Here’s a piece of news: The table tag isn’t deprecated in XHTML!
OK, “that’s not news” you say. True. It’s not. But it seems to be for some. In fact, it’s amazing the lengths people will go to avoid using tables. You know what I’m talking about.
But, “It’s not semantic”, “It’s not separating content from layout properly”, “It’s soOOoo Web 1.0” or many of the other “reasons” to shun tables are mostly, well, crap.
There’s no way I’ll believe that it’s better to use a dozen div’s and a hundred lines of CSS to accomplish the same as a table. Talk about re-inventing the wheel!
Just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should.
Listen, if you have tabular data, or need to use some sort of grid, just use tables. Be reasonable, be pragmatic. If you need a hammer, use a hammer, don’t use your forehead instead. Sure, they’ll both drive nails… Probably.
Let me re-emphasize the ‘be reasonable’ part. Remember, it cuts both ways. Too many tables can be a bad thing, and they can be a crutch. The point of this rant is that you shouldn’t avoid using tables, or some other shunned-but-non-deprecated tag, just because it’s popular to.
- end of rant -
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