programming

1. Deliver to multiple user agents. The same piece of marked-up content is readily deliverable in a wide variety of user agents, the collective name for devices that can read XHTML, such as browsers, handhelds like smartphones, cell phones with browsers, and screen readers that read text for the sight impaired. You simply create a different style sheet for each device type, or let the XHTML display as is.

2. Improve performance. Pages are much lighter (smaller in fi le size) and therefore download faster, because your content only needs minimal structural markup. We can now replace all of the presentational markup we used to load into the tags in every page of a site with a single style sheet. As you will see, a single style sheet can defi ne the presentation of an entire site, and the user’s browser only needs to download it once.

3. Serve all browsers. With a little effort, you can have your pages degrade nicely in older browsers, so all users get the best experience possible with their available technology.

4. Separate content and presentation. You can modify, or entirely change, either the content or the presentation (read: design) of your site without affecting the other.

5. Build fl uid pages. It’s easier to code for varying quantities of dynamic content within your pages. For example, it’s much easier to create pages that can accommodate varying numbers of items in a given listing or menu of your e-commerce store.

6. Confi rm your code is correct. Validation services for XHTML and CSS can be used during development to report instantly on errors in your coding. This provides faster debugging, and the assurance that a page is truly completed when it both displays correctly on-screen and passes validation.

7. Streamline production. Production is more effi cient. It’s too easy for you (the designer) to be sidetracked into content management, because you are the only person who knows where the content goes in the mass of presentational markup. You end up being the one to add it—a tedious job and probably not what you were hired to do. By adopting standards-based practices, you can provide simple markup rules to the content team and work in parallel on the presentational aspects, knowing their content and your design will marry seamlessly down the line.

8. Distribute content more easily. Distributing your content for third-party use is much easier because the content is separate from any specifi c presentation rules, and in many cases, simply not feasible otherwise.

9. Make it accessible. It’s easier to make your site accessible and meet legal requirements, such as those with disabilities.

10. Do less work. You write less code, and it’s a whole lot quicker and easier to get the results you want and modify your work over time.