Redesigned the site's » Archive index page (from scratch). It contains links to all monthly archives posted since the site's launch (summer of 2000). Gateway to Memory Lane.
Been meaning to do that for some time now (years, actually). That page was the single-most mucked-up page on the entire site. The code was a rat's nest of deprecated standards, poor design choices and mark-up errors. I'm surprised it would render.
Began that page back when I knew very little about HTML and before I'd even heard of CSS. Over the years, the muck seemed to multiply as the page grew. It's not a highly trafficked page, so I didn't worry about it.
Tho at sundry times, I'd go in and try to manually clean up the code. That always proved an exercise in futility. Seemed like the more I tried, the worse things got. The only real solution was a complete makeover (a move which could be viewed as symbolic of the site's growth and development).
Now the page contains a third the mark-up it did before (10-KB vs 30) and the styling looks 3X cleaner, by making use of advanced techniques such as colgroup styling for better readability. Leaner, meaner and faster-loading.
