zahnster

Up until a few days ago, I never thought about the <noscript> tag. It was one of those internet relics, back from the old days when we built websites with tables and had messages like “optimized for Netscape Navigator”.

However, my website is now truckin’ the noscript tag, and quite proudly at that.

It all started the other day when I was talking js effects at Zenbe - how to create seamless unobtrusive js animation without the typical ‘blips’ associated with unobtrusive use of JavaScript (ex: if js is shortening an element height to only show partially, as it does on my portfolio, you see a blip as that js loads). I didn’t have a solid answer - just a long lost thought of calling css through <noscript>.

To be honest, I wasn’t sure it would work. I can’t remember the last time I used noscript; pretty sure it was indeed back in the Netscape days. However, thanks to Jeremy Keith linking my site this evening, it kicked me into gear and I implemented noscript into my portfolio site with great success (I’ve been meaning to tighten it up for weeks).

In a way, it’s a total hack. I’m using noscript to cancel a css height I’m setting in my screen.css - a height which otherwise would break my ‘unobtrusiveness’ - because if js was not there, my height would be locked and the content only partially seen. The noscript loads in a call to reset the height to auto, letting non-js enabled devices to see the whole content as one page.

So, is noscript gone? Hell no! It actually seems to be pretty useful in creating solid, sexy websites styled and animated with unobtrusive javascript.