CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) help to style elements on your site including font, layout, spacing and more. CSS takes the HTML on your site to another level, adding creativity and design to the core content. It can be a real time saver and has a long list of benefits – here are just a few:
- CSS is SEO-friendly, so search engines crawling your site can easily read and index content because of efficient organization and simple clean code.
- CSS is cross-browser friendly, making it easier for users to view your site on many different browsers, while maintaining the intended look and feel.
- CSS allows total control over your design, making changes to the style easy and seamless, and most importantly, consistent. Changes can be made across the entire site (as opposed to just one page at a time).
To date, CSS has been through a lot of changes, but achieving lean clean code is achievable when you follow a couple best practices. First off, keep code organized, coding generic elements first, then custom elements later. This will allow for faster editing. It’s also good to keep a template library so you don’t have to re-write code or reinvent the wheel later on. When writing code, use smart and easy-to-remember names that are also sustainable for the life of your site – the last thing you want to do is have to rename all the individual elements if you redesign your site a year or two down the road. Group elements when possible, as opposed to repeating your code. Finally, write CSS first for Gecko browsers (Firefox, Mozilla) first, then tweak for others browsers (Safari, Chrome and IE). If you’re interested in finding out more about CSS and how it can improve your site, contact our CSS experts today. Website Jungle has developed many sites using a combination of HTML5 and CSS. To view work samples,
click here.
