Week 9 Readings

Articles

CSS Tutorial. (n.d.). w3schools.com. Retrieved from http://www.w3schools.com/css/

             The CSS Tutorial (n.d.) offers interesting details on CSS. One such point is the origins of CSS. According to the Tutorial, when developers added tags such as <font> and color attributes to the HTML 3.2 specification, the process of developing large web sites became longer and more expensive for web developers to complete. As such, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) constructed CSS so that, in HTML 4.0, a user can remove the formatting from HTML documents and store them in a separate CSS file (under Introduction, “Styles Solved a Big Problem”). In effect, then, the CSS was developed as a solution to an earlier problem – revealing how software and digital technologies evolved through trial and mishap.

            Another interesting detail was how a person could insert CSS into their work. The Tutorial (n.d.) lists three ways to do so: 1) an external style sheet, which changes the appearance of the Web site by changing one file (under CSS How To…, “External Style Sheet”); 2) an internal style sheet, used for single documents which have a unique style (ibid., “Internal Style Sheet”); and 3) inline styles, which mixes content with presentation (ibid., “Inline Styles). Such categories imply organization to the CSS’s development as well as the different manners in which CSS affects visual elements. A user can use CSS for more focused projects; no one has to stick to manipulating the presentation of a whole website when she or he really needs to differentiate individual pages from each other, for example.

 

CSS Tutorial: Starting with HTML + CSS. (n.d.) W3C. Retrieved from http://www.w3.org/Style/Examples/011/firstcss

             The “CSS Tutorial: Starting with HTML + CSS” (n.d.) covers some details that I’m unfamiliar with. For example, in the second “warning” for Step 1, it notes how the “ul” elements represent a list with one hyperlink per item, serving as the “site navigation menu,” while the “hl” and “p” elements “form the unique content of this page” (CSS Tutorial, n.d., under Step 1: The HTML). I found such “warnings” to be fascinating; they elaborate and build on the basic information of the Tutorial and introduce new ideas of using HTML. In the case of the example I gave, I am now curious at what “unique content” the “ul” and “p” elements produce and want to try that out.

            I particularly liked the Tutorial’s approach to colors. Step 2 covers the basics, teaching how to add color using the <style> elements – specifically <style type=“text/css”> and elaborating with how to set the colors for the text and background of the body (CSS Tutorial, n.d., under Step 2: Adding Some Colors). I love adding variation to my work when I can, experimenting with colors, type fonts, and the like, so I will need to investigate this when working with HTML. Similarly, the analysis on link colors under Step 5 was most interesting. I am familiar with the standard for having links to pages I haven’t visited remain blue while those which I have clicked becomes purple (ibid., under Step 5: Styling Links). However, I am now curious of why this is the standard. Having a consistent color-coordination is beneficial for the Web overall, allowing fewer confusions for newcomers without varying the colors. But why blue and purple? Why not some other colors, like green and red? Were the colors chosen randomly, or was thought put into it or does it correspond to a cultural norm? I really want to experiment with this, see if anyone would actually react if I changed the colors.

 

Lie, H.W. and B. Bos. (1999). Chapter 2 in Cascading Style Sheets, Designing for the Web. Boston: Addison-Wesley.

             After reading the Chapter, I found that H.W. Lie and B. Bos (1999) provided interest notes using organic metaphors. For example, their “anatomy” of rules and declarations. Each are made up of two parts – the rule consisting of the selector [the link between HTML documents and the style] and declaration [determines the effect of the rule] (Lie and Bos, 1999, under “Rules and Style Sheets,” “Anatomy of a rule”) and the declaration made up of properties [the quality] and value [specifies the type of quality] (ibid., “Anatomy of a declaration”). Each are interlinked, the declaration and all of its components contributing to the overall form of the rule. One part cannot exist with the other, or otherwise the rule as a whole fails. This is almost true for the human body; although the body can continue living without both kidneys, for example, overall it needs most of its organs intact to function fully as a living being. Viewing the anatomy of the rule like this emphasizes both its limitations and complexities in CSS.

            Another organic-like feature involves formatting documents in CSS as tree-structures. Lie and Bos suggest this course to emphasize the “inheritance” factor of the elements; “through inheritance, CSS property values set on one element will be transferred down the tree to its descendants” (Lies and Bos, 1999, under “Tree Structures and Inheritance”) but sometimes elements override others in the “children” (ibid., under “Overriding Inheritance”) or cannot be inherited (ibid., under “Properties that don’t inherit”). As such, the organic-metaphor allows users to understand CSS better. Most American public high schools teach the basics on genes and genealogy in biology courses, so theoretically a good number of people understand the basic idea of the transference of genes, and if not, most people are familiar with how family trees work. Users would be familiar with the logistics; thus, applied to the CSS, they can make the leap between metaphor and reality and be able to understand how CSS works.
            By emphasizing the organic metaphors, Lie and Bos almost imply that CCS documents are almost alive. They have “organs” which determine whether they live fully or not or how well they accomplish basic functions. They have elements that can be passed on to others “genetically.” This is an interesting method for them to use. They could be doing it accidently, for poetic reasons, to make their concepts more relatable, or to make a point on its complexity.