w3c validation

[lieven23]

I try to validate my site and I get this message in w3c validation:

Sorry, I am unable to validate this document because on line 146 it contained one or more bytes that I cannot interpret as utf-8 (in other words, the bytes found are not valid values in the specified Character Encoding). Please check both the content of the file and the character encoding indication.

The error was: utf8 "\xE7" does not map to Unicode

see : www.afro-masks.com

[dbltoe]

use firefox with the html validator add-on and you will be able to see more information. Those are the languages errors I mentioned in your other post.

[lieven23]

now ,the firefox validator says:

Sorry, I am unable to validate this document because on line 171 it contained one or more bytes that I cannot interpret as utf-8 (in other words, the bytes found are not valid values in the specified Character Encoding). Please check both the content of the file and the character encoding indication.

The error was: utf8 "\xE7" does not map to Unicode

line 171 of my index page's html says:

<div id="languagesContent" class="sideBoxContent centeredContent"><a href="http://www.afro-masks.com/index.php?main_page=index&amp;language=nl"><img src="includes/languages/dutch/images/icon.gif" alt="Nederlands" title=" Nederlands " width="24" height="16" /></a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href="http://www.afro-masks.com/index.php?main_page=index&amp;language=fr"><img src="includes/languages/french/images/icon.gif" alt="fran��ais" title=" fran�ais " width="24" height="16" /></a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href="http://www.afro-masks.com/index.php?main_page=index&amp;language=en"><img src="includes/languages/english/images/icon.gif" alt="English" title=" English " width="24" height="16" /></a>&nbsp;&nbsp;<br /></div></div>

you can see that there's a letter missing in franais(français)
because that character is not supported
in place it places a small rectangle form with "FFD" in it.

How can I replace it?

If that's is the problem??...

[Anonimus]

Sorry for the delay of the answer, but until now had not come into this forum.
You're right lieven23, the problem is the character 'ç' UTF-8 does not interpret.
The solution is simple, edit the file changing the character 'ç' for any other.
I think it is better to have a spelling mistake but the w3c validator validate the code, isn't ?
Greetings from Catalonia.

[Athens Collectibles]

I think it is better to have a spelling mistake but the w3c validator validate the code, isn't ?

Unless I'm totally ignorant, why is it so important that the w3c validator validates the code? Mine doesn't validate for things like "border-radius", "cursor:hand" etc but what's the big deal about it?

[Website Rob]

Many use the W3C Validator as the W3C makes the Validation Standards. Also, it is easy for a Client to use their URL and get information on whether the coder -- they may have paid good money to -- knew what they were doing.

Validation is important for lots of reasons:

- as a coder it shows you know what you are doing
- as a coder it makes it easier to find mistakes
- as a client they know they got good results, if they paid someon for coding

If we use your site as a Validation example, it's a good thing you don't care about Validation but I hope you didn't pay someone for coding.

athenscollectibles .com shows 237 Errors which for a Professional Coder would be acceptable; and should be unacceptable to their Clients as well.


For example.

<div class="wdk_sidecolumn-type-basic" style="width:140px; overflow-x: hidden;">
<p><div align="center"> << you cannot have a 'div' within a 'p' tag
<center> << this tag was dropped about 8 yrs. ago and should not be used

Mind you, if a person does their own coding then they can go by their own Standards. For Professional Coders charging people money for work done, it is a whole 'nother ballgame.

[Athens Collectibles]

Thank you Rob, interesting viewpoint.

It's not that I don't care about validation, it's more that I'm not familiar with these doc types etc.

The site you run through the validator is not a Zen Cart site. It's hosted by an e-commerce platform and I'm not responsible for the coding except for the pages I add to the general template provided by the host.

My Zen Cart site is athenscollectibles.info and this too has a number of validation errors but I haven't paid any one to code it. I'm still in the design phase and I will have a look at the errors when I'm through with it.

Just to take advantage of your knowledge since you are around: one of the validation warnings is

<a href="/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=5&language=en">

Comment: This is generally the sign of an ampersand that was not properly escaped for inclusion in an attribute, in a href for example. You will need to escape all instances of '&' into '&amp;'.

Would the link work if I followed the suggestion and changed it to

<a href="/index.php?main_page=index&amp;cPath=5&amp;language=en">

(Probably yes, in which case it won't be too difficult to correct most of the errors and warnings).

Thanks for the explanations and best wishes for a nice weekend.

[Website Rob]

Would the link work if I followed the suggestion and changed it to

<a href="/index.php?main_page=index&amp;cPath=5&amp;language=en">

--------------------------------------------------

You are correct as the answer is Yes.

By default, Zen Cart will do the substituting for you. It's when you do some custom coding that you need to remember.

Also, Validation applies to all / any site, not just Zen Cart ones.

[dbltoe]

@Athens
Yes, some sites will look okay even with 237 validations errors. BUT... You can only assume that the site is going to display properly IF you force everyone to use the same browser you are using.

It's interesting that conforming to W3C standards will often not do well with "Internet Exploder". That's why you see many "clear both calls in the Zen Cart files. Just to make it look more accurate with IE.

Sometimes Browser Shots can give you a better feel for whether your site will work with a particular browser.

[torvista]

Out of the box Zen Cart (catalog) is valid, why break it with sloppy modifications?

I find the FF HTML validator indispensible for development work: just by keeping an eye on the status bar tick/cross icon I can see immediately when I have broken something that although wrong, the browser will interpret ok and not show as broken to the eye.

If you don't keep the code valid you are giving yourself extra work when you come to identify and fix the non-FF browser-specific problems.