W3 Schools is a site devoted to teaching a variety of tools for use on the web from html 4.01 to ajax. They use a well organized three column layout, I can find nothing to fault with the way this site is organized. Of course it passes validation from W3c with flying colors.
CSS is linked and used for all design elements from fonts to link appearance and behaviors. The only fault I can find is that it is not commented, perhaps they keep an internal version of the CSS that includes comments.
Mark up is done in xhtml transitional and is well formed and easy to read. It lacks comments, but again I wonder if they don't keep a commented version of this document internally. Even though it is uncommented, it is relatively easy to see how the mark up is used through a good use of class names.
The design makes a great deal of sense, at column left there are a wide variety of tutorials, starting with the most basic "Html Tutorials" and ranging through a number of other more advanced topics. In this way, a user will see what is most commonly needed first. The red headings on the table for each topic draw the eye easily. Though they've changed the default link coloring, it is abundantly clear where the links are.
The center div communicates the purpose of the site very clearly. There is no arbitrary use of graphics or art, scrolling further you'll find a section on current events of interest to web developers.
In the right column, you'll see the color scheme from the left column has been reversed - black table headings, with red links. This stands out nicely against a white background. This area is reserved for examples of various web tools (html, css, xml, etc) which again is probably more commonly visited than the material beneath it. The only change I can conceive of here would be moving the "validation" portion up the column a bit, perhaps over statistics.
This site does have advertising, both first (from W3 Schools), second party (an advertiser pays W3 Schools directly for ad space) and third party (from Google.) However, only first party advertising for certification from W3 Schools appears on the home page. All three types of ads are found in the bottom portion of the tutorial and example pages. The second and third party ads are well targeted (of possible interest to people browsing this site), appropriate and unobtrusive while remaining visible.
If there were such a thing as a perfect web site, this one might come very close indeed. A great looking site and a great resource, I've used this site throughout this class and will no doubt be looking to it in my next one.
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- © 2008 Chris Demmons