Its about the “Web designers who can’t code”

March 9th, 2010 by Nikhil

With my limited skill-set with tools like Photoshop and Illustrator, I can honestly confess that I’m a better developer than I am a designer. But my background with core (server side) development with Java/PHP/COBOL , has been a very positive influence on my UI development skills. What I mean is, while creating my designs,i.e. whenever I do design, I think about how the design can be best converted into HTML-CSS and while doing the HTML-CSS, I give a thought about the backend technology and make reasonably sure that the HTML can be easily implemented into XSL loops or PHP snippets etc.

Over years, I have been thrown head on to designs by UI designers who probably donot have a clue what HTML or CSS is. All these years I have been thinking that I would asking for too much, If I just expect the designer, who is trying to shov his “impossible to code” design down my throat, to understand just a little bit what his design would be converted into. THAT would help right?

Then, I came across this post today … Web designers who can’t code …Thanks Lord! I’m just one of many who feel the same … The above artitle is a bit a long winded .. but worth the read, every word of it.

Thanks Elliot Jay Stocks … I feel relieved!

Here is some excerpts from Elliots article.

Wow, what a day! It started with one little tweet and ended with a discussion that seemed to sweep across the whole web design community. It appears there are some very strong opinions held on the subject of whether web designers should be able to code.

So, before we get into this, allow me to quickly recap what I said on this morning on Twitter:

Honestly, I’m shocked that in 2010 I’m still coming across ‘web designers’ who can’t code their own designs. No excuse.

… I should’ve been a little more specific in my tweet. I was talking about designers who don’t have even the most basic HTML and CSS skills to turn a flat design into an actual site. Not people who intentionally choose not to code; those who can’t. And I’m also referring only to front-end code here; of course it’s ridiculous to think that designers should also be amazing back-end programmers …

We get ‘web’ designs sent in Illustrator, 300dpi, impossible to code, no consistency / usability.
~ Amy Mahon

It’s getting late, and I’ve got to wrap this up somehow. I know there will be many who disagree with me, and my intention is not to offend or upset anyone who can’t code, but I hope that some of what I’ve said reflects some of the points that always come up when delving into this debate.

At the end of the day, I don’t lose any sleep over who can code and who can’t. I’m just genuinely surprised to find so many designers that lack front-end skills, as I thought this was a thing of the past.

Also read the comments , there were around 320 comments, as i write … they are worth a read.
Please read Elliots full post here .. Web designers who can’t code


get ExpressingIT News by Email Subscribe to ExpressingIT by Email |  Follow Me on Twitter


Leave a Reply

 Subscribe to ExpressingIT RSS
get ExpressingIT News by Email Subscribe to ExpressingIT by Email
 Follow Me on Twitter