37 signals wrote this week ‘Web designers should do their own HTML / CSS’. This post basically follows thinking I’ve had for a long time where by you shouldn’t call yourself a web designer if you can not code HTML/ CSS. As expected there are some pretty strong for and against opinions in the comments. In the past I’ve been fairly vocal myself about my opinion on this and also experienced in my working life the frustration of making up a design from someone who doesn’t understand the web as a medium or HTML / CSS.
Potters know what clay is.
It is an obvious frustration that some people (thankfully this does seem to be on the decrease) who ‘design for web’ have no understanding of what that means. One area sadly is those print designers who end up doing a bit of web design ‘on the side’ which quickly becomes more than the side. As I have sat in both the developer and designer camp I know only too well the frustration of having to make up a design created by someone who is not aware of the medium they are designing for. One of the major areas often designers who do not know the web as a medium or code XHTML / CSS fall down on is realising the web is not print. In a website there are conventions you can work in and use to bolster your design. Link styles, navigation, the fluidity of the web as a medium - these all play a part and if you don’t understand them you can’t use them as tools to create your design.
What type of site you are designing also should be understood. Can you honestly think that a designer could create a good blog design without understanding what WordPress (or the blogging platform they are designing for) can or can’t do? Would they be able to know all the tools available to them and use them to their optimum? If a designer doesn’t even know what a CMS is or what commerce systems are how can they design a site that works for it. Of course, I’m not saying they have to be able to code these systems from scratch, but knowing what they do or don’t do and what functions they can use in their design, surely that is essential? I simply think it’s either a very very rare person or impossible for a designer to be able to only ever work in Photoshop and not even know how to code XHTML / CSS or what the mediums they are designing for can do.
Changes in response to coding.
If you are the designer of the code and making up the HTML / CSS you have the ability to interpret and develop your design in this phase. I never see a design fully complete until the HTML / CSS has been done as more often than not by going through the coding process it evolves. I feel designs mature through this process and for me to not have this part of the process in the majority of my work would be a shame. On those projects where I’ve not been able to do this I at least because I understand the medium can work with the developer and get solutions. My designs at the start are made with the understanding I have of the medium from being able to code myself.
Harsh but true.
I’m probably just like the 37 signals article not making friends in this post, but you know what I’ve sort of gone beyond caring on that one. For far too long the web has been seen as an easy design option that you do not need to know the relevant skills to design for. If we are ever as web designers to take it to the level of a full profession where skilled workers are recognised we have to take a stance. The web, HTML and CSS are not closed books and it does not take long to grasp a rudimentary ability in them - there can be no real excuse for a ‘web designer’ to not be able to do their own code.
I fully understand that sometimes the working process does not allow the designer to be able to produce the code - I guess my point really is ‘can they’ - if not they shouldn’t be designing for the web. It’s not that you do produce every line as this is a luxury I often have but some don’t, however if you can’t what on earth are you doing designing for the web? Print designers have to understand printing processes and what needs to be done to get something looking right in print. So why shouldn’t web designers also have to know XHTML / CSS and understand what a website is. When I design as someone that can code in XHTML / CSS I understand what I am designing for. To me that is a strong point and often the difference between a design working or not.
I’ve never fully understood where this kind of posts comes from — and I’ve read a few. Are there really people out there who know nothing of HTML and call themselves web designers?
Look, I’ve been dabbling in design, DTP and print, HTML/CSS for years now, I’ve done a couple sites in simple code from scratch and I occasionally help people out modding a CMS (often WordPress) to their (basic) needs. I do the pix and the vector logo, I mess with the code and the structure, but I hardly “design”, let alone develop.
If I read posts like this (which obviously indicate there’s cowboys out there charging more and doing less) I’m seriously considering changing my profile and putting out an ad.
Of course, all this does not mean that I don’t sympathize; I know you and others are real designers and I can only imagine what it must feel like when the fools you refer to come along and run off with your clients because they do it cheaper.