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Web Standards in UAE

Posted: July 28th, 2006 | Author: dotblack | Filed under: UAE, Web-Design | 10 Comments »

That’s true, Web Standards. And they look good on UAE websites. The day Etisalat wears all standards and respects it, is a milestone. It’s a mark, it’s a good thing! ’cause Etisalat usualy never respected web standards, nor browsers.

EtisalatIt was yesterday when I was trying to find out why Etisalat would block YouTube. I hated Etisalat, paying a visit to their website changed my mind (although still hate them for YouTube). Reminded me of DU, the first visit to DU’s freshly simple website.

Finally Table-less

It is satisftying to see at least Table-less XHTML markup in Etisalat’s website. The code might not be valid(not valid at all), the markup is spread badly around white-spaces in code, lauzy Java CMS. But still, Table-less which gives me hope and keeps me happy for a while. There’s progress.

Etisalat's website

On the other hand, the website structure has improved dramatically! Indeed, great job on the IA. As for accessibility, it might be still underwork, or really just an after thought. Off topic, but really bad typography in English(works for the logo, not for the Nav!)

Pioneers taking standards way

This is just the begining, did I forget to mention the huge steps in i18n and localization in the websites designed and developed for/by UAE organizations? Looks good.

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10 Comments on “Web Standards in UAE”

  1. 1 Rami Kayyali said at 5:34 am on July 28th, 2006:

    Yes, it’s a step forward, but they’ve only done in response to DU’s threat rather than awareness, don’t you think?

  2. 2 dotone said at 8:11 am on July 28th, 2006:

    Very true(exactly how they rebranded as well). That’s the good side of the competition. But, the point is, once Etisalat does that, the message has at least reached. Promising!

  3. 3 Magnus said at 9:14 am on July 28th, 2006:

    Following standards? Perhaps… but their site looks really strange in Firefox on Mac. There’s a scroll bar all across the right hand side that apparently doesn’t do anything. And their online payment system? Doesn’t work with Safari, and works just barely with Firefox. And both browsers usually do better with standards than IE, in my experience.

  4. 4 dotone said at 11:14 am on July 28th, 2006:

    Magnus, sure I understand it’s not even cross-browser compatible. You noticed that I emphasized on the “Table-less” code, no semantic markup. I even noticed that the JS used is not fully following DOM. I can garauntee you, Etisalat’s site won’t even improve more than that(it’ll take at least another year), but that’s by itself a huge step, I tell ya that. ‘Cause they outsource UI design, and then implement it on their CMS by the in-house team. The in-house team really needs some fresh faces.

  5. 5 dotone said at 11:42 am on July 28th, 2006:

    Forgot to mention that I tested it on Firefox and Opera on Windows, and it looked good in Mac-Firefox it’s broken in Safari though.

  6. 6 Rida Al Barazi said at 4:04 pm on July 28th, 2006:

    I agree that its a very good step, but we are moving one step at a time while the world is moving ten…

    As you said in-house team needs some fresh faces, not only in Etisalat but in many others too, the market needs to be educated more to do more and seeing Web Standards is a good sign that they start to understand the need of it and start to implement it, even as a response to competition, actually this makes it more thrilling to me :)

  7. 7 Rami Kayyali said at 5:26 am on July 29th, 2006:

    Man, this brings back so many memories. I’m actually having a deja vu from year 2000 of Eric Meyer, Tantek, Dave Shea and a few others arguing about “tabled” vs. table-less.

    The good ol’ days, huh?

    Hey, perhaps we should start some organization that actually works with companies and teaches them the advantages, how and what to do, etc. No, not like AISO, something more real and down to earth, what do you think?

  8. 8 dotone said at 5:57 am on July 29th, 2006:

    A group? Like a “UAE WS group”? That’s just great, I’m up for it. Who else is?

  9. 9 Rida Al Barazi said at 4:18 am on July 30th, 2006:

    I’m up too :)

  10. 10 Rami Kayyali said at 5:14 am on July 30th, 2006:

    Maybe not just a UAE WS Group, how about a MEWS Group, it even has a cool pronunciation.

    I’m up for it.