Why am I here?
Probably because you followed a link at the top of another page on this site, with a message directing you to this page if you think the site looks plain or ugly. That message is revealed only to
- internet-enabled devices with basic web browsing capabilities such as hand-held computers and WAP phones, and
- old versions of graphical web browsers that do not comply with current web standards.
If you are using a device like a hand-held computer, then you should be seeing a largely “plain text” rendering of our pages. You are not missing out on any of the information on the site, and this simple presentation should make it easy to read regardless of the size of the screen on the device you are using. This page will be of no further interest to you.
On the other hand, if you are using a graphical web browser on a desktop or laptop computer to surf the Web, then please read on… or, if you do not care for explanations, you can go straight to the point.
What is this all about?
The screenshot on the left shows what our web pages look like in a browser that supports web coding standards recommended by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The screenshot on the right shows what our web pages look like if the browser has poor compliance with these standards.
Before there were common web standards, different browsers reacted in different ways to the same web page code — so it was often necessary for web site developers to build several different versions of every page on the site (and to combine this with complicated programming tricks to deliver the right version), just to make sure each page worked in all of the common browsers. Today, web standards allow web site developers to build just one version of each page, in the knowledge that it will look the same in all browsers that support these standards. It might not look the same in an older, non-compliant browser, but this is set against the benefit that site builders can produce pages that download faster, and offer more features to the majority of site visitors. The older, non-compliant browsers are dying out; every major web browser released from about 2001 onwards has been built around the W3C standards.
Why has the Land Court adopted web standards?
As well as the benefits mentioned above, a driving force behind our adoption of web standards is the issue of accessibility. We aim to make our site accessible to all users, regardless of any disability they may have, or the technology they may use to access web pages.
But if the pages do not look the same for everyone, how are they accessible?
Being accessible does not mean that the site must appear identical to all visitors. Accessibility is focused on content and information. Accessibility demands making all content — text, important images, or multimedia — available to everyone. In order to do this according to the standards, we make use of Cascading Style Sheets to separate presentation from content. Separating presentation from content makes it easier for us to offer higher quality pages and accurate, up-to-date information.
Web coding standards such as Cascading Style Sheets and XHTML set down by the W3C make creating accessible pages possible.
What does this mean to me?
If you are not surfing the web with a standards-compliant browser, your web experience is being severely hampered because the browser you are using does not support W3C standards, particularly Cascading Style Sheets, which control presentation.
In order to improve your web browsing experience we respectfully suggest that you upgrade your web browser to one that supports web standards. We have set out below a list of free browsers that are sufficiently compliant.
If you are viewing this page from an environment in which you have no control over which browser or version you use (such as an office network), contact your system administrators and tell them of the advantages in upgrading to web browsers that are standards compliant.
Standards compliant browsers
Some browser suppliers allow you to download different versions from their web sites. We recommend you download the latest, full release (not an “alpha” or “beta” version). In each case what you will be downloading is an installer program; you must run the installer before you can begin using your new browser.
For Windows operating systems:
For Mac OS 8 – 9 (Classic) operating systems:
For Mac OS X operating system:
For Unix/Linux operating systems:
Further information
You can find out more about the importance and benefits of web standards at the Web Standards Project (WaSP).
Copyright 2003, The Scottish Land Court
