There is nothing wrong with using absolute positioning, actualley it has an advantage above many other ways of layouting pages.
However as you are using position now, it dosn't seam to serve any purpose. You are saying "position: absolute;" without saying where you would like it positioned.
You need to understand how positioning works, if you are trying to position something "absolutely" relatively to the edges of the containing element, rather then the root element; then you will need to apply "position:relative" to the containing element, and "position: absolute;" to the element you want positioned.
To fix your problem with your Navigation division, you will need to apply "position:relative" to its containing element (in this case td), and apply "left:0;" right after "position:absolute;"
However your website is invalid, and dosn't include the required lang attribute, nor a proper doctype see: http://www.brugbart.com/?AID=4 - The Importance of Doctypes
You are also incorrectly using tables for layouts, it only makes things worse, and more confusing. Also you shouldn't be typing attributes and properties in upper-case, since this may make things even more confusing. Neither should you mix deprecated presentational attributes, with CSS properties.
See also: http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/conform.html#Deprecated
You may also want to consider writing the styles in a External StyleSheet, this will make things a lot easier, and clean up your code. See: http://www.brugbart.com/?AID=6#Sec3 - External StyleSheets
You are also using deprecated tags such as:
, and tags that dosn't even exist, such as: , , and
The below will get you started on modern css based layouts:
http://www.brugbart.com/?TID=1 - An Introduction to HTML
http://www.brugbart.com/?AID=6 - An Introduction to CSS
http://www.brugbart.com/?TID=7 - Position Based Layouts
http://www.brugbart.com/?TID=8 - Float Based Layouts
If you have a specific problem with IE, then you can use Conditional Comments to apply IE specific Styles. However the need has differed when IE7 went live, and many webdesigners, are already ditching support for IE6, leaving such users between the choice to upgrade their broken browser, or use one of the alternatives.
I only use Conditional Comments to inform people how to upgrade their browser to IE7+ or try one of the alternatives. See also: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms537512.aspx
I've recreated your website, and made it fully standard compliant, and search engine friendly (by placing the content first). When your site is viewed by either SearchEngines, text based browsers, or screenreaders, the content will be placed first for accessibility reasons; and to make search engines index your actual content as Descriptions, instead of using content of alt tags, or even your navigation menu links.
Another way to circumvent the problem would be by use of meta tags, See: http://www.brugbart.com/?AID=81#Sec5
Simply copy the below into your index.html file on your server:
-----StartCode-----
Linda Williams: Main
Welcome
This is an online portfolio of my projects.
Thank you for visiting my web page. This is an online portfolio of my projects.
Currently this site is being recreated, however the pages are still up for viewing. Please click on the
Web Pages link to the left to browse my web development section of my portfolio.
Currently there are issues with Internet Explorer. Please be patient as they are being investigated and
resolved. Updates will follow soon. PHP implementation coming soon.
THANK YOU FOR VISITING!
This site currently only functions properly in Fire Fox.
Best if viewed in 1024x768
Last updated: May 18, 2008 - ©Copyright 2008 Linda W
-----CodeEnd-----
The above is somewhat float based, since when using a background on basement, it becomes quite complex to allow the content to be the final factor determining the height, i declared a min-height to tell the browser, that the Basement division should minimum be of this predetermined height, unless the content requires it to be longer.
Also note how i placed the logo last, inside the basement division, and then positioned it absolutely, so when viewed in normal browsers, it would apear at the top.
This is also a trick to place irrelevant stuff last, so that ScreenReaders, and SearchEngines don't confuse it with the content. The alt tag ensures that the image makes sense, and search engines also index the words in these, so its allways a good idea to include alt tags on images.
When dealing with float based layouts, with colored backgrounds, we need to clear our floats before the containing division will expand with its content, i simply applied it to the Copyright statement at the bottom.
I'm not saying its impossible using a fully position based layout when having a basement with a color, i actually demonstrated one way to do this for IE7, Firefox, and Safari in my Equal Height Columns Technique at http://www.brugbart.com/Examples/BlueBodens_Equal-height_Columns_Technique.html
If the columns dosn't need to be of equal height, but has a min-height, then try my first BorderTechnique at: http://www.brugbart.dk/bordertechnique.html
