Results tagged “Web page” from Ye Olde Rad Blog III

"Hey Rad Man!" began an email I received last week. "I'll pay $100 for a link on your Downloads page." Of course, there's no way of knowing if such offers are legit .. until the cash arrives.

 BenjaminI've researched Search Engine Optimization (SEO) enough to know I don't much care for it.

Programming I enjoy, but SEO contains a seemingly endless amount of info to digest, some of which conflicts from site to site.

And the suggested techniques are often time-consuming, with dubious results that demand the patience of a saint before you start to see results. Rather focus my energies on generating original content.

Moreover, some of the techniques used to 'optimize' web pages (for higher search engine rankings) seem manipulative, if not downright dishonest. Many of the SEO sites I've visited have a 'slimy' feel to them » detailing how to trick search engines into ranking your pages higher.

I learned that links from 'ranked' pages will (in turn) yield greater 'importance' to the pages that those links aim at (point to). This is (I assume) what this person had in mind when she contacted me.

The email seemed both professional and specific. (Not slimy.) The girl was clear about what she wanted. And best of all, her proposal could be implemented minutes. (Simple.)

The problem was .. that the page they wanted a link on was created back when I knew squat about web standards (XHTML & CSS). The underlying mark-up (code) was a rat's nest of deprecated tags and coding no-no's.

Downright embarrassing .. from a webmaster's point-of-view. Miracle the page would render at all (.. even in 'quirks' mode).

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Rad Goes Strict (XHTML 1.0)

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I converted the homepage to » XHTML 1.0 Strict (document type declaration) from XHTML 1.0 Transitional (which applies the rules associated with rendering web pages more loosely).

Strict

Only problem I had was the square Google AdSense ad, which I've traditionally wrapped in a <table> tag/element .. which is not the correct way to code it. (Cuz it's not really a table. Rather it's a JavaScript script.)

In Strict, I needed to convert the <table> to a <div> and "float it" left (in CSS) .. otherwise none of the other text would wrap up alongside the ad (like it does now).

All the images in the center section had to be assigned a class and 'floated' right (in CSS), cuz the Strict DTD does not allow you to align="right" .. like I used to do.

Aligning deals with "presentation" (as opposed to structure and content), and the Strict DTD moves everything pertaining to presentation out of XHTML (and into CSS).

I'm actually fairly comfortable with the requirements of the XHTML 1.0 Strict DTD .. enough to begin creating all new pages using the Strict doc-type declaration.

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