Site Map -> Does layout matter? 3

[1DMF]

I'm now working on my sitemap page, hey I finally get to use a table in it's proper context - woohoo!

the thing i'd like advice on is what order I should put the links.

should it match the actual site layout, or is alphabetical order more appropriate.

should I group the links in categories?

What's the best way to do this?

thanks
1DMF.

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[BillyRayPreachersSon]

Why would you use a table for a sitemap?

See here:

http://www.aol.nl/sitemap

http://www.coedit.co.uk/information/sitemap/

http://www.ceop.gov.uk/sitemap.html

http://www.virtualglobaltaskforce.com/sitemap.html

for many ways of doing it without tables.

Dan




Coedit Limited - Delivering standards compliant, accessible web solutions

[tt]Dan's Page [blue]@[/blue] Code Couch

http://www.codecouch.com/dan/

[/tt]

 

[1DMF]

Why would you use a table for a sitemap?

Because I wish to present my links in a tabular format.

<th>URL</th><th>Description</th>

I take that is allowed?

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[ChrisHunt]

I don't think there's any one answer to this question. The job of the site map is to help people to find their way around your site, by providing a clear listing of its pages. The best way - for clarity - to list those pages will vary from site to site.

If you more than a handful of pages, some degree of categorisation is probably a good idea. Normally that category scheme would follow the structure of your site (there are automated tools out there that can spider your site and generate a map of this sort), but that's not the only way you could do it.

I wouldn't rule out a table as a way of mapping out some sites, but I'd have thought that a set of nested <ul>s is the more natural choice.

-- Chris Hunt
Webmaster & Tragedian
Extra Connections Ltd

 

[BillyRayPreachersSon]

Using tables to display tabular data is one thing, but using tables to display non-tabular data in tabular form is a grey area...

I guess it all boils down to your own preference, as ultimately who can stipulate that something as generic as a sitemap is or is not tabular data when it could be construed as such in some circumstances.

Dan



Coedit Limited - Delivering standards compliant, accessible web solutions

[tt]Dan's Page [blue]@[/blue] Code Couch

http://www.codecouch.com/dan/

[/tt]

 

[1DMF]

I've decided to go with my table in the end (rightly or wrongly).

the structure of the site "IMO" is simply a tabular list of what pages are available with a description of their usage.

to me it makes it clean, simple, easy to understand, gives much more information and guidance that those "Standard" <ul> sitemaps , and hey it's even SEO friendly!

Ticks all the boxes "again IMO"

but I appreciate your input as always, so thank you.

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[Foamcow]

No, go on, do it as a proper set of nested lists.


<honk>*:O)</honk>

Tyres: Mine's a pint of the black stuff.
Mike: You can't drink a pint of Bovril.

 

[1DMF]

ok foamy , but only if you can help with how I would lay it out, I don't mean the list obviously, but i want to give the description as i have done.

I don't mind sectioning it out , eg.

Useful Links
Mortgage Advice
Insurance Advice
Loan Advice
Company Info

something like that but lists don't allow for multiple colums do they?

which is what i'm after

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[BillyRayPreachersSon]

lists don't allow for multiple colums do they?

You clearly didn't look at the links I gave you above. They show 4 different styles of sitemap, and the last one has nested lists shown over 4 columns.

Dan

Coedit Limited - Delivering standards compliant, accessible web solutions

[tt]Dan's Page [blue]@[/blue] Code Couch

http://www.codecouch.com/dan/

[/tt]

 

[1DMF]

You clearly didn't look

oh yes I did SIR! and I instantly dismissed it because it used JavaScript to acheive their layout, if it uses JS , i'm not interested!

Also I don't like it, the headings are clickable links, they shouldn't be , at first glance they appear to be column headings but they are not, I find the map confusing and unhelpful.

I did look, I just didn't like, sorry!

;-)



"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[ChrisHunt]

using tables to display non-tabular data in tabular form is a grey area

How does "non-tabular" data differ from "tabular" data? If you want to display anything in tabular form, tables are (usually) the way to do it.

So if 1DMF wants his site map to be like this:
[tt]
+------------+---------------------------+
|URL | Description |
+============|===========================+
|home.htm | Our home page |
|about.htm | Details about our company |
|contact.htm | How to contact us |
+------------+---------------------------+
[/tt]
A table is a perfectly valid and semantic way to mark it up. It's not the only way - since it's a succession of term-and-description pairs, a <dl> is another possibility (as I've done at

http://www.extraconnections.co.uk/articles/web-design-resources/

)

The real question is - is this tabular form the best way to present a site map? I would suggest that in 99% of cases it isn't, because...
[ul]
[li]There's no reason to show raw URLs to the end user. Use the page's title instead and link it to the page in question[/li]
[li]Then, if your page titles are up to scratch, you shouldn't need to add a text description. If a title really needs further explanation, a title attribute could be used to do it in a tooltip.[/li]
[li]Urguably, the description text makes the map less usable, because it's more text to wade through in pursuit of the one item you're looking for.[/li]
[li]Finally, if your site has more than a handful of pages, it's probably organised into sections and subsections. A map is intended to help you find your way around a site, so it needs to reflect this structure somehow. A tree built from <ul>s is the conventional choice here (though not the only possible one).[/li]
[/ul]
It may be that 1DMF's site is one of the 1% where a table of URLs and descriptions is the best way, that's something that only (s)he can really judge.

-- Chris Hunt
Webmaster & Tragedian
Extra Connections Ltd

 

[1DMF]

well , thank you Chris!

I'm interested in this <dl> , whats that I know of OL/UL.

Though I checked your page and there is some weird scroll bar thing going on, are you using frames? or overflow:scroll?

the text also seem to float over the scroll bar, never seen that before! - lol

and when you move the scroll bar the headings move but the main text is stationary, not sure you were trying to acheive this, but you seem to have a whole bunch of weird funkyness going on!

I don't see why a map can't show URL, maybe they want to know the url and type it into an address bar, maybe they are on the phone to a friend and wish to communicate the direct URL to a certain page.

After all it is a map of URL's, so to me seems logical to give the URL.

I also asked the question in another thread when posting on accessibility whether I needed a map, as I already have an XML sitemap, someone suggested I could write a script to create a site map from the XML map, I wasn't keen on writing a script for that purpose, seemed a bit OTT, when I think a static HTML page would be better, but it spawned the idea of what the sitemap should contain!

If I hade used a script to convert the XML sitemap , all that would be is a bunch of URL's with not even a description.

I've decided I'm going to split it out into the sections as I suggested above, maybe I will use a table for each section. (oh no , not more tables, burn the witch!)
or maybe I'll use this DL, once I understand it's usage and if it can be applied the way i want.

However, I thought the standards we're not just about valid syntax, but semantics, seings as I wish to have a map in tabular format, shouldn't semantics dictate that it is a table that i use?



"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[BillyRayPreachersSon]

I instantly dismissed it because it used JavaScript to acheive their layout

No it doesn't. The only JS used on that page is to make all the columns the same height so that the grey lines line up (a crappy client requirement, one I wasn't happy writing).

An alternative would have been to use a y-repeating background image with no JS.

Dan

Coedit Limited - Delivering standards compliant, accessible web solutions

[tt]Dan's Page [blue]@[/blue] Code Couch

http://www.codecouch.com/dan/

[/tt]

 

[ChrisHunt]

I checked your page and there is some weird scroll bar thing going on...

What browser are you using? It looks non-weird in FF and in IE6 (and in IE7 last time I checked).

-- Chris Hunt
Webmaster & Tragedian
Extra Connections Ltd

 

[1DMF]

Ok Dan, I just saw the JS and that it was to do something to the colums (as you had commented the code) and didn't look much further, and as I've also said, I didn't like it (sorry , don't take it personally, you know I have the utmost respect for you and your help!), I'm sure there's a load of stuff I've done you don't like ;-)

Chris -> I'm using WinXP SP2 , IE7 (all updates) with a screen resolution setting of 1280 x 1024

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[Vragabond]

Chris, in IE7 (same version, same screen as 1DMF), your textarea overflows and causes problems, adding another scrollbar on the right of the content box. This scrollbar then behaves the way 1DMF mentions.

___________________________________________________________
[small]Do something about world cancer today: PACT[/small]

 

[Foamcow]

However, I thought the standards we're not just about valid syntax, but semantics, seings as I wish to have a map in tabular format, shouldn't semantics dictate that it is a table that i use?

Keyword is 'map'. Maps show the location within an environment. They are not simply lists of 'places'.

So by using HTML list elements you can nest them and so imply the position of each item in a list and where that list is in the overall map.

The thing with a table is that it doesn't imply a site structure in quite the same way. Whilst you can nest the tables, it just doesn't feel right (to me at least). The way I think this might work is if you only had a single column in each table, and everything relating to an individual 'place' was in a single cell. Once you start splitting info across multiple cells the semantics break down (imho)


If you are simply showing page titles as links then I would use an ordered list (possibly an unordered list).
If you are wanting to attach some info to each item in the list (such as the URL, a description) then you may want to use a Definition List (dl).

The format for a dl is :

<dl>
  <dt>Definition Term</dt>
    <dd>Definition definition</dd>
    <dd>further definitions for the same term</dd>
  <dt>Another term</dt>
    <dd>blah</dd>
  <dt>And another, with no definition</dt>
  <dt>last one</dt>
</dl>

<honk>*:O)</honk>

Tyres: Mine's a pint of the black stuff.
Mike: You can't drink a pint of Bovril.

 

[1DMF]

cool thanks foamy, i'll have a play (when I get time) and see if I can use this Defenition list, sounds interesting.

I had nothing but a few sites to re-vamp for accessibilty yesterday (well apart from the google fiasco!), now I have a major re-write on a section of our members area and an internal DB change with the VB front end.

Never rains when it pours!

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[ChrisHunt]

I think this might work is if you only had a single column in each table, and everything relating to an individual 'place' was in a single cell. Once you start splitting info across multiple cells the semantics break down (imho)

I think you have that completely backwards.

If you have a single-column table, that's just a list. Nine times out of ten you should be using a list element for it.

If you have multiple values to show - say a url, a title, a description, an author, a last changed date, etc. - a table becomes a more sensible choice, not least because of the accessibility features you can build into column and row headers.

-- Chris Hunt
Webmaster & Tragedian
Extra Connections Ltd

 

[1DMF]

I've just had a play with DL , to get the desired two column effect I had to use

dd {
    width:220px;
    float:left;
    }
dt {
    clear:left;
}

which is all well and good, but without CSS the structure would fall on it's face , where as doesn't a table, even if design formatting with CSS is missing, still keep it's structure?

a good example for this springs to mind. TOC , a Table Of Contents say for a book, it's technicaly a list, but by it's own defenition shouldn't you use a table?

+-----+--------------------+
|PAGE |CHAPTER             |
|=====|====================|
| 01  |in the beginning    |
| 05  |then came more      |
| 09  |we have a middle    |
| 15  |are we nearly there |
+-----+--------------------+

you wouldn't use a list, would you? , however an Index , that is a group of nested lists.

is this correct?

HOWEVER !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I re-thought the design and in the end opted for the nested lists, I was right to use a table for my design, just the design was not right for the content (as you had pointed out, i know , hear the penny drop!)

Thanks for all the input, as always, you guys rock!


"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!