Upgrading from Blackbaud NetCommunity 6.10/6.15: Div Based Layout Design

A constant hot button topic with web design is always the ability to conform to the latest standards as set forth by the W3C. One of the core items that has been discussed is the benefit of CSS/Div based layouts as compared to an older traditional table based sites. Some of the reasons are listed here:

1. CSS layouts tend to have less code and render faster which improves a websites appearance on search engines due to Google’s “PageSpeed” metric.

2. Modern browsers recognize CSS coding as the current standard.

3. Users aren’t hindered by the ‘Grid-like’ nature of tables.

To tell which type of layout you have you will want to access Blackbaud NetCommunity and navigate to your current layout. When looking in the HTML view of your website you will see one of two things. Keep in mind, this may not be exact but is used as an example.

CSS/DIV based site

<Div ID=”siteWrap”>
<Div ID=”header”>
<Div ID=”headerMenu”> Some Content </Div>
</div>
</div>

Table Based Site

<Table>
<tr>
<td>Row 1 Info</td>
<td>Row 2 Info</td>
</tr>
</table>

If you fall into the CSS/Div-based category you should be ready to proceed with the update and may not need to make any adjustments. For the majority of table-based Blackbaud NetCommunity sites, you will still be able to display table-based layouts with a fair amount of accuracy, however we have found that when tables become nested and complex there is the possibility that items might render out of alignment or they may become disproportionate.  This is due to some of the table attributes being deprecated over time, table align and table bgcolor being examples of this.

If you would like to discuss the compatibility of your older table based layout site, or if you would like assistance in determining which site you are currently using please do not hesitate to reach out to the Blackbaud Support team at (800) 468-8996 or by emailing bbncsupport@blackbaud.com.

You can keep up with us on Twitter by following @bbsupport; we use the hashtag #bbnc when we discuss Blackbaud NetCommunity. Take a look at our Twitter Guide for more information.