Teaching Webstandards to newcomers

Quite often I find introductions to HTML texts longer than they should. They explain how problems from the past can be solved with a new approach, things that existed in the past and you shouldn’t be using anymore.

And to do that, often texts name those practices. And because some people may not know that particular technique, they may even explain it, just to tell you that you should never use it, and that you were happy if you weren’t acquainted with it on the first place.

The web is there for a reasonably long time now, and some readers of a text like this one, may never lived the time when were formed the practices that are condemned today.

Some psycologists say that you should not teach good practices to children by telling them “do not do this”. Instead you should say “That is the right way” because in the child’s mind, the graphic image of the thing happening is stronger than the negation in the sentence. I believe this apply to all of us, in a certain degree.

Now and then I found myself trying to find a good tutorial to show people that are just starting and can’t deal with the big complexityof things these days, and additionaly have to carry the burden of the history of the HTML usage.

I just started to write my own text and I’ll publish it on the Zo’C site soon.

There are excellent references out there, but I would like to give contribution with a text to address basic HTML for web newcomers within web standards and semantic markup.

The text will only focus in XHTML because is cleaner and more strict and, to me seems to be a long lasting standard, suitable for mobile web and the next generation of accessing devices.

I think it is time to move forward, leave the dark past of dirty table hacks behind and start to teach newcomers and even seasoned web designers looking for refreshment a clean start. Let’s not talk people to avoid this and that, let’s just teach what is worthy.