I'm using a table for layout (sorry I know the forum doesn't approve!)

I want to have a horizontal line created by coloured table row. Dreamweaver won't allow the cells to be less than 11px, even though all that is in them is a spacer gif 1x1 pixels. If I enter a lower height it says this is less than the minimum and won't accept it. It won't accept it direct in the html either. Why not, and how can I change this? I'd like about 5px.

Also, the supposedly transparent gif, created by Dreamweaver, actually shows as a little dot. And of course the full width spacers in the lowest cells which are there to keep the cells at the correct width show up as lines, even worse.

Help much appreciated.

I think you have summarised your opening statement quite nicely! This is one reason why we don't use tables for layout :-)

Sorry!

Have you tried simply adding a div with the repeated image as a horizontal line? Or border-bottom, or make it 5px height and set the background?

Rotorhead thanks for the reply. I'm a rank amateur and don't fully understand what you say but never fear I will get the books out and work it out!

Meanwhile I accidentally found out what caused the 11 px height prescription. It was because the table had cell padding (5)(ao 10 in all). Remove that, and I can adjust the height as much as I like.

Well done! You will find this kind of thing happens lots and lots with using tables.

Divs are just defined 'areas' in a defined place on the page and of a defined size. You can then add content (ie text) to them. They are the main alternative way of making a laout to using a table...and much better! Tables should only be used for tabular data!

Do some searches on div so see what they do. Most sites are constructed of a series of div 'boxes'.

I suggest that if you don't use Firefox as your web browser, you start doing so and then you install an add-on called firebug. You can then use this to highlight the way in which a page is constructed from divs or tables.

 

Have fun!

Well done! You will find this kind of thing happens lots and lots with using tables.

Divs are just defined 'areas' in a defined place on the page and of a defined size. You can then add content (ie text) to them. They are the main alternative way of making a laout to using a table...and much better! Tables should only be used for tabular data!

Do some searches on div so see what they do. Most sites are constructed of a series of div 'boxes'.

I suggest that if you don't use Firefox as your web browser, you start doing so and then you install an add-on called firebug. You can then use this to highlight the way in which a page is constructed from divs or tables.

 

Have fun!

Brilliant. I'm now using Firefox and it's great. I had been told about it before but just hadn't got round to it. it seems much faster and better than IE. And I've realised that setting a text size eg small is no good as it's different in the 2 browsers, but point sizes do work ok.

So thanks again.

I will look into using divs. But I have a friend who told me she'd used css layout, seemed fine but then it would be a complete mess in another browser ... that's what put me off. Is there a trick that avoids that?

Welcome to Firefox. The more you use it, the more you will discover!

Might I also recommend that you insall the following add-ons to help with your web development:

FireBug (to completely inspect a page and even change and remove things directly)

ColorZilla (to 'sample' colours on a page)

Web Developer Toolbar (pretty much to do everything else! All about viewing info on a site)

IE Tab (to quickly try a page in IE but still using FF!!)

 

And then also software called MultipleIEs to install other versions on the same machine.

 

As for your concerns about using style sheets for layout....

tables will irritate you beyond belief and aside from anything else...that's not what they are supposed to be used for. Making a site according to the standards will be rewarded by speed of the site, ease of alterations and also by the search engines.

Yes, there are problems with divs and style when using IE but that is because of problems with IE not with the design method and these problems are well documented and understood online; whereas tables just do things seemingly at random.

Overall.....layout with style is much better.

 

It's probably fair to say that as a complete newbie, tables are easier but you will quickly realise their limitations.

 

Have fun!!