Many developers that start out and or developers that work in the mainstream do not tend to focus on efficiency but rather getting the job done, and getting it working. This is generally an issue and in fact more time consuming than having organized, efficient, and clean code. We discuss several key aspects that make the importance of having clean markup, which leads to code that is more efficient.

Skimmable

Imagine your office desk, piled with papers of all different priorities and genres, your stapler is stashed away somewhere inaccessible or memorable, and the likes. You are now five minutes away from a meeting, and you need to locate an important document from an unorganized stack. You know you will not find it in time, and skimming through the pile quickly will not help at all.

The same case scenario relates to development, your code needs to be well organized and clean to be skimmable. Without clean markup and organized code, skimming through your code would be very difficult and near impossible. Therefore, skimmable code is all about clean markup, and a definite essential.

No Clutter

When making your code clean and organized it also means that you are eliminating clutter and unneeded code. Many developers tend to complicate simplicity by adding more code than actually needed to achieve a certain goal. Efficiency is all about clean code, and the more unneeded code that is added the less efficient the script or software becomes. Therefore, get rid of the unneeded clutter, keep things down to the point and efficient.

Pass It On

Clean Markup is very essential for passing your work on from developer to developer, and group to group. If it is difficult for you to understand your code a week or month later from when you developed it, then chances are, no one else will. Furthermore, eliminating clutter and making your code understandable and skimmable will make your code understandable for anyone you pass it on to. This is a good technique to adapt to, to assure your code is getting closer to clean markup.

SEO Optimized

Clean Markup of HTML and or CSS leads to better search engine optimization and the reason for that is pretty clear, the cleaner the markup, the more organized your code, text, and the likes are, which means the crawlers can easily obtain information without grabbing random elements off of your website due to terrible markup.

Some people take search engine optimization lightly and treat it as a passing fad in the web industry. However, search engine optimization leads to greater exposure across the internet, which means, clean markup leads to more exposure, which leads to a greater chance of success. Therefore, spending the time to develop efficiently not only improves your skills as a developer, but it also benefits you in the long run.

Valid Markup

Valid HTML and CSS is a compliment of clean markup as having invalid code means you are not coding properly and have errors in your code, which means you are not developing or coding efficiently or effectively. Despite knowing that you may have errors in your code and knowing how to fix them does not mean you have clean markup, but rather, inefficient developing techniques. With that said, always keep your markup valid in order to assure clean markup.

To conclude, there many other essentials to clean markup, however, the key to clean markup is code that is efficient, effective, organized, and valid. If you get those four elements down right, you are on the track to great clean code that not only will you appreciate and benefit from, but everyone involved will as well.

Author – GrindSmart Media

who has written 30 posts on [Re]Encoded.com.

GrindSmart Magazine is an adventurous blog that focuses on web development articles within a wide range of topics which aim to inform and challenge the minds. Follow GrindSmart on Twitter here.
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