Just finished up redesigning my 4th site in the past 5 weeks (along with 4 relocations and 2 migrations). I love starting with a brand new template and coding something very clean and neat, however sometimes it is just better to update existing templates. Anyone who has reworked templates for a major set of changes knows that sometimes it feels like things are messy and out of control. Especially with stylesheets.
I still have not found a decent way to order classes in a stylesheet that makes any sense (and is maintainable) but search functions make that passable. However, I still cannot help but feel like the stylesheet is messy since I really have no idea which classes I’ve obsoleted vs. which classes are still used by some obscure template I never touched. I’ve always been meaning to find a better solution to this then my usual method: <i>leave them all there – just in case</i>. A clean and tidy stylesheet reduces server load and is easier to maintain.
So instead of doing the work I was supposed to be doing today, I goofed off and coded a little stylesheet analysis program. The idea is pretty simple: Read the rest of this entry »