molly.com
Sunday 16 December 2007
Define Web Standards in a <p> or Less
You’ve got one paragraph to clearly define the term “web standards” - if you can do it in one sentence, all the better.
GO!
Filed under: professional, policies, standards, software, web design and development, WaSP, w3c, browsers, molly asks you
Posted by: Molly | 5:56 pm |
December 16th, 2007 at 6:20 pm
Web standards are an increasingly sore and itchy pain in the ass.
December 16th, 2007 at 6:27 pm
Haha… We have a winner!
December 16th, 2007 at 6:32 pm
Web standards: having to actually do it properly, instead of just pretending to.
December 16th, 2007 at 6:50 pm
“Standards are about building sophisticated, beautiful sites that will work as well tomorrow as they do today.” - JZ
-
December 16th, 2007 at 7:05 pm
[Web standards make] it easier for people with special needs to use the Web. Blind people may have their computer read web pages to them. People with poor eyesight may have pages rearranged and magnified for easier reading. And people using hand-held devices can browse the Web just as easily as those using high-end workstations.
- via webstandards.org
December 16th, 2007 at 7:09 pm
Here’s my best shot:
“Web Standards are a set of specs, conventions, and best practices that web developers and device/browser manufacturers are asked to adhere to in order for everyone involved to get (and stay) ‘on the same page.’”
Gotta say, though — lately, it feels a lot more like Colly’s definition.
December 16th, 2007 at 7:26 pm
they’re both the technical specification baseline which guarantees interoperability, and the “softer” (not machine-readable, but reliant on human judgement) guidelines and ideas on how those technical specs should be applied to real-world content. (as in: something can be syntactically correct and validate, but still be completely non-semantic)
December 16th, 2007 at 7:27 pm
Web standards enable layered infosystem architectures, ensure a common featureset [intersection] across browsers, and enable developers to distinguish broken product from fixed product.
December 16th, 2007 at 7:35 pm
web standards: distinguishing the ‘can’ from the ’should’. - and knowing why.
December 16th, 2007 at 7:37 pm
Sure, I’ll give it a quick shot.
Web Standards: Definitions of languages and methods of using these languages for use by developers of web browsers and developers of web applications. The group of standards known as “Web Standards” today refer to the specifications around markup and style languages, as well as to the guidelines on how to use these languages in a way promoting interoperability, stability, usability, accessibility, and elegant coding practices.
December 16th, 2007 at 7:52 pm
I thought a more corporate/government style clarification was in order:
Web standards facilitate a multi-disciplinary, synergistic framework of co-dependent interchanges via a glass-pipe paradigm.
December 16th, 2007 at 8:06 pm
While it is not a technical definition this is how I would explain web standards -
“a set of best practice methodologies and technologies which can be utilised to develop higher quality web products.”
Close?
December 16th, 2007 at 8:14 pm
‘An attempt to ensure all users (human or otherwise) have equal access to the Web, regardless of technology or personal capabilities.’
December 16th, 2007 at 8:36 pm
Definition:
Web Standards are a set of guidelines created to provide a common, structured means for communicating information on the web. These standards provide a medium that both application vendors and content creators can rely for consistent and accurate representation of textual and visual data through browsers, screen readers, and other web connected applications and devices.
Interpretation:
A language for communicating on the web. Unfortunately, most of the vendors are half-deaf and many of us web geeks have horrible grammar and a bad accent.
December 16th, 2007 at 9:26 pm
Web Standards are, how we should think.
December 16th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
A series of definitions that define how the implementing mechanism should respond to an agreed upon series of commands.
’nuff said?
Think about this: of all the standards that are produced, which usually work? Those that are defined by some indeterminate democratic process, or those that actually have an end date on their definition?
Okay. I’ve got started: nails. A plentiful, easily manufactured item that come in a standard series of sizes first defined when Rome ran the world. Updated sometime between 1200 and 1600, but no real improvement since then. Screws, based on threads per unit measure, length and thickness - something that’s based on the number of nails you get per penny, as per the Romans and pre-Renaissance Europeans.
Web-standards: a series of definitions that are endless in their evolution because no one can agree on a standard way of doing things. There’s this special case, and that one, and then someone else objects to some slight (pick one: perceived, real or imaginary).
And then we have that endless “Who’s on First?” (Yes, he is) where no person, or body, or whatever, wishes to actually take the lead and declare: “Enough! ALREADY!” So we have a standard that takes longer than the standard lifetime to develop. So far, I can see a real need to call in geologists and forensic paleontologists to figure out what happened to the “committees” producing these standards. Or, maybe, they simply forgot to meet?
Web standards? A pathetic, miserable and lonely document, wandering the wasteland of Cubicle City outside a committee room, Somewhere, Nova Scotia. Seriously: if any of the people on these committees came went for Congress or Parliament, I’d vote against them simply for being incapable of decision making. Politicians do a better job, and that’s saying something! I’m not quite sure I want to know when a supposedly intelligent group of people were so incapable of ordering coffee. Let’s give the job to my cats: I’m sure we’ll see results a lot faster.
(By the way, I mean no slight to Nova Scotian’s.)
Carolyn Ann
December 16th, 2007 at 9:47 pm
I’ll be a little more accurate:
A series of statements that define how the implementing mechanism should respond to a series of commands.
I think that more than sufficient.
Carolyn Ann
December 16th, 2007 at 9:50 pm
Web standards are the specifications for how the web should be coded in order to ensure maximum compatibility across browsers and other devices.
btw, the p tag in your header breaks Google reader (in firefox at least). Once I select your article to view the short description I can’t do anything else in Google reader without refreshing the page. You hacker.
December 16th, 2007 at 10:11 pm
@Carolyn: Yeah, ok, so the W3C &co. are far from paragons of efficiency and effectiveness. But there’s a big difference in complexity and subjectivity between screws and nails and web pages. On the one hand, you need to define an effectively limitless amount of human communication, in every language and on every subject, using a fixed number of predefined semantic elements. On the other hand, you need to standardize the length and width of small pieces of metal.
Web standards are complex and subjective because web pages are complex and subjective. When we say “web standards” we mean a lot of things, from technical specifications to common sense and good practice. But I couldn’t define it clearly in a single paragraph. Maybe a definition list would do the trick.
December 16th, 2007 at 10:20 pm
Holzschlag–
You want a definition of what standards are or what they should be? And one coming from an outsider who is a relatively pragmatic, crude and fed-up-with-tact jarhead? Be cautious for what you may ask. :
:
December 16th, 2007 at 10:21 pm
Shit. A damned Net hieroglyphic.
December 16th, 2007 at 11:25 pm
Web standards mean an extra 35% on your paycheck, if you can do them right.
December 17th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Web standards = separating content, presentation and behavior to help make sites universally accessible and gracefully degradable. With a little ease-of-maintenance frosting. :+)
December 17th, 2007 at 12:34 am
Web standards - a junction to the accessibility road.
December 17th, 2007 at 12:51 am
The web is a client/server technology. The dialog between client and server is possible thanks to standard protocols (or “web standards”). Breaking standards affects that dialog and can lead to unpredictable results (depending on the server, the browser, the device, etc.).
December 17th, 2007 at 1:14 am
I am amazed at the number of responses that describe what web standards (are intended to) do rather than what they are. Be that as it may, here is my attempt at defining ‘web standards’.
I first assume, considering Ms. Holzschlag’s background and extensive body of work, that by web she means the World Wide Web and not the Internet. (they are different!)
Web Standards - an authoritative set of rules and principles for creating and sharing hypertext documents.
December 17th, 2007 at 1:27 am
@Ian
The first sentence of your definition is right on. The rest just describes what they should do.
@Jeff Croft
If you replace everything after the word ‘practices’ with something like ‘hypertext documents’ I agree completely.
Your frustration is showing through.
December 17th, 2007 at 1:33 am
I used the term, “the languages that make up the web” in place of “web standards” on the “why” page of the Alternative Browser Alliance. Though without context, someone might read that as meaning English, Spanish, Chinese, etc. instead of HTML, CSS, JavaScript and so on.
I like to use the term “specifications,” though, rather than “standards,” since it gets the idea across the idea that there’s a document that says “This is how X should work,” rather than “Oh, this code isn’t up to standard.”
December 17th, 2007 at 1:47 am
Specifications for (X)HTML, CSS and Javascript that enable us to build pages that the machines can consume, make findable and then tell us what the pages say. Achieving interoperability for your information.
December 17th, 2007 at 1:56 am
How about in ten words?
Mine: “Web standards help designers and developers create the pedantic web.”
December 17th, 2007 at 1:57 am
Web standards are what makes it possible for users to experience what developers intended whatever the browser or user agent. For true interoperability, however, implementers must support web standards, and content authors must use them for their content.
December 17th, 2007 at 2:10 am
Web standards is knowing exactly how things should work in theory then having this theory blown to pieces by the “real world”
December 17th, 2007 at 2:38 am
Web standards: a complete mess, with a few bits and pieces that are actually known to work. All in all the near-perfect tool-set for messing up the web without breaking it.
December 17th, 2007 at 2:49 am
This post is killing Google Reader
I think it’s the P tag in the title.
December 17th, 2007 at 3:13 am
WebStandards: an amorphous set of situation appropriate ‘rules’ that bind the more morally responsible (but still rag tag) group of proactive web professionals together. See also: ‘excuse for conferences’, ‘excuse for drinking’, ‘geek socialising’.
December 17th, 2007 at 3:51 am
The way I see it, no matter what the processes/specifications/tools are, Web Standards is about bettering the Web for the future! So it should be a bold definition:
“Web Standards are a set of guidelines and best practices to improve the Web today for a better tomorrow”
December 17th, 2007 at 4:03 am
Web standards transcend the limits of technology by setting our information free. By implementing them we affirm our desire to communicate and our desire to be understood. They help us to express ourselves clearly within a framework that lowers the barriers to understanding and delivers the promise of the Web as an open, universal community for humanity.
December 17th, 2007 at 7:09 am
With apologies to various no-doubt-trademarked catch-phrases of the Java(TM)(R) language:
Write once, parse anywhere.
December 17th, 2007 at 7:46 am
Web standards exist to create interoperability between UAs.
December 17th, 2007 at 9:43 am
This post is breaking my Google Reader as well…
December 17th, 2007 at 9:50 am
Geoffrey; that doesn’t actually define web standards, although I agree it is one of their primary purposes.
Maybe something like:
Web standards are a set of specifications for the syntax and semantics of the document formats (and protocols?) used on the web. They provide authors with a set of vendor-neutral formats for distributing their content, which are expected to work with a broad range of viewers (”browsers”) and implementers with the necessary information to make UAs that act in the way expected by the user and in the same way as other implementations of the same standard. In practice many existing web standards fall short of these ideals either because they do not provide authors with the abilities they desire, or because they do not provide enough technical detail for interoperable implementations. Arguably CSS 2 demonstrates the first of these flaws whilst HTML4 demonstrates the second. Additionally many “web standards” as they are written are out of sync with the reality of the behavior that has become standard in browsers and, even where the behaviors agree, the intersection of the features available in the most common browser engines is substantially smaller than the set of all features defined in the standards.
I’m not quite happy with that definition but it at least conveys some of the necessary ideas.
December 17th, 2007 at 9:52 am
[Web standards] are ment to be broken.
December 17th, 2007 at 9:53 am
Many of us are saying the same thing, using different words. James Bennett must surely get the prize for brevity, though!
@Louis: The analogy wasn’t terribly good; it was the first thing I thought of! The modern world would have a hard time existing without those things, though!
I have to observe that if that’s what’s being worked on, it’s little wonder these committees can’t even figure out how to order coffee. Tackling something that big would reduce even Hercules and Jason to tears. Zeus, too.
Quick! Someone! Anyone! Give the committee’s a copy of Voltaire’s Candide! They’re playing the role of Dr Pangloss; It might help them produce the best of all possible standards… (/sarcasm)
Thanks, Louis! I was trying to figure out why my analogy wasn’t quite working.
Carolyn Ann
December 17th, 2007 at 10:54 am
The vision of the one interoperabilable web
December 17th, 2007 at 11:41 am
Web Standards are a set of community-developed best practices that aim to maximize web site compatibility across hardware and software configurations, thereby increasing web site usability, accessibility, search-engine-optimization, and ease-of-maintenance.
December 17th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
I properly escaped my entities. What’s that say about Google Readers WEB STANDARDS support?
:P
Having fun with your answers,
M
December 17th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
One (web) to many (all users).
December 17th, 2007 at 2:00 pm
Web standards are the means for us build the web the way it was intended to be: accessible to man and machine alike; they make the web bigger and more important than it could ever be without them; and they allow us to build sites without letting any person or organisation stand in the way of universal accessibility.
December 17th, 2007 at 2:36 pm
Web standards are like the weather. They make some people boil, and some people freeze. Some people ignore them, and some people like the Brits are obsessed and always talk about them, while the Aussies have it better than most. But at the end of the day, when its good it makes you smile.
December 17th, 2007 at 2:40 pm
Web standards are a set of best practices for building web sites. From here you can continue with (x)html, css, JavaScript, W3C, involvement, no tables (unless you need to), bla, bla, bla.
December 17th, 2007 at 2:59 pm
Courtesy of teh Devil’s Dictionary (http://www.eod.com/devil/archive/web_standards.html):
Web standards [noun]:
A large stick or cudgel, used by the slightly more anal-retentive to beat the slightly less anal-retentive.
December 17th, 2007 at 3:15 pm
Wilson–
Just a couple of questions. Is this large stick in the shape of a baseball bat, albeit a very small one? And is it inscribed with the word, ‘Opera’? Or is it more slender and shorter and resembling something …well, that you might find on the web site of Xandria. And is it inscribed with the word, ‘Microsoft’?
I couldn’t resist and make no excuses.
December 17th, 2007 at 6:17 pm
that which is ignored or implemented so poorly by dominant authoring environments and browser software that the web is around 10 years behind where it should be and understanding how browsers get it wrong takes longer to learn than the specs themselves.
December 17th, 2007 at 8:32 pm
What I’m thinking we should do right now is find a way to quickly sort relevant words in comments.
No one has given the same answer. I’m thinking we should look for common ideas and sort those. Right now I have no easy way of doing that, at least of which I’m aware.
Suggestions? Thanks!!!
M
December 17th, 2007 at 9:36 pm
“No one has given the same answer”?
Au contraire, m’dear! Most of the answers state the same basic idea.
Jeff Croft: Web Standards are a set of specs, conventions, and best practices that web developers and device/browser manufacturers are asked to adhere to in order for everyone involved to get (and stay) ‘on the same page.
maelorin: distinguishing the ‘can’ from the ’should’. - and knowing why.
stilist: An attempt to ensure all users (human or otherwise) have equal access to the Web, regardless of technology or personal capabilities.
Ian Muir: Web Standards are a set of guidelines created to provide a common, structured means for communicating information on the web. These standards provide a medium that both application vendors and content creators can rely for consistent and accurate representation of textual and visual data through browsers, screen readers, and other web connected applications and devices.
Me (Carolyn Ann): A series of statements that define how the implementing mechanism should respond to a series of commands.
Dustin Brewer: Web standards are the specifications for how the web should be coded in order to ensure maximum compatibility across browsers and other devices.
James Bennett: Write once, parse anywhere.
Geoffrey Sneddon: Web standards exist to create interoperability between UAs.
jgraham: Web standards are a set of specifications for the syntax and semantics of the document formats (and protocols?) used on the web. They provide authors with a set of vendor-neutral formats for distributing their content, which are expected to work with a broad range of viewers (”browsers”) and implementers with the necessary information to make UAs that act in the way expected by the user and in the same way as other implementations of the same standard.
Alan Gresley: The vision of the one interoperabilable web
Andy Hieb: Web Standards are a set of community-developed best practices that aim to maximize web site compatibility (…)
Ron Hunsberger: One (web) to many (all users).
Mo: Web standards are the means for us build the web the way it was intended to be: accessible to man and machine alike; … and they allow us to build sites without letting any person or organisation stand in the way of universal accessibility.
Most of the others concentrate mainly on some aspect of web development [sic…], and not the definition of “web standards”. All of the posts I’ve mentioned can be boiled down to “a series of definitions that dictate how an agent must react”, or some other (much better) English.
There is agreement in the sentiment, but not necessarily in the words.
Does that help?
Carolyn Ann
December 18th, 2007 at 9:58 am
Preserve human capital. make it work. do it once.
December 18th, 2007 at 10:23 am
1) Web standards: be professional!
2) Web standards: don’t fake it, just do it!
December 18th, 2007 at 1:27 pm
Web Standards - You know those things web developers and browser makers tend to agree are a good thing, but yet still don’t follow.
December 18th, 2007 at 1:28 pm
Web Standards: Doing it right.
December 18th, 2007 at 2:51 pm
Hi Molly,
.You’re very likable.also I follow your lynda.com exercies.I wish you to keeping your success..
Sorry but I love you.I read your big book “special edition using HTML4″..and I fall in love with you
Yours sincerely,
Alper
December 18th, 2007 at 4:36 pm
Web Standards are the _minimal_ of what we should be working with. The non standards are where the innovation is.
December 18th, 2007 at 7:57 pm
Web standards: Conformance to guidelines and principles for building out the word wide web.
December 18th, 2007 at 8:00 pm
You know how you buy some flat-pack furniture from Ikea, and when you take out all the pieces you think, “Wow, how am I going to put all this together so that it stands up straight?” Web standards are the instructions which float out of the box when you tip it upside down. Sometimes they’re cryptic, sometimes they don’t seem to make a lot of sense, but in the end your coffee-table is going to look just as good in your house as it did in the store.
December 18th, 2007 at 8:17 pm
*ahem* Considering the horrors of browser testing, I should maybe have finished with a parenthetical observation: “(Although you might find out that your living-room floor isn’t level…)”
December 18th, 2007 at 9:03 pm
Web Standards are a secret plot to turn artists and writers into programmers.
December 19th, 2007 at 7:50 am
The cause of, and solution to, all of our problems.
December 20th, 2007 at 1:21 am
Web standards: Conformance to guidelines and principles for building out the word wide web
December 20th, 2007 at 2:58 am
Web Standards are the common ground by which we can all disagree in increasing extents over word, thought and practice; whilst getting the fuzzy warm glow that we get it and other people don’t.
Or is that me getting cynical in my old age
December 20th, 2007 at 4:13 am
I had to think about this for a few days. Here’s my shot.
Webstandards is about delivering content in an open and accessible way, making information available for every person using the internet.
December 20th, 2007 at 6:37 pm
“Mostly harmless.”
December 20th, 2007 at 10:28 pm
tossing up between “are broken” and “a good excuse to go drinking”
December 21st, 2007 at 10:52 am
W3C
December 21st, 2007 at 11:01 am
Web Standards represents a common language that is accepted by developers of both websites and website rendering software, such that this common protocol can result in a smooth transition from the concept of a design to that design’s implementation.
(Granted, this is a fantasy world kind of definition, but it never hurts to dream..)
December 21st, 2007 at 11:08 am
What is defined by the W3C in the RFC’s.
You idiots.
December 22nd, 2007 at 12:43 pm
<p><dfn>Webstandards are semantic XHTML plus beauty in CSS and a maximun of usabilty.</dfn><p>December 22nd, 2007 at 7:01 pm
Like a Developer I realize that we must think on consumers, thinking on this, for me Web Standarts is:
“Respecting all consumers on the WEB”
December 22nd, 2007 at 10:43 pm
Sometimes I really get the feeling that a conversation with any one of my 21 cats might get a better response.
I am feeling somewhat put out by the fact that many have responded to this question, Molly, and you’ve basically replied with a wish for someone to point out what those correspondents are saying. I am not including the dimly conceived (and even more poorly constructed) insults in this consideration.
All in all, I’m saddened that the effort I, and others, have put in has met with such little response from you, Molly, the questioner. It may not be much for some (although that little compilation I did had some work put into it!), but acknowledging that effort is surely not going to take very much on your part? “Such little” - none, to be precise.
As in real life, and in real relationships, there is a need to acknowledge that the other person has, at the very least, responded to you. Otherwise the other person simply feels that they are being ignored; or, in the case of such a question as the one you asked, used in a political game of which they know nothing, and desire to participate in even less than that!
I wouldn’t mention anything, but you did ask for feedback in that survey - and it was willingly provided. But a response from you? Nary a word. Not even a “thank you for participating” post, with a compilation of the results.
Personally, I’m getting a little annoyed at the giving, and the lack of response to that provision. It might not mean much, but it does mean something to those that give. A little “thank you” every now and then isn’t too much to ask, and it tells your readers and correspondents that you actually do appreciate what they provide: of their time reading your blog, and of thinking about, and crafting their replies. Not all of your readers have English as a first language - they have a harder task responding than those of us who grew up with the language!
It is, I grant, up to you how you acknowledge, and if you do so. But think about how you would feel if someone asked you an important question, and another, and another, and so on, and didn’t bother to acknowledge your contribution! Don’t forget: we’re not paid to respond, we do it because we want to, and the desire to have a conversation about the topics you raise. We are not chopped liver! A simple “thank you” would be nice.
Carolyn Ann
December 23rd, 2007 at 5:30 pm
Things such as reciprocity in kind, balance, attempts to interject human behavior into a linear medium, assumptions of intent, etc. — well, perhaps when such things get put aside, the illusions of social networks, including blog expectations, fall to the side as they should.
Okay, back to what are Web standards. Web standards are [….]. Shit. I forget the question.
And Merry Christmas, folks.
December 23rd, 2007 at 5:42 pm
What a web developer is referring to when she invites browser manufacturers to RTFM.
December 24th, 2007 at 10:40 am
Web Standards — an alternative to chaos.
December 29th, 2007 at 7:06 am
Widely adopted guidelines for CSS, XHTML etc. that help ensure that web sites are accessible on a wide variety of platforms and to a wide range of users.
January 3rd, 2008 at 1:43 pm
Applicable to not just web standards, but standards in general:
To serve as a structured guideline for those producing the tools and/or content for the use and/or utility of all the people making use of or enjoying the platform for which the standard is made.
January 4th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
forum thanks
January 15th, 2008 at 6:09 am
Allows developers to create a single CSS file for a website that will work across all types of browsers on all types of platforms and still display correctly!
March 30th, 2008 at 6:28 am
thanks
April 8th, 2008 at 10:44 am
Looks very interesting. Thanks for article.
Regards