Below is our interview with Mark Roberts creator of free-css.com…
Could you provide a bit of information about yourself and free-css.com?
Free CSS came to life about 18 months ago after my first attempt at building a template site called “free-css-templates.co.uk”. Due to the amount of interest in the original site I decided to change the name to (it was surprisingly still available) the magical name of Free-CSS.com.
As the site started to grow I had an influx of emails referencing tutorials and reference material – so in turn I started writing tutorials and added other relevant CSS information to the site.
There are still quite a few sites out there using tables for the layout, why should they move over to using CSS?
That’s a tricky question. My personal point of view (like many others) is that tables are or were constructed for tabular information and not for lay out. Although many developers have converted to CSS there are still those who use CSS the same way as they would use tables – nesting DIV tags the same way as a table would be built. This in my opinion is no change to using tables.
There is increasing talk amongst designers about ignoring IE6 compatibility, what are your thoughts on this?
A question that has to be answered in 2 steps:
a. If you are building a personal or portfolio website then cover as many browsers as possible – this shows that you know what you are doing and that you have taken care in accommodating as many internet users as possible.
b. If you are building a commercial website then it’s basically an argument that has to be covered with your client(s). Extra mark-up for browsers that don’t conform to W3C standards means more time has to go into the project. As we all know “Time is Money”
I personally still cover IE6 – whether it be for personal or commercial projects.
What is your favourite use of CSS design on the web (and why)?
I don’t have a personal favourite – I enjoy building my sites using CSS because of the flexibility. The top site to demonstrate the flexibility of CSS is most probably Zen Garden. Zen Garden demonstrates what you can do with one and the same HTML file by changing the CSS – create numerous individually styled sites.
Your site is ranked in the top 5 on Google for some very popular search terms (e.g. “CSS templates”), how much of this was down to conscious effort and how much has been through natural linking?
That my website ranks well in the majority of search engines is mainly down to the users of the site. If someone likes a site then they will blog about it or tell their friends who in turn tell their friends. All free marketing makes for a naturally well linked website, which as we all know improves rankings. Obviously some work has gone into the optimisation of the site, but that was never the number one aspect.
What lessons have you learned about running a site this big?
There have been two main lessons:
1. Better planning – I never expected that the site would grow to the size it has.
2. Listening to the users – if they say that something doesn’t work or if you get emails that repeat queries then change the way elements work or add extras so that your users have a better “User Experience”
Building a site this big needs a lot of thought and planning – I have just spent 10 weeks solid, re-building and re-structuring the site. I have listened to what the users of my site have said and now the site incorporates the 3 main aspects that they wanted, which included an advanced template search system, the capability to vote for individual templates and commenting capabilities.
Looking to the future, are there any new capabilities in CS3 you are particularly keen to start using?
The main aspect of CSS3 that interests me the most is being able to create rounded boxes with just one or 2 tags instead of having to use either multiple tags or full width images. There are obviously other areas where multiple images could easily be used, but my favourite is rounded corners.
How do you see CSS evolving in the coming years?
I would like to see more use of CSS and maybe more specific element use. At the moment due to Browser wars and non compliance, CSS support is varied. Meaning that Browser developers should get to grips and support all aspects of CSS – it would make life a lot easier.
Are there any resources on the internet you use that you would recommend for beginners and advanced coders?
All or should I say the majority of resources that I use or have used can be found on my site under External Resources which can be found here http://www.free-css.com/free-css-resources.php
If you missed it, read our interview with designerstalk.com’s Oliver Dale
Good interview guys. I like Mark’s site not really because of the finished templates (some of which are already good enough), but becuase they can provide an excellent starting block for customsiing them without starting from scratch.
As with all these template sites, you need to approach them and view the templates with an open mind. Try to imagine header banner changes, color changes and layout changes and don’t assume you can only change the content.
It’s also a great way to get to know CSS better, becuase you can see how certain elements are styled and loks for the hacks they use.
I also agree with Mark, in that, we still cover IE6 becuase you cannot be certain what browsers your clients’ customers will be using.
Keep up the good blog!
Interesting reading someone like Mark still insists on building IE6 compliance to such a full extent. I have my doubts how much longer this will continue especially with Windows 7 round the corner ( which will no doubt include IE8 ).
And as the previous post mentions, templates are a great place to learn. One thing I love about web design is the constant progression of web standards. Just when you think you know everything – the machine moves forwards to the next level.
I agree that CSS makes for great flexibility and I believe that you should design a business website for the most popular browsers, screen size and where possible be standards compliant.
I personally use Firefox and our last months’ ecommerce visitor analytics showed the following:
User Browser
IE – 69% (IE7 – 73%, IE6 – 19%, IE8 – 8%)
Firefox – 24%
Safari – 4%
Chrome 2%
others – 1%
User Screen Size
1024×768 – 28%
1280×800 – 25%
1280×1024 – 12%
1440×900 – 10%
1680×1050 – 10%
800×600 – 2%
others – 13% (mainly larger screen size variations)
The trend is to ever larger screen sizes because the prices are now relatively cheap. That’s why I changed my view on 100% fluid width CSS design (website spreads right across the users browser in a maximised window), as they just don’t provide a smooth eye-flow for a user and the focus is lost – particularly if you want someone to buy from a website.
I have to disagree with you about Zen Garden, many designs offer too much style over function and the home page does not achieve a good balance in my view (those light mauve links would play havoc with sales conversion rates). 100% width fluid designs just don’t look good in my opinion on a larger monitor (I use 1680×1050 res). I have found that good CSS is a compromise between a number of factors that must include commercial aspects, moreso for business.
Of course, elements of all the above will change over time and there’s no doubt that CSS is the smart way to control the look and function of any site for the foreseable future.
It’s great to read an interview with Mark as he really is passionate about web standards and CSS from a coding point of view.
He is actually a CSS mentor of mine from a few years back when we worked together, now I can say that with his help my coding skills have caught up with my design skills. We were coding sites for SEO purposes and delivering well coded sites to the browser, free from errors means fast sites for users and better indexing for search engines.
Getting it ‘right’ in ALL browsers gives you a certain satisfaction and if you code to W3C then you can expect to have a head start when bug fixing in IE6.
Yes we all hate it but there are some holy hacks and easy work arounds for IE6 now (display:inline being a fave of mine to fix puzzling layout issues). I use IETester now (http://www.my-debugbar.com/wiki/IETester/HomePage) to quickly run my layouts to check for compatibility.
Marks brilliant site http://www.free-css.com has all the building blocks you will ever need to get a full grasp of building compliant W3C sites with CSS and Xhtml. I recommend any designer to dig deep and bookmark his site as a valuable resource.
Congrats on the site Mark and keep up the good work!
Can only agree with Mark and Adrian, IE6 hasn’t gone yet and may not for a while. Our figures across several sites show about 26% of IE total – 18% of all visitors. We also still regularly receive queries to the help desk on the subject of IE6 and the topic came up amongst browser issues at a student day we held.
Would also like to thank Mark for the effort on his site which we know fairly well. Apart from going well beyond just being a template site and adding much more, the whole principle of using templates is important in our effort to persuade site owners to avoid WYSIWYG editors, produce a more functional/compliant site.
Most find the CSS side harder to master than a basic grasp of HTML. We even deliberately use templates on our web help sites, as a demonstration of the principle. Whether free, or low cost, these are a real help to many people who can’t afford design fees and would normally end up with a less functional, or less attractive site.