[Slice]

After doing so much work in the web development platform, you begin to realize which practices are good, bad and down right blasphemy.

This thread is made for those who are newish to the web development scene, to have a quick read over before you decide to do something awful.

The Good:

• Be creative
  
• Site Accessibility for the impaired
  
• Ease of access
  
• Organized content

The Bad:

• Automatic sound .. MAKE IT OPTIONAL
  
• Too many ads
  
• Marquee tags
  
• Flashing GIFs
  
• Animated ads
  
• Copyright content (with no permission)

The Ugly:

• Tables controlling website layout
  
• Popups asking users to not navigate away from your site because they will be missing out on an amazing deal
  
• Comic Sans

Reply with all your goods, bads and uglys

This post has been edited by Dormilich: 21 March 2012 - 11:38 PM

[e_i_pi]

In regards to Site Accessibility for the impaired, I find that most of the stalwart supporters of this table about not using tables, and properly using alt tags. While I think this is noble, I believe there is a massive oversight here. Visually impaired people aren't just those who have trouble seeing, it includes the colour blind. It might srprise you to know that roughly 10% of the population is colour blind to some extent. That's a whopping amount, and probably a big candidate for attention that often gets overlooked.

Anyhow, on with the topic, here's my additions to the list:
The good

• Servers that are capable of taking the load thrown at them
  
• Sites that get styling upgrades regularly
  
• Good layout

The bad

• Using inline CSS where you don't need to
  
• Styling for a specific browser
  
• Styling for IE
  
• Forms that don't check validation before sending
  
• Every social networking button under the sun being on a page. I'm talking about Facebook, Twitter, Google+, MySpace, FaceSpace, SpaceBook, Twittle#, and every other damned social networking spam bucket on the net.

The ugly

• Those stupid ads that pop up over the video you're trying to watch
  
• Automatic popups of ads in other windows
  
• Microsoft's patented JS alerts errors/exceptions that fill up the entire screen.
  
• JS alerts that hide behind the main window
  
• Just anything to do with popups really

This post has been edited by e_i_pi: 21 March 2012 - 07:52 PM

[Dormilich]

on a quick note I would add: using inline Javascript (The bad)

[CTphpnwb]

My addition under bad and ugly:
Mixing languages like PHP, HTML, Javascript, and CSS in the same file. There's a reason we have .php, .html, .css, and .js files: it's the KISS principle. Putting those languages together violates that principle.

This post has been edited by CTphpnwb: 22 March 2012 - 06:30 AM

[Sergio Tapia]

Please, please PLEASE don't use tables for layout.

I don't care what your reasons are; unless you have a very specific need for it, just don't do it.

The power CSS gives you is just astounding and proof of that is when you need a change you just tweak a couple of CSS rules.

This isn't some hypothetical, textbook situation. This actually happens, and it happened to me yesterday at a client site. It happens and when you do learn how to use it properly your workload is made very easy for you in the future.

Invest time now, save time later.

[innuendoreplay]

The Good:
Good color scheme and readable font.

The Bad:
Non-images included.

The Ugly:
A lot of text.

This post has been edited by innuendoreplay: 22 March 2012 - 10:39 AM

[Curtis Rutland]

Quote

Sites that get styling upgrades regularly

Depending on what you mean by "regularly", I'd put this in the bad category. Updating your style all the time pisses users off, because you're breaking what they're used to. I mean, minor style tweaks are fine, and even a large update that's done gradually over time is fine, but doing design overhauls every couple of months is not going to endear you to anyone except your designer (who'll be loving the money he gets from billable hours).

[e_i_pi]

Curtis Rutland, on 23 March 2012 - 08:05 AM, said:

Quote

Sites that get styling upgrades regularly

Depending on what you mean by "regularly", I'd put this in the bad category. Updating your style all the time pisses users off, because you're breaking what they're used to. I mean, minor style tweaks are fine, and even a large update that's done gradually over time is fine, but doing design overhauls every couple of months is not going to endear you to anyone except your designer (who'll be loving the money he gets from billable hours).

Sure, and Facebook is a good example of this being bad. I guess I'm talking more about the natural evolution of a site by a site owner that invests a genuine interest. I think you'll agree that most of the time, the first draft of a site is just that - a draft. You often don't realise a bad styling/layout until there are hundreds or more outside users utilising the site, and coming back with feedback about how it's hard to find something on the site. That's more what I'm getting at here. I suppose it would be better phrased "Site owners that let a site stagnate".

[Martyr2]

I have an ugly....

Minimizing and obfuscating your javascript code. I know it is done for performance and such, but it is a friggin nightmare for debugging and doesn't allow your visitor to help you out by reporting a bug that may be preventing them from using your page to its full potential.

I hate running across a page that has an error on it, so I dive into its javascript to be helpful and running right into a block of crap that is void of spaces and variables named a, b, c and d. Not to mention the error ends up reporting something like "'a' object expected" or something ultra cryptic because of the variable names.

[The Architect 2.0]

how many users are actually knowledgable enough to help out with HTML/CSS. nevermind javascript?

[e_i_pi]

A better question is how valuable are users that help out with HTML/CSS/Javascript?

[Curtis Rutland]

Martyr2, on 22 March 2012 - 09:48 PM, said:

I have an ugly....

Minimizing and obfuscating your javascript code. I know it is done for performance and such, but it is a friggin nightmare for debugging and doesn't allow your visitor to help you out by reporting a bug that may be preventing them from using your page to its full potential.

I hate running across a page that has an error on it, so I dive into its javascript to be helpful and running right into a block of crap that is void of spaces and variables named a, b, c and d. Not to mention the error ends up reporting something like "'a' object expected" or something ultra cryptic because of the variable names.

Well, for a lot of websites, it's almost crucial they serve their JS/CSS that way. The ones serving millions of requests a day save a lot of bandwidth by stripping whitespace and minifying their code. But yeah, the average person's website out there doesn't need minified JS.

[Shane Hudson]

The Architect 2.0, on 23 March 2012 - 04:38 AM, said:

how many users are actually knowledgable enough to help out with HTML/CSS. nevermind javascript?

A lot of us are very knowledgable about them, however believe me... when everybody asks the same question and does not use search it gets sooo fustrating to answer everyone. We are not paid remember.

This post has been edited by Curtis Rutland: 27 March 2012 - 06:47 AM
Reason for edit:: Removed double post.