Can anyone recommend good HTML code books to clean up my websites code

[peaceandkarma]

Hi, my website seems to have a lot of errors within its HTML code. This is due to using my website hosts templates which have a number of errors within them. The good thing is that my website is fully customisable and I'm looking to remove them by learning basic HTML coding myself and rewriting the code to the correct error free code.
A problem I have at the moment is that my traffic seems to come solely from Google and I'm connecting my lack of traffic from other search engines to the HTML errors on my website.
Does anyone know of any good HTML code books that will help me clean up my code. I would rather clean up the code myself as I feel if I'm a website owner its really part of the job to know HTML code. I would appreciate any answers.

Kind regards Warren.

[williamc]

Start here: http://validator.w3.org/ that will give you a good bit of insight on any broken code on your pages, and tips how they may be fixed by seeing what was found wrong.

[LD]

Start here: http://validator.w3.org/ that will give you a good bit of insight on any broken code on your pages, and tips how they may be fixed by seeing what was found wrong.

When you mentioned your tutorial contest I started writing a tutorial but got side tracked and it ended up as a satirical argument on just that, W3C compliance. If I find a proper venue for posting it I will post some of it.

Sorry, I digress. The main thing was, that I tried for hours to get the code right even though a specific test page rendered fine in the test browsers. However, continuing on, when I just about had all errors fixed, a new bunch errors came into play. I gave up 3 hours later after choking down a cold dinner and the best I could do was 9 errors. I think all are JavaScript errors but the page reneders fine in the 4 browsers I tested it on. But as tiring and frustrating as the experience was, I think I learned a thing or two.

[weegillis]

Sadly, what you're going to find is that the code over which you have editorial control is limited, and that the hosting provider may well be adding code of their own when it leaves their servers. Have you checked for this in generated code (Inspector)?

If the above is in fact the case, then many of the errors may be in that code, and even when you clean up your portion, there will be theirs remaining unfixed.

The only real way to have complete control over your code is to only use your code. As soon as third party code comes into play there will be a myriad of possible errors that turn up in a validator, but that do not trigger errors in the rendered page. Invalid code works too, in most cases. Sometimes the developers just can't work around a particular validation issue so opt to ignore it, or find some way to justify it. One of those 'user check' situations.

Building a website with a host provided 'builder' is the surest way to give up control over your website. If you remount your own crisp pages and the host is still tacking on their goodies as the pages leave the server then you have no choice but change providers, or upgrade to a paid hosting package. Nothing is ever free.

[peaceandkarma]

Thank you for all your replies, I'll have a crack at cleaning it all up and I could host the site myself in a few years time so I'll keep my options open.

Kind regards Warren.

[chrisJumbo]

Note: This is not an affiliate link. I have purchased quite a few of Sitepoint's books.

http://products.sitepoint.com/?tag=&filters[tag][]=html&filters[difficulty]=&simpleform_submit_marker=showme

"Building Your Own Website the Right Way" - 3rd edition is probably a good place to start.
Also "The CSS Anthology: 101 Essential Tips, Tricks & Hacks, 3rd Edition"

Are you near a Borders? They are going out of business and you may find some good books at 50% to 75% off.

cd :O)

[morestar]

Does anyone know of any good HTML code books that will help me clean up my code. I would rather clean up the code myself as I feel if I'm a website owner its really part of the job to know HTML code. I would appreciate any answers.

Kind regards Warren.

I would really follow the advice of visiting the W3C Validator - unless you want to purchase a book to add to your book-shelf, but be aware you'll have to throw it out in 5 years as it'll probably be quite out-dated.

For every error you find, paste it into Google and find out how to fix it - I've yet to come across an error that cannot be fixed - although sometimes it takes days to figure out - you can.

[cbosleeds]

Just going back the the original question here. If its a lack of visitors that's the issue, then the source code may well be contributing somewhat if its utter spaghetti but it is only one of about 200 factors so I'm sceptical that this is the cause of a lack of traffic. Although, it may be the cause of a lack of conversions if there are faults that show up client-side.

An internet marketer would be able to look and tell you. The bottom line though really is that if you're running an online business, then its your job to run the business and grow the business rather than tinker with the code unless you really do have world enough and time to practice and learn. Run it by an internet marketer, let them look at the code but also keyword and competitor analysis and positions as well and they'll be better placed to identify the missing peice in the jigsaw. Search engine positions aren't often noticeably harmed by a few coding errors although they can be affected more by mountains of extraneous code which buries the content into obscurity from an SEs perspective.

First off, put a link to your website on here and I'm sure a few people will give it the once over, and you might get to the source of your traffic issues more quickly.

[felix.renegade]

You may want to start with eBooks. That is how I learnt HTML a few years ago. This will allow you to test a few of them and when you find the one you are comfortable with, then you can buy. Go to wowebook.com, search for and download eBooks. This is not an endorsement. I have gotten a few books from there...

[dgswilson]

my traffic seems to come solely from Google and I'm connecting my lack of traffic from other search engines to the HTML errors on my website

IMO probably not. More people use Google-Search than anything else. Once you've followed advice and seen what W3C shows you, copy css and html page on to your PC and play with it, opening up with browser to check changes. Any specific html question you have you can type into search and get answers.