| The two main staples of modern web design are still | | | | loads of content and RSS feeds, that if you don't |
| at odds even though it was predicted long ago that | | | | take proactive measures to separate out the data |
| table use in web design would be extinct and | | | | from presentation with CSS/XHTML, then it will |
| replaced with sleek, CSS style sheet driven websites! | | | | become a nightmare just to manage your site. Don't |
| The debate about which way is best rages on. You | | | | wait till your site is 1000 pages to properly format |
| don't have to travel far in web circles to hear the | | | | your site with the best design to suit your ongoing |
| squabbles on the blogs over CSS and table web | | | | needs. Remember we all start out with one page on |
| design. The table purist will speak of ancient die-hard | | | | a site and the longer it's out there the bigger it gets |
| standard compliance and how it's impossible to | | | | (at least we hope it gets bigger!). So your best bet is |
| achieve with CSS. The CSS purist, on the other hand, | | | | to get moving forward and find middle ground and |
| will say that your table leader site is "old" and "heavy" | | | | use each style where appropriate. |
| with tables. In other words, you should completely | | | | Go easy on yourself if you find that you have the |
| redesign your website with CSS so that the "Google | | | | wrong design on a web page. We all are buried in |
| spiders" can peruse your site freely and reward you | | | | work and sometimes need to prioritize. If you review |
| with high Google rankings. | | | | your pages and your business efforts accordingly, |
| Believe it or not, there is a place in the world for | | | | you will be able to match up the correct design |
| both! For example, if you have a truly quantitative | | | | styles to your needs. To review the benefits of |
| set of data to display, then you should use the table | | | | Table-based design (the old style is great at |
| design. Even though it is said that the "Google | | | | presenting quantitative Excel style data), read this. |
| spiders" light design that CSS provides, your website | | | | The Table based designs are much more practical |
| will not fall through the floor in rankings just because | | | | when using the Excel style data presentation, but |
| you have a table or two on some web pages. It | | | | tend to get docked a bit in the search rankings due |
| does not negate the fact that numerical data and | | | | to being more difficult for the pages to be crawled. |
| table design (for example, Excel spread sheets) is for | | | | CSS is excellent for separating out the data layer |
| appropriate data display. In other words, if you have | | | | from the presentation layer and it takes much less |
| a ton of RSS feeds and many automated widgets | | | | code to code a CSS driven web page then it does |
| coming to your site, then it's time to separate out | | | | for it's sister table design. So your local "Google |
| the data from the presentation layer with XML | | | | spider" loves the CSS sites and will improve your |
| & CSS. You will find that if managing a site with | | | | rankings. So use it where you can! |