RE: Accessibility/SEO and IDs?

It seems that there is a need out there for essentially programtically
optimizing html pages.  Just like compilation converts, say, C code to
machine code, optimizing html would optimize it with all the various
heuristics (shortening id's, gzipping ahead of time, removing whitespace,
removing comments, etc).

Anyone have such a practice in place?  I.e. a separation between source html
and optimized html?  If so, do you use an automating product?  

I'm just curious as to whether this is common practice among expert web
people and which tools are common for this process.

moran

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf
> Of Anthony Ettinger
> Sent: Wednesday, March 22, 2006 7:54 PM
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: [wdf-dom] Accessibility/SEO and IDs?
> 
> you should try to keep your markup lean, i very rarely need  more than
> 3 or 4 id's on a page.
> 
> 
> On 3/22/06, Anthony Ettinger <[email protected]> wrote:
> > You are right, it makes a difference...I certainly wouldn't give ids
> > names like "something_logn_and_ireitating_here"..
> >
> > However, it does make it easier for someone reading the code. If you
> > have to put 3 lines of comments around it for it to make sense, then
> > you've lost the original goal.
> >
> >
> >
> > On 3/22/06, Jim Auldridge <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > I should correct my earlier e-mail about ID attributes and SEO.  It
> > > turns out that the HTML standards may soon include header and footer
> > > (etc) elements based on the amout of sites using DIVs with those IDs.
> > > It was a search engine company that provided that information to the
> > > standards folks, which is where I confused the issue.  My apologies.
> > >
> > > In regards to Anthony's statement, "since it's an id, it should only
> > > be on the page once....if your page load time is effected by the id
> > > attribute, you've got bigger problems," I don't think that is
> > > completely accurate.  True, a given ID should only appear once in a
> > > document, but your document can have as many IDs as it does elements.
> > > So shortening their names can certainly shorten the total size of
> > > outputted content.  This is a valid thought on the part of site owners
> > > with cheaper hosting whose sites could receive bursts of traffic.
> > > Serving 100 extra bytes several thousand times can add up.  If it adds
> > > up enough, it can cost you down time or extra money.  Just a thought.
> > >
> > > Jim
> > >
> > > On 3/22/06, Anthony Ettinger <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > > On 3/22/06, Chris <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > > > If you work in a team, there's the benefit of whoever does the
> CSS, or
> > > > > ties in backend code, etc, has a better chance of discerning one
> chunk
> > > > > of HTML from another and its purpose.
> > > > >
> > > > >  From a user's perspective, remember that every ID can be targeted
> as an
> > > > > anchor, i.e.: blah.html#list_of_shopping - that can be useful if
> for
> > > > > example, you want to link someone to a specific section of a long
> page
> > > > > they want to read. Personally, I'll occasionally View Selected
> Source in
> > > > > Firefox to get IDs like that and add them into a link I send to
> people
> > > > > on occasion. That's an extremely geeky use of the capability, but
> the
> > > > > point is, there are uses... probably some far less geeky than my
> own. So
> > > > > you may as well make them user-friendly.
> > > > >
> > > > > Lastly, you're going to run into overlap with short IDs... but if
> small
> > > > > HTML is of the utmost importance for some reason, the shorter IDs
> may be
> > > > > a better fit.
> > > > >
> > > > > -Chris
> > > > >
> > > > > Seb Frost wrote:
> > > > > > Is there any reason (other than to make your own
> work/maintenance easier) to
> > > > > > use semantic IDs on your webpages?
> > > > > >
> > > > > > In other words, does <div id="header"> benefit anyone other than
> the coder
> > > > > > over <div id="h">?
> > > > > >
> > > > > > I'm all for cutting down on any bytes that don't need to be sent
> to the
> > > > > > browser, and if working by myself I'd quickly get used to
> shorthands like
> > > > > > this, and they wouldn't proove to be a maintenance headache at
> all, for me.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > But is there a benefit to longer IDs?  Will search engines pick
> up on <ul
> > > > > > id="list_of_shopping"> or is <ul id="l"> just as good?
> > > > > >
> > > > > > cheers
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Seb
> > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > >
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> > > > microformats are on the rise, but I would stop short of saying it
> > > > makes a difference in Google serps.
> > > >
> > > > The main concern should be readability. id="header" makes much more
> > > > sense than id="h".
> > > >
> > > > since it's an id, it should only be on the page once....if your page
> > > > load time is effected by the id attribute, you've got bigger
> problems
> > > > :-)
> > > >
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> > > > --
> > > > Anthony Ettinger
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