After having more years than I would like to admit to designing websites using tables, over the last year we made the leap to switching to CSS (Cascading style sheets).

For years and years websites were designed using tables, these are a set of structures for organising the way in which your browser displays the content and styling of your website.  As a designer you really rely on being able to process some key elements of site design very quickly, such as setting up the basic layout and tables were the way of doing this.

First of all it was a bit daunting having to ditch an old friend in favor of a new technique, but learning new techniques is a major part of staying up with the pack in the web design industry.

My first thoughts were it seemed very long winded and it was taking far too long to work out how to perfom simple tasks like creating a three column floating layout.  After nearly 10 months of exclusively designing in CSS now……what a breath of fresh air, I can see what all the fuss is about, it is so much easier to create really good looking layouts and most importantly the code content is very light and neat.  This makes it so much easier to work on a large site with masses of content.

So, I eagerly await the arrival of the next ‘big thing’ that will prompt me to re-focus and start all over again.  CSS has with the benefit of hindsight been a real leap forward.  I’d be interested to hear peoples views on making the leap to CSS.