It always amazes me how many web developers don’t validate their website code.  To me it shows that they are unprofessional and possibly lazy, it’s not a difficult task and if you are writing good web code then it shouldn’t be difficult to validate a site.

So what is validation?  There is a non-profit making organisation called W3, the World Wide Web Consortium that develops standards to ensure the long-term growth of the Web.  It’s sponsored and supported by all the big IT organisations Microsoft, IBM, Apple etc. They provide on an online validator http://validator.w3.org/ that will show whether your website has valid code.  Valid code means that all of the code works,  it’s clean, tidy and functional.  It’s useful for developers as it picks up errors and shows what and where they are so that you can fix them.  Why don’t you check your website to see how good your web developer really is?

So as well as showing that your web developer really knows how to code, what else is validation useful for?:

1.  Cross browser support – this means your website should look the same in all browsers.  Have you noticed there are more about these days, Google Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Safari?

2. Which leads us to accessibility.  Accessibility is big news these days, do you want to discriminate against someone because they have a disability, if your website doesn’t work in specialist browsers for disabled people you could be accused of being discriminatory.

3. If your web site is built to certain standards it means that if your web developer ups and moves to Timbuktu that any other competent web developer should be able to update and maintain your website.

4. Despite what they might tell you,  there is little or no certification for Web professionals, and only few universities teach Web technologies.  I was quite lucky in my degree that this was covered in extra courses after our exams in the second and third year. Able professionals will take pride in creating Web content using semantic and well-formed markup.  Anyone can create a website using Word these days so it really is a way of separating the professionals from the cowboys.

I always try to make sure websites I create validate, although I will add the caveat that with content editable sites I can’t help what my customers add.  For example with shops that use Zen Cart. Validators hate ampersands (&) because they are used in many html tags, so if you want to use an ampersand in your text, then you should be typing (&).

Have a play with the validator and see which companies and developers are really professionals http://validator.w3.org/.