Occasionally, I offer free advice on forums where webmasters ask for feedback on there website. When doing so, myself or another experienced webmaster will suggest that the owner asking for the review should validate their code.
The common responses:
- Validating HTML, who cares…
- I can get my site to look and work the way I want without validating. It’s a waste of time.
- It won’t help my SEO
- It takes too long
- Nobody needs to tell me how to build a site
- And the list goes on…
Surprisingly, many get very defensive about not validating. I can tell another webmaster their logo looks grainy or unprofessional, and they will say “Thank you! I knew it needed fixing. I will get on that right away.” If I say “You should validate your code to improve user accessibility.” I get “Piss off”, or “it’s a waste of time, I know how to build a site, validate your own”. They are not as kind as the the commentators I get on this site. Maybe many of you understand there is a value to it, but you just haven’t been convinced yet.
Most site owners don’t validate, see my recent post about 2009′s top ten website mistakes. In the next two posts I will list some real reasons why validating will benefit the user, and equally important, how it will benefit YOU.
Do I get paid for promoting W3C’s method for validation? No. I want you to start validating because I know once you start, you will quickly begin to experience the real benefits. You will also find out it’s easier than you think.
Haven’t tried it yet? Validate Your Website on W3C.
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I agree with you on this, especially if you are selling web design services, since then good, validated code should come second nature.
It also doesn’t take long to do, so it may just been seen as lazy if you don’t.
You are right on the money here, I think many of the naysayers are only that because they haven’t taken the time to see what a difference validated code makes.
Exactly!
Well said Robert, people often do not concentrate on the small factors in getting the bigger picture. But as a service provider it is very necessary to be perfect on the smaller ends which would automatically make the bigger picture right.
I just tested this page and it validated. I’m impressed. Almost every time I’ve tried to validate anything it fails. Perhaps if the pass/fail was limited to “will the page display in IE/FF/Chrome”, more people would use it?
Guy.
I agree with you on this