How Valid is that Validator?

by Maggi Norris, Webmistress
Nem5 Awards Program
15 October 2001

My website was done. I thought I had created Web Maggic. Then, I saw it in that "other" browser. When I checked my pages with HTML validators, I saw more red than black. I started researching what the validators said were mistakes, and I wound up wondering which needed validation more, my site or the validators.

HTML Standards

HTML standards are something webmasters continually have to contend with. It is nearly impossible to maintain everything in an up to date manner, merely because standards are always changing and being upgraded. Just when you think you have it mastered, newer versions of browsers are released and it is often necessary to start over again.

Most of us go through the same learning curves from just learning to truly understanding. The road in between the two points is often very confusing. How is it possible to find the problem areas of coding that make a page look good in one browser and appear dreadful in another? How do we find the line of code that is always causing an error message to pop up on the page?

Validators to the Rescue

I found HTML validators could help show where all the problems were. I learned to depend on HTML validators instead of my own best judgment. When my award program was new I used HTML validators faithfully to check every single page. I took points off the score for every mistake shown on the validator.

I started noticing that some of the things the validators said were dreadful mistakes weren't so bad after all. A good example is color frame borders. I was using Internet Explorer and putting colors in the borders around the frames. The validator said this was a big mistake in Netscape.

Invalid Validation

When I looked at a page with color frame borders in Netscape, there was no error message. The window didn't crash and my computer didn't either. The whole page looked exactly the same, but there was no color in the border in Netscape. Huh? Did I lose my mind? Was there a bug in the validator? So, off I went to check it in another validator. The result was exactly the same.

This made me realize that validators are not sentient beings in a little box. They are programs written by wonderful experts. Validators are still "just" programs. They have been programmed to recognize coding that will cause different results in different browsers. They have been programmed to always consider those differences as mistakes. They are still far from being able to understand that just because something may result in slight differences between browsers does not mean it is always bad.

Other Invalid Readings

Another problem that validators often misinterpret are third party scripts, like counters. They will often see them as mistakes because part of the script coding is not where the validator thinks it should be or the script isn't written to look exactly the same in all browsers, even if it will work in all browsers. But we aren't allowed to change counter scripts.

The numbers of items that can show up as deadly on a browser also include margin height and width tags, scrolling and space tags, as well as many others. I learned to test these results to see how they will look and work in the tagged browsers, instead of relying only on what the validator said.

Valid Results

Validators are not always off the mark. They can tell why an error message is popping up on a page and can often show you how to fix the problem. They can tell when there are real coding mistakes that can mess up a beautiful design. They can tell when there are broken links or if a tag was not closed properly.

Validators have many uses that make them a wonderful resource to anyone who wants to take advantage of what they have to offer. I believe it is still important to remember to use my own best judgment when a validator is the choice of methods I use to check pages. I find them too restrictive and they are too literal for my own good to rely on solely as the measure of what makes a site good.

My Own Validation

With current browser standards set the way they are, there is little that can be done by the average user about the fact that validators see mistakes that are minor as being the end of the world, or the death of a web page. I do have a few rules that I follow for the sites I review for award and for myself when coding my own pages.

1. If anything will cause any browser version to crash or cause it to show an error message, either popup or in the status bar, don't use it.

2. Test everything in as many browsers as possible. Get a large list of people using different operating systems and different browsers AND different browser versions, and ask them to check every page for you.

3. If even one person complains that something caused a problem, take it seriously. If one person has the problem, you can guarantee others will too. Not everyone will tell you. They will just leave the site and never return. I definitely don't want that and I don't believe any one else does either.

4. Not all browser specific tags are errors and not all of them will cause a problem in other browsers. Take the CSS script that changes the color of scrollbars. The color change will be seen in Internet Explorer, but not in Netscape. It won't show as an error; you just won't see the color change. However, an HTML validator will tell you it is an error.

My Rules

Those are my 4 main rules when testing new pages. I make sure to get plenty of feedback and testing done in a lot of different browsers with a lot of different operating systems at a lot of different connection speeds. That way, I have an idea what will work and what won't. Anything that is too confusing or that will cause a crash or freeze up is a no-no.

If I can't tell immediately by looking at the coding that everything should be fine, I still use validators to check pages when reviewing sites for awards. If it says something is browser specific and I don't have the browser that could be a problem, then I show it to one of my judges with that browser. I ask if there are error messages or real problems, like freezing or crashing.

Screenshots taken from different browsers are a good way to see if the web page has a real problem, or a simple difference of appearance. If it does not distort the aesthetic beauty of the page, then the difference will not count against a site.

Making Maggic

There is nothing wrong with doing special things that can't be seen by everyone, or that will be seen differently on different computers. As long as what is done looks good and works well for everyone who sees it, then it does not necessarily have to look or work exactly the same for everyone.

When a web page is created and everyone who sees it believes it is beautiful, no matter what browser is used to view it or what the literal validator has to say, the webmaster who created that page has just validated his or her own brand of Web Maggic.