How to write style sheets (CSS)
If you wish to use
Cascading Style Sheets on Web pages,
here's a suggestion on how to do it, especially how to
solve problems or preferably avoid them.
The discussion here is limited to
CSS1,
since
CSS2 has been implemented to a small extent only.
It is assumed that you have read some introduction to style sheets,
such as
WDG's
CSS Quick Tutorial or
Dave Raggett's
Adding a touch of style.
- Create your HTML document(s) according to
good authoring principles.
- When you have an idea about a presentational suggestion,
check from
WDG's
reference
CSS Properties whether there is a property
which can be used and how it is to be used.
That way you'll find reliable information about how
it should work, by the specs.
- Check the implementation status for
the features you are going to use, from the
Master Compatibility Chart by
webreview.com
.
Note that being not supported ("N" in the table) is not that serious
but buggy ("B")
implementations are.
- If you decide to use CSS for your purposes, write a style sheet
according the specifications and
associate it with your HTML document.
- Check your HTML
document using
a validator. (Naturally, you used a validator already at step 1.
You need to validate again, since you have added something to your
HTML document in order to associate a style sheet with it.)
- Check your style sheet
using
a CSS checker. It is practically certain that you
make lots of mistakes in your CSS code, and a checker
is therefore indispensable.
- Having done that, and having fixed the errors and re-checked your code,
see how the document looks like on some browsers.
Preferably, test it on all major versions of IE and Netscape from
version 3 onwards and on Opera.
- If problems remain, and you can't find an answer e.g. by
using the documents listed under
CSS Pointers,
consider asking for help in the newsgroup
comp.infosystems.www.authoring.stylesheets
.
Please remember to tell the URL of your page,
check the FAQ before posting,
and
use
good Usenet style.