I haven't used tables for layout for years now -- but I do actually still miss them. Some things were actually just easier to do with tables (ie. multiple full height columns, vertical centering, and a host of other miscellaneous items that come up from time to time where I wish I could just throw in a table). There are of course ways to do these with div based layouts, but I actually feel like they were a bit cleaner with tables. I've come across whole websites just devoted to creating columns with divs and addressing the issues that arise with div based columns! I think one of the advantages of tables was that cells were linked, so if one cell grew vertically, it also pulled down the cells next to it. Elments of the page were tied to on another -- which is a nice principle in terms of design.
Don't get me wrong, I actually really like divs and coding pages in that style (it's all I've done for the bast 4 or 5 years), but there were some nice things about tables. I also notice the same 'validating' reasons given that I don't necessarily agree with:
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Originally Posted by HTMLBasicTutor
"[with tables] you have to redo the pages if you want to make a major layout change"
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I've never actually understood this point -- if I'm making a change, I'm going to be editing files regardless of how they are coded. Generally this is only a stylesheet and a layout file whether it's div or table based.
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Originally Posted by HTMLBasicTutor
people tend to nest tables within tables too much
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People tend to nest divs within divs too much as well.
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Originally Posted by HTMLBasicTutor
Tables are meant for data, not layouts
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True, but if something does work well for another use, then I don't see the issue. History is riddled with tools and inventions created for one purpose, but which work brilliantly for other uses as well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by HTMLBasicTutor
Coding for Tables based layouts is more bloated
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I think this is debatable. There are some layouts that require much less coding when done as a table, especially simple ones with just a header, sidebar, main content window, and a footer. Much of the behavior is a natural property of the table structure (ie. columns) -- with divs, you have to code that behavior into it.
Again, just thought I would play devil's advocate here. There are many, many advantages to using divs, and yes, if you're coding websites now, they should be div based. However, there were some very useful features of the table-based systems that were let go of when divs were adopted.
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