X-Cart forums

[Sisom]

I've just been fiddling with the X-Cart installation that I'm customising for a client, and I decided to try displaying the Featured Products in two column mode. Suddenly, all the changes I had implemented on the one column version were lost, and then I looked in Firebug and my heart sank: tables.

Not only tables, but the craziest implementation I have ever seen.

<tr class="first product-name-row">
                  
            <td class="first product-cell">
              <div class="image">
                <a href="product.php?productid=17515&cat=0&page=0&featured=Y"><img src="http://www.mrdtrading.co.uk/store/images/T/kart2small.jpg" width="125" height="79" alt="Red Rooster Go Kart" /></a>
                              </div>
            </td>
                            
            <td class="highlight last product-cell">
              <div class="image">
                <a href="product.php?productid=17518&cat=0&page=0&featured=Y"><img src="http://www.mrdtrading.co.uk/store/images/T/xctD748.tmp.png" width="125" height="125" alt="Rugged Racer Mini 101" /></a>
</div>

So the table spans both columns, and then you have two <td> elements, one for the first product, one for the second. And repeat, all the way down the product description...

I may not have time to completely implement it with this client, but with my next job, I think I am going to completely redo this mess, and make it use CSS properly, i.e. no tables for layout. Perhaps I can get Qualiteam to hire me as their chief CSS designer! (Or rather, ONLY CSS designer, as they don't seem to understand how it works...)

I also keep seeing

<br /> <br />

and content which is only surrounded by div tags, no paragraph tags, hence their unnecessary use of the <br /> tags. How can you use CSS when you have something like:

 
<div class="whatdoescssmean">
A load of text that isn't in a paragraph.
<br />
How do you change the bottom margin on the line above? Can't do it.
</div>

[balinor]

Yea, they still don't get it

[Sisom]

Hi Balinor, it's driving me nuts! It's like having to recode the thing from the ground up every time I start looking at a new template!

Is there a proper CSS template out there, with redesigned X-Cart templates? It would save a lot of people a lot of time if there were.

I can't understand how Qualiteam can't have one person who understands CSS properly, and it's not even complicated stuff that they're getting wrong, it's the basics, like the float property - they don't even know what it is!

[balinor]

I know...I rewrite the whole template system from scratch each time a new version comes out. I had a 'proper' table-less layout in 4.1.x and I basically reuse that one each time. The way they use float and CSS drives me absolutely insane. All they need is one CSS pro over there to do it right!

[ARW VISIONS]

do you normalize the margins and padding of your <p> tags, hate the different default settings per browser.

[balinor]

Depends - the alternate stylesheets per browser usually take care of that.

[ARW VISIONS]

I don't use the <p> tag all that much.

[ARW VISIONS]

I have thought long and hard about re-writing the whole thing, but with some many versions being released it seems like a waste of time. maybe v5 will stick around for a while.

Originally Posted by Sisom

Is there a proper CSS template out there, with redesigned X-Cart templates? It would save a lot of people a lot of time if there were.

[cflsystems]

Tables are ok if they are used to display tabular info but you are right - the whole html/css in xcart is a huge mess. And that is also contributing to the huge main css file

[Sisom]

Originally Posted by Ashley

I don't use the <p> tag all that much.

I use the <p> tag all the time, to represent anything that looks like a paragraph, or anything that I want to hook CSS onto. There are so many instances in the templates where there aren't any <p> tags at all, just a container div and the text inside it.

Perhaps one of us can approach Qualiteam and see if they'll hire us for a few months' work, to fix it all!

Anyway, I'm going to have to redo the two column layout, as it is it's simply impossible to apply CSS to it - how can I put a background around one product box, when there are two side by side in the same table, they way they've done it?

I know it wasn't like that in 4.1, I have another site that uses that and I had no problems with two or even three column layouts. I'll have a look at that code and try to use it in 4.3.2, when I've done it all, I'll post it up in Completed Mods.