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Re: Semantic markup vs CSS styling for emphasis

for

From: jeff newman
Date: Aug 6, 2003 9:56AM

I do agree that it would remove the structural meaning of the mark-up. I'm
not sure if this would be penalized in anway, i.e. lower ranking in search
engines.

My natural instinct, as has been expressed by others is to use the
appropriate tags wherever possible and then pretty them up using CSS. I
can think of a couple of examples where getting a CSS tag to perform a
function already available in a standard HTML tag could lead to problems
down the road.

But then again, it all depends on what you're hoping to accomplish, right?
:)

j.


On Wed, 6 Aug 2003 16:30:45 +0100, Mark Fletcher <mark-
<EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:

> Hi Jeff,
>
>> Even if you're using CSS you still have to mark up where your
>> emphasis/strong begins and ends. It's much simpler to just use the
>> appropriate tag than to create a class/div/selector. The only time I
>> can
>> think of using a CSS solution that doesn't involve <em> or <strong>
>> would
>> be if I needed different kinds of emphasis for some reason.
>
> Absolutely I could not agree with you more.
>
>> Unless I'm totally missing the point of what you're asking (which is
>> possible... it's only 11:10am... groan....)
>
> The main question is would you do this:
>
> This is <span class="emphasis">bold<span>
> emphasis {font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-
> weight:
> bold;}
>
> Or would you do this:
>
> This is <strong>bold</strong>
>
> strong {font-weight: bold;font-style: normal;}
>
> In my mind using the span removes the structural meaning from the mark-
> up,
> do you agree with this?
>
> Cheers
> Mark
>
>
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>



--
Jeff Newman
Librarian, Reference Department
Robarts Library, University of Toronto
p: 416.978.1953
e: <EMAIL REMOVED>


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