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XHTML: Designer or Developer

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 2:58 pm
by alex.barylski
In respect to my other thread on Web 2.0 designs. I'm curious, do we as developers feel XHTML/CSS is best left for the designer or the developer.

Personally I would side with the latter, only because XHTML is still coding (although declarative in nature) it is still "technical" and should be outside the domain of a graphics designer - although the two should always work closely togather.

What do you think?

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 3:12 pm
by matthijs
Difficult to answer. There are designers capable of writing good html and developers who do the same. But, there are also designers or developers not capable of writing good html/css. So it depends on the person.

I still voted for the developers because a "pure" graphic designer, without any developing experience would seem - in general - not be the right person to also code the html. The basics of html/css are not difficult, but the finer details can be. So if you really want top-notch quality, a specialist in (x)html and css is needed.

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 3:19 pm
by alex.barylski
I would have to agree. :)

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 3:23 pm
by Weirdan
I'd say xhtml for developers, css for designers.

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 4:06 pm
by alex.barylski
Touche. Thats being very specific. :)

While I agree, I personally wouldnt' expect a designer to know just CSS. Obviously they are responsible for setting font colors, etc...but converting those font colors into CSS would be left in the hand of a XHTML guru. :)

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 4:55 pm
by dreamscape
It depends on what you mean by "designer".

Someone who sees themselves as a "web designer" should absolutely be capable of writing competent XHTML/CSS, IMO. And I would absolutely expect them to be able to. Writing the XHTML and CSS is part of the design process in building a website, so you can't call yourself a "web designer" and not know how to do it, IMHO.

On the other hand, someone who sees themselves as a "graphic designer" probably will not be capable of writing XHTML/CSS, and I would not expect them to do it.

The same goes for "developer".

I'd expect someone considering themselves a "web developer" to be capable of doing it competently.

I'd not expect someone considering themselves a "php developer" to be capable of doing it competently. (though everyone who considers themselves a "php developer" probably at least knows basic HTML)

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 5:27 pm
by alex.barylski
I agree. Mostly.

A graphics designer is certainly different from web designer. Graphics designers typically know more about publishing (traditional media) than do Web Designers.

Web Designers should know XHTML/CSS.

PHP developers, however, should also know XHTML/CSS. For starters. It's a programming language, just a different kind as noted above.

Secondly, PHP developers will likely have an equal hand in writing the XHTML as the web designer would.

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 6:26 pm
by dreamscape
Hockey wrote:It's a programming language, just a different kind as noted above.
Here is where I disagree. HTML/XHTML is not a programming language. It is a markup language; a data format.

You would not call an XHTML document a program or application, would you? I don't hardly think so. And you wouldn't call someone who can only code XHTML a programmer, would you? I don't think so, again.

Just because you "code" it, doesn't make it a programming language, IMO.

Programming languages convey instructions to the computer. Markup languages convey information, IMO and in the opinion of the American National Standard Dictionary of Information Technlogy.

Not trying to be picky or anything :D
Hockey wrote:PHP developers, however, should also know XHTML/CSS.
I did say that most PHP developers will know basic HTML; however, proficient knowledge of XHTML and CSS is neither necessary nor required to become a proficient PHP developer.

Here is how I see the differences between them all:

Graphic Designer: proficient in computer aided design and publishing
Web Designer: proficient in computer aided design, HTML/XHTML, and CSS
PHP Developer: proficient in PHP
Web Developer: proficient in HTML/XHTML, CSS, Javascript, and one or more server side programming languages

Naturally there is some overlap, and a person can in fact consider themselves to be more than one.

Posted: Sun May 06, 2007 11:58 pm
by d3ad1ysp0rk
All the companies I work with don't have the luxery of having a graphics designer. They have a web designer, and the web designers job is to bring a layout from the conceptual stage to the web stage, and ready for a developer to start working on it.

If your company is working on a huge project, I guess the best solution would be;
- Graphics designer to create the original layout in their graphics program of choice
- Web Designer to splice the layout up and create the xhtml/css to handle keeping the look and feel correct
- PHP Developer to do backend development

Posted: Mon May 07, 2007 1:45 am
by alex.barylski
dreamscape wrote:Here is where I disagree. HTML/XHTML is not a programming language. It is a markup language; a data format.
XML is a data format but observe the L as in language? It's both. XHTML is rendered and it's output is not typically of "data" but information so I would not agree with your assesment that it's a data format.
You would not call an XHTML document a program or application, would you? I don't hardly think so. And you wouldn't call someone who can only code XHTML a programmer, would you? I don't think so, again.
NLP purists would argue otherwise I bet. :)

XHTML or any language which "programs" a computer...meaing: Causes some sequence of instructions to be executed as a direct result of the language (markup/source/etc), is indeed a programming language.

There are different styles or types of programming languages:

1) Declarative
2) Imperative

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declarative_programming

Would I call someone who used a WYSIWYG to hammer out XHTML a programmer? No, well not really, maybe a really high level version of one.

They are still "programming" the computer. When you write XHTML by hand, it requires a lower-level understanding in how markup works. So you are actually programming, but declaratively as opposed to imperatively.

There was a time when I wouldn't have considered PHP developers "programmers" either, but guess what? Thats what I do full time now and I find it equally rewarding as C/C++ Windows desktop development. ;)
Not trying to be picky or anything
Yes you are, don't lie. :P

We all are, as developers (word of year coming up) were pedantic and constantly trying to outshine the next and prove our point, myself included. ;)
I did say that most PHP developers will know basic HTML; however, proficient knowledge of XHTML and CSS is neither necessary nor required to become a proficient PHP developer
Your right, in theory. But seeing how PHP is primarily used as an HTML "embedded" language, not knowing HTML and just solely PHP would get you about as far as a city bus pass in taking you around the world. :P

Unless you landed a job doing GTK+ (which I have never seen and I've been around the block several times) your useless. :)

Posted: Mon May 07, 2007 3:13 am
by shiznatix
I am quite picky with this. I really believe that designers should know (x)html and css. This is expecially true because designers will just make a image of the website, the chop it up in fireworks and tweak it with dreamweaver. Ya that is all fine and good if you are doing a static website but as a PHP programmer who wants to keep his code separete from the html I use a templating system (usually phptal) and using dreamweaver insanity does not make this easy.

Designers, in my opinion, really should know how to write (x)html and css fairly well. Maybe not being the best in the world at it but being able to handle basic stuff is important and if they need help with some more fancy stuff then ask the coder, no problem.

Posted: Mon May 07, 2007 8:54 am
by dreamscape
Hockey wrote:So you are actually programming, but declaratively as opposed to imperatively.
No, XHTML, XML, etc are markup languages, not programming languages.

Programming languages are instructional languages.

Markup languages are informational languages.

Big difference

Just because they are declarative, doesn't make them declarative programming languages. Arguably, all markup languages are declarative in nature.

Examples of declarative programming languages are SQL, XSLT, etc...
Hockey wrote:Your right, in theory. But seeing how PHP is primarily used as an HTML "embedded" language, not knowing HTML and just solely PHP would get you about as far as a city bus pass in taking you around the world. :P
I may have agreed with PHP 4, but with PHP 5 OO improvements, and the community pushing harder for better design practices, it is entirely possible for someone to competently write a complete application only knowing basic HTML, especially if they use View Helpers, and leave the nitty-gritty XHTML up to someone else to do when the application is done. Even with PHP 4, I've seen numerous applications whose code was half decent, but whose XHTML/HTML left you scratching your head and asking, "Oh, why, oh why?" :lol:

Posted: Mon May 07, 2007 11:08 am
by RobertGonzalez
XHTML is a structured markup language. CSS is a loose formatting ruleset. A designer designs and a developer develops. With that, a designer would best be employed to design the look and feel of a site (and might in turn employ a graphic artist to assist in the design creation). However, a designers work, in my opinion, stops at design. A developer would then develop the design into a functional application interface.

Posted: Mon May 07, 2007 11:17 am
by pickle
Everah wrote:XHTML is a structured markup language. CSS is a loose formatting ruleset. A designer designs and a developer develops. With that, a designer would best be employed to design the look and feel of a site (and might in turn employ a graphic artist to assist in the design creation). However, a designers work, in my opinion, stops at design. A developer would then develop the design into a functional application interface.
+1

Posted: Mon May 07, 2007 1:52 pm
by Jenk
pickle wrote:
Everah wrote:XHTML is a structured markup language. CSS is a loose formatting ruleset. A designer designs and a developer develops. With that, a designer would best be employed to design the look and feel of a site (and might in turn employ a graphic artist to assist in the design creation). However, a designers work, in my opinion, stops at design. A developer would then develop the design into a functional application interface.
+1
"

It's just like car designers. They draw up a pretty picture of what they want it to look like, employ a sculpture to make it into a model, then employ a load of engineers and machnaics to create the final machine. Small changes are made to accomodate the mechanics, but the designers rarely get their hands dirty in engine oil.

Same for application development, especially web-design.