Not Surprising

Apparently most websites on the internet suck. At least according to today's link.

How do you tell a good webpage from a bad one? Chances are if you're using IEv6 and suffer from no disabilities, you would probably judge it on aesthetics, how it looks, and how it's laid out. If you're using a different browser, or using a different operating system, or have a disability such as visual impairment, colour blindness, deafness, etc. then the question is moot to you. You just know.

You go to a site and find you can't even use it if you don't have Javascript enabled. The font is too small. The colour's don't contrast enough. You have to embiggen the font, and sections start overlaying each other.

Of course, web developpers can ensure they're writing good code if they adhere to the recommendations made by the W3C.

I am a professional web developer. I suffer from a disability. It's called "artistic cluelessness." What it means is that I put functionality way ahead of look'n'feel. For layouts I use simplistic, logical layouts. If I were building buildings I would be an engineer, not an architect.

The evidences of my artistic cluelnessness could be seen way back in my childhood. When brother Jack and I were teaching ourselves to program when we were 14 and 15 years old, Jack's programs would have nice colour schemes with nice layouts. His programs would be nice to look at. My programs just used the DOS default grey on black text, one line after another. White space was used as a divider, like I use here on this blog.

It can still be seen on this blog. Look at my blog. I used the default blogger layout. No imagination.

So, how do I have the gall to call myself a professional web programmer when I admit that I suffer from artistic cluelessness? Thankfully every web developer position I've ever held has had someone else hired as a graphic designer doing that work. I've been free to do the coding. And to compensate I stay very close to the W3C recommendations. As a result, my sites, as ugly as they may be, are as accessible as possible...or they will be, if I ever get the time to fix them up.

This blog post has no point, as few, if any, of my readers are web developers. I just saw this article and wanted to point it out.