I recently discovered HTML Validator for Firefox and Mozilla. I try to make all the pages on my sites validate correctly, and I have been testing them using a local install of the W3C Markup Validation Service. That works well, but I do have to manually submit each page for validation.
The HTML Validator extension is different, as it runs in the background, and checks pages as you’re browsing. This makes it much easier to spot any errors.
Cool. Carsurvey is one of the few sites I’ve seen that gets a green tick btw.
Thanks Stephen – it does surprise me how many sites don’t make the effort to write valid markup. I guess that it’s hard to make a business case for. As long as a site looks good in IE6 and Firefox, that’s enough for many people.
When new browsers like IE7 hit the market, my sites shouldn’t need many changes. And some of the most important visitors to a site are robots, not people – I think they’ll find valid markup easier to understand.
It’s a great extension, i’ve been using it for a few months now although do be wary that it is a bit lax on some checks (I can’t remember what went amiss off the top of my head). So I take it as a great heads-up guide whilst i’m doing development but then I do a final check with the w3c validator.
Thanks for the tip Gary. I’ll be sure to do some final checks with the W3C validator uploading new code to my live server.