur coder, but I'd say the code for this site is well-written.

I think the disclaimers I mentioned are included to avoid any misunderstandings and hard feelings with clients. In mmy experience, when significant errors are made, a complete or partial refund is still commonplace if reported within a week or so. I suppose the avoidance of financial liability is part of the consideration.

I'd LOVE to see web designers held responsible for textual errors. Even the site owners themselves don't seem to care though.

Pop — Mon, 28 Jul 2003 18:01:29 +0000

Quote: Originally posted by mmi
Hey
On the copy in advertising, many publishers/printers include a notice disclaiming any responsibility for errors in the text.

Ummm, I wonder why. Could it be there to possibly avoid a lawsuit? Maybe Webmasters should consider using something like that too.

Pop — Mon, 28 Jul 2003 17:30:09 +0000

I am not a practicing paralegal. However, I do have proof of certification. No, I've never heard of anyone suing a Webmaster for writing bad source code, but that doesn't mean it hasn't happened or could happen. I'm beginning to wish I had not made mention of it.

My primary objective is to somehow get Webmasters to write better code. Why validate? http://valet.htmlhelp.com/page/why.html

mmi — Mon, 28 Jul 2003 16:42:31 +0000

Hey

Since those forward slashes preceded by a space are part of the W3C's XHTML standard, I don't see a problem with the warnings being generated.

http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/#guidelines

I'm wondering if doing something with the DOCTYPE could avoid them, but I looked around and didn't find anything.

I don't see how a lawsuit over validation could be successful unless it were an explicit part of a contract. In your work as a paralegal, Pop, have you ever heard of anyone bringing such an action?

On the copy in advertising, many publishers/printers include a notice disclaiming any responsibility for errors in the text.

fifeclub — Mon, 28 Jul 2003 15:33:41 +0000

I'm not offended, I realize that we're just having a discussion. Talk is good.

I never used that service before but it appears that those are warnings, not actual errors. http://htmlhelp.com/cgi-bin/validate.cgi?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hampton-homes.net You had the optional "show warnings" check marked.

However warnings are still something I should look into. They never came up when I validated the same page at w3c (just the stat tracker) http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=www.hampton-homes.net . I'm sure I do have additonal errors on other pages but as I understand, you're supposed to have a trailing slash after "single" tags like and , which is what kept coming up on your original query. Now I'm definitely not an expert, nor even a professional so I'd love to get other opinions on this from others. Is my code actually xhtml? If so then I will update my doc type to reflect the correct style.

P.S. Moderator, if you feel that it would be best to break off the second half of this thread and move it to a more appropriate forum then that's okay with me.

Pop — Mon, 28 Jul 2003 15:02:58 +0000

Fifeclub, I'm not here to offend or argue. I'm sorry if I offended you.

I'll let the validation speak for itself. http://htmlhelp.com/cgi-bin/validate.cgi?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hampton-homes.net%2F&warnings=yes&spider=yes

Not one of the 20 pages validated without errors or warnings when validated to the HTML 4.01 transitional mode, as called for in the DTD of each page validated.

As a paralegal, I stand by my statement about the legal expectations of a site owner. If you purchased advertising space in a magazine or other publication, wouldn't you expect the copy to be correct? I would. If the publisher refused a refund I think I would have grounds for a lawsuit, if I decided to file one.

Since the source code has a direct and controlling effect on how a site is rendered by the users browser of choice, I think validation to a minimum standard is very important. That's my personal opinion.

Since HTML 4.01 transitionl is achievable, I stand by my statement. I think every site owner has a legal right to expect nothing less, unless prior arrangements were agreed to.

fifeclub — Mon, 28 Jul 2003 13:30:53 +0000

:eek: To my knowledge, nearly all of the code validates except for two things. One is the stat tracker script that shows up on every page and the other is a Yahoo Map link on one page. Neither of these are codes that I can alter nor do they affect the actual page display at all. (There are a handful of little things I have to fix here and there like adding alt="" to a few images.)

Otherwise, I respect everybody's opinion here at Webmaster Forums, but I'd be careful before claiming that site owners have a legal right to expect that the code on their site is 100% w3c valid. I agree that they should expect a well created site that functions competantly, and that we should strive for strict validation, but I'd hate to confuse Webmaster-Forums visitors to say that it is actually a legal right. Theorhetically, if I charged only $10 for this entire website and the only problem is that visitors don't see alt tags on some images, that site owner should be jumping for joy that they got the deal of the century.

Peace.

Pop — Mon, 28 Jul 2003 12:20:05 +0000

None of the source validates.

In my humble opinion if the source code I write fails to meet at least minimum approved standards, the page is not finished. Site owners have a legal right to expect professional Webmasters to meet at least minimum HTML approved standards.

Busy — Wed, 16 Jul 2003 23:21:36 +0000

fifeclub it could be my browser (mozilla 1.4) I updated it a week or so ago and been having some problems with it messing my puter up after a while.
I had another look and it wasn't there but this time on return to the index page (from another) it showed up (very nice pic) so it could be my browser and connection speed (dial up)
If no one else mentions it don't worry about it