The Web Standards Mafia

My very first webpage was done using CSS way back in 2001. I was fortunate enough to never have gone through a tables phase in my development career. I never experienced the heartache and frustration that came with designing a site and having it look completely different in every browser. Sure the page didn't look exactly the same in each browser, but it was pretty close. I had the ability to separate the content and style from the beginning and I admit I took that for granted. Back then it never occurred to me that I was only able to accomplish such things because a group of people took the actions necessary years before to make it happen.

Today is the Third Annual Blue Beanie Day. It is the day we celebrate and show our support for Web Standards. For the majority of you new people on the scene you won't know or possibly even care about Web Standards. You know how to work your XHTML and CSS, but probably don't understand the effort that it took a group of people to ensure that the browser makers tried their "best" to support them in a standardized way.

Well guess what? I'm here to tell you the story, the Drawar way.

Screw the Bees, WaSP Me

As with most revolutions, the Web Standards movement started with a small group of people and they called themselves WaSP, White Anglo Saxon Professionals. Sorry, WaSP actually stands for the Web Standards Project, but WaSP sounds much cooler and allows you to come up with better jokes. When the web began and horrible webpages started popping up all over the web you were allowed to write HTML any way you wanted. You didn't need to close tags, you could nest them anyway you wanted and the browsers still worked. CSS was merely a specification so if you wanted to get the job done you had to use tables and a lot of inline styles. This wasn't the biggest problem though, the problem was with the browsers. The browsers all rendered a page differently. That is like every human being given a pair of eyes that worked differently. Now try designing a pair of jeans for these people without them arguing that their vision of the jeans was the right way. Yes, that was a horrible analogy, but work with me here.

In 1998 WaSP was formed to try and get the browser makers all on the same (web)page (let me know when I should stop). The W3C already had the specifications and standards in place and WaSP wanted to ensure that all of these specifications worked the same way on the web browsers. There is no point in having industry standards if the toolmakers don't follow them.

They state their purpose better than I could.

Tim Berners–Lee, the inventor of the Web, had founded the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to nurture and recommend technologies such as CSS and XML that would enable the fledgling medium to remain open, interoperable, and accessible. If fully supported, these technologies would enable designers to design and developers to create functionality far beyond the capabilities of any individual web browser.

Today's lesson: if you can create a project where the mission statement sounds like a plot for a Sci-Fi movie, then you have a good chance of being successful.

There are people feeding the homeless. Others are trying to stop the spread of HIV. This group wanted to make the web a better place when they knew 99% of the world wouldn't even notice. I don't care who you are, when you can find even one person who is devoted to making something better without looking for fame or fortune, then you have a wonderful thing happening.

I may refer to the WaSP people as a group, but in reality they were more like the Mafia with the mission to end bad browser support. You cross the family, you just signed a death wish. None of what I said has any truth behind it, they are really nice people.

The Godfather

Zeldman. The King of Web Standards. It is Blue Beanie day because the guy wore a blue beanie on a book cover, which also happened to be the first book on web design that I ever purchased. The only chance I would ever have of a day being named after me is if I became a centerpiece for the next Victoria's Secret catalog. So why does one person receive so much credit for making Web Standards a reality? Simple. He had the biggest impact on getting people to use them (that is my professional factual opinion). Sure there were a lot of people involved in making web standards a reality (see below), but Zeldman was the big name that took a lot of the flack for pushing the standards that most of us didn't even care about at the time.

One article set the tone: To Hell With Bad Browsers.

If you followed Zeldman back in the day then you remember how almost everything he wrote involved web standards. When you are trying to create change what you need is passion and this man had it in spades. Now have you ever been passionate about Web Standards? I loved the idea of Web Standards, but was I willing to put my reputation on the line to ensure that companies embraced them? No chance in hell. Sure I could write about them and create sites that showcased them, but I wasn't going to risk my career on them. Zeldman was willing to take that risk and whether you want to argue his importance or not you should at the very least show him some respect.

Can you imagine trying to change the mindset of a whole industry where the makers of the tools aren't in the mood to change? Have you ever known Microsoft to cooperate with a group of unknowns? Sure, when the government is on their case they will do what needs to be done, but when a small group of developers are trying to change how their browsers render pages then you probably won't find them jumping on the bandwagon. We are still trying to work through our issues with Internet Explorer today. Because of this the job of WaSP isn't quite done yet and although they don't get the press they used to, we must not look at their mission as being any less important today.

Made People

I would be remiss to make you believe that the only person that deserves praise was Zeldman. Although I know I am going to receive some hell for missing a couple of people, this is merely an account of the people that had a huge impact on how I view web development and Web Standards. If Zeldman was the Godfather these were the Made People (politically correct, cough).

Eric Meyer

Eric Meyer is an internationally recognized expert in CSS and the use of web standards, and has been working on the web since 1993. In that time, he has written a wide variety of tutorials, articles, and books devoted to helping designers and developers improve their web skills. He is the best-selling CSS author and best-recognized CSS authority in the world. His seven books have been translated into six languages and have sold in the hundreds of thousands.

Eric A. Meyer

Sure the guy couldn't design his way out of a baby's crib (love ya Eric!), but you will be hard pressed to find a nicer guy in the industry who is an expert in their field. If you have ever met an expert before then you know that many times they are uptight, pompous, and arrogant. Eric isn't and he is the real deal when it comes to CSS. You might be using one of his CSS hacks or the idea of resetting all CSS elements back to 0. He is the redheaded CSS assassin.

If you haven't already be sure to checkout Eric Meyer On CSS and More Eric Meyer on CSS.

Molly E. Holzschlag

Molly E. Holzschlag is a well-known Web standards advocate, instructor, and author. She is Group Lead for the Web Standards Project (WaSP) and an invited expert to the HTML and GEO working groups at the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

Via each of these roles, Molly works to educate designers and developers on using Web technologies in practical ways to create highly sustainable, maintainable, accessible, interactive and beautiful Web sites for the global community.

About Molly

The Queen of Web Standards. Now this isn't a quality that benefits web developers, but I have no problem in saying that when it comes to industry experts, Molly is the only one that can keep up with me at a party. In fact, I have a hard time keeping up with her. She is passionate about what she does and equally as passionate about life. If you ever have a chance to meet her in person don't miss the opportunity. You will never regret it.

If you haven't come across one of her 30+ books on web development, then you probably aren't reading books.

Dave Shea

The css Zen Garden is the site that showed the world that CSS based designs could be beautiful. When it comes to my own designs you can see that I stick to the basics because my imagination doesn't push itself that far. Shea's mind works the same way, but somehow his basics are about 100x better than mine. This man took CSS based design and flipped it on its head.

When everyone was saying that you needed tables for complex designs, Shea showed the world you didn't. You could build beautifully complex designs with CSS and clean XHTML. Although the site isn't nearly as popular as it was years ago, we owe CSS based design progression to this man.

If you ever see him out, he might come across as quiet. He isn't. Strike up a conversation with him and you are in for a treat.

Tantek Çelik

Have you ever met someone and felt intimidated by them because their brain was so big you could see it on the outside of their head? This is how I felt when I met Tantek. To call the guy a genius is giving the word genius a compliment. Checkout this 7 year stretch and let me know if you have accomplished more.

He gained a following during his time at Microsoft (1997-2004), where he worked on the Macintosh version of Internet Explorer. Between 1998 and 2003 he managed a team of software developers that designed and implemented the Tasman rendering engine for Internet Explorer for Mac version 5. During his time at Microsoft he also served as their alternate representative (1998-2000) and later their representative (2001-2004) to a number of working groups at the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), due to this work he is credited on a number of recommendations relating to XHTML and Cascading Style Sheets. While working for Microsoft he also developed the "box model hack" that is used by web designers to work around the Internet Explorer box model bug.

Wikipedia

If you are unaware of the Box Model Hack all you need to know is that it saved lives back when browsers were still sketchy on their CSS support. For everyone complaining about IE6, if you didn't have to deal with IE5 in the past then please just sit down. IE6 is heaven compared to it, but Tantek helped to get IE5 out of hell and into purgatory.

I hear that he only wears glasses to appear mortal to us humans.

Roger Johansson

You might not have heard of Roger Johansson, but you should have. When it comes to web accessibility and standards, 456 Berea St. is the blog to go to. Always well-written and informational without putting you to sleep.

He might also be the most stylish man in the industry. I'm not sure if that is a Swedish thing or not, but damn this guy knows how to wear an outfit. He could probably be wrong on something and you wouldn't even know because you are too busy thinking about how you need to shop where he shops.

Again, these aren't the only players on the web that helped bring Web Standards to life, these are the players that had a direct impact on myself and ones that I feel some people might not be aware of. Caught up in the list mania of today's design community we can't forget about the people who busted their asses in giving us a chance to develop for a better web. Today is the day we can show them our appreciation and if you don't understand why, remove all CSS from your design, insert tables and enjoy yourself. None of them did it for the fame or money, those were merely benefits, they did it because they shared a vision of the web being a place that was accessible for all because it should be. Information is free, but how free is it when it doesn't work in your browser?

Web Standards sometimes gets a bad rap because there are many people who feel that if your site doesn't validate then you are doing it wrong. While it is great to have a site that validates it is even better to show your effort in trying to implement Web Standards on a site. As long as you are doing your best in trying to make a site accessible to everyone then you are doing your job and to me that is what Web Standards stands for.

Therefore, I tip my Blue Beanie to all of you who continue to push the Web Standards movement forward. I can not thank you enough. Shots of Patron are on Molly.

If you get a chance today, toss a shout out to the people who are helping to make the web a better place for all on your blog, Twitter (#bbd09), Facebook or anywhere else you can. They deserve it. We all do.