why do we use <div> , apdiv, or a div in a css. ? instead of just placing elements. my book has me separating page elements into div blocks, but im not sure why. and ap divs in dreamweaver can go over anything, pretty cool, and you can specify divs in an external or internal css style, but im not sure why we do these things instead of just placing images and text where they are by themselves. any help greatly appreciated. thanks. derek.

<div>s are elements. Everything that uses <name [attribute_list]> & </name> as demarcation points are elements. Some elements are "self closing" and use <name [attribute_list] >|/> .

do we assume that by "apdiv" you are referring to an absolutely positioned element that is constructed using <div></div> tags?

It sounds like you skipped a few pages that dealt with the terminology of HTML and CSS

A <div> is a division element. It is a demarcation of an area of the document that can be assigned different properties (styles) from the elements around it.

absolutely positioned elements (of ALL kinds) are removed from the document flow so do not affect other elements in the document.

Normally you would "just place images and text where they are" and allow the document flow to take care of how they behave. Just that sometimes you have to (or want to) affect the natural flow to position elements differently.

if i was going to position a picture to the right hand left hand side with text around it, inside a div , the book has me do this. why do i have to do that when i can just put in the picture and wrap around the text without a div. i think he could have done the whole page without divs actuallly, im still not sure why someone would use a div, except when you want to change the background color to something different than is already there around it. thanks for answering my post about backgrounds by the way. also, do you use a div in an external css to be able to quickly make similar pages to the one with the divs in it? derek

Well, to make any page, you need containers of some kind. You can use many type of things, but <div>s are usually best, because they are just generic block-elements that are designated to be used as all-purpose containers. Assuming you know how to style them correctly, you could, in theory, build a site out of almost anything, say, <ul>s and <li>s, or <dl>s and <dt>s, <dd>s. Of course, it would be silly to do so.

Until you understand HTML (and CSS) a bit better, I would do the examples in the book. Even if they aren't perfect examples, it will be good to get familiar with HTML structure so that you are comfortable working in its environment.

ok thank you very much . derek