Web standards, Google, Microsoft and browsers

I've been very busy reworking my web pages so that they're easier to use (and maintain, remember I use automation to update and publish my pages). The basic problem is that my current page (yes it's mostly one large page) is about 128K in size or 200 printed pages (very hard on the eyes). Contained in that lump-O-links are 298 valid links (I check them weekly) and descriptions which I've broken down into 48 sections. I'd think I can organize that into 5 large sections. Each of the 5 sections will have the 48 sections divided up and those will be broken down into related (and smaller) pages. This will make the pages a lot friendly and easier to navigate. I'll optimize my page size for 800x600 since most people are at least using a screen that large (I love using Google's Analytics). I've been pouring over examples of various layouts and experimenting with CSS to find an easy to use (and easy on the eyes) lay out. I finally figured out one that works well and follows the standards. I built up a mock up and had all the features working reasonably. I tested it out with Firefox and Konqueror (screen shot) under Linux and it worked smoothly (and no Javascript thank you). So I decided to test it with IE 6.0 and all I can say is that I curse the day Microsoft wrote IE! That nice pretty CSS file I had is now peppered with all sorts of hacks to get around MS limitations. My HTML files had all sorts of conditional HTML commands related to IE. Before you say: "ignore IE because my web site is Linux related", I'd like to note that 33% of the visitors are using IE! I can't ignore that many visitors. And I really need to take advantage of CSS to use the pages space efficiently.

Another reason for efficient layout is that I've been investigating putting up Google's Adsense on my web site in the hope that my web site (www.linuxha.com) will earn enough money in a year to pay for it's expenses. I don't intend to go crazy with ads. I don't want the ads taking up a lot of space (they'll be text ads) and there will only be one at the top (none at the bottom or the sides of the page). It's not the main purpose of my web site which is home automation and Linux!).

Lets say the web site costs me $200.00 (US)/year for expenses (that's pretty close). I happen to get approximately 50K hits/year on the just the main page. If 2% of the visitors (1 in 50) click on the Google text ads the pages will pay for themselves (50K x $0.20 x 2% = $200.00). I really don't expect that the web site will bring in a lot of money. If it doesn't bring in any money then there's no great loss as I would have been paying for the site anyway.