Design in the Browser: Use CSS to Stop Lying to Ourselves and Our Clients

Designing web pages as static images is usually a time-consuming exercise and produces a lie we tell ourselves and our clients. We're not designing pictures of websites, so why ask clients to sign off on one? Web work is dynamic, and needs to be seen and evaluated as early and often as possible in many browsers.

By designing in the browser we're able to solve a number of issues we face as people who make and sell web sites. Our mockups behave like web pages because they are web pages. We don't accidentally design features that are impossible to code. Any troublesome css technique will be discovered and addressed at the beginning of a project rather than in it's final days. And maybe most importantly, clients are never asked to sign off on a static facsimile of a web site that we all know will be at least slightly different from the final site we deliver.