Minor webpage/html tips

Been doing some minor html-ing for work. The handout I received (based on a few printed-out web pages), says that "logical" tags (e.g. <em> and </em>) are preferred to "physical" tags (e.g. <i> and </i>) -- even though both are displayed as italics.

Similarly, e.g. <strong> and </strong> are preferred to <b> and </b>, even though both return boldfaced characters.

I did a quick web search to find an explanation, and
according to http://www.translatorscafe.com/cafe/html_tutorial.asp?pn=hg_em.html, the reason is that for the visually-impaired, text-readers know to verbally stress a word when "emphasize" is encountered -- whereas text readers ignore the cues for "italics".

The above-cited website suggests that both "italics" and "emphasize" have their uses, depending on the application or use: Italicize for **visually** distinguishing text (e.g. foreign words; beginnings of lists); emphasize for STRESSING words or phrases.

Good stuff!!! ;)

However, note that some websites -- like blogspot.com -- will allow "italics," but not "understand" the "emphasize" tags. So, use what you can...


In searching for a list of "less than" and "greater than" characters so I could post this blog entry, I found a nifty list of html special characters at
http://www.natural-innovations.com/wa/doc-charset.html -- like ☮ and ☯!!!

Be sure to put the semicolon at the end of the special code number, or the character may not display correctly.


An additional tip: A web page guy was here, discussing our company web page with our receptionist. I overheard a good tip, which was: If you have multiple pages coming off your main page, instead of dumping a page and building a new one with a different html address, it's better to just modify an existing page. (For example, don't dump "wedding.html" for "our_wedding.html".) Reason: The old one is already registered with search engines. If you put up a "replacement" page, then you go to the bottom of the web search list.

A good insight!!!


--GG