I am not a CSS wizard by any means, but one thing that has always bothered me was the inability of CSS to easily generate columned layouts. All you need to do to find evidence of this is to search for "css three column layout" or "one true layout" and count the results (though I'm sure you are well aware).

Most of the solutions to CSS's column impotence require the use of float. Now, if I'm not mistaken, float is meant to float content around other elements inside of their container (such as floating text around an image inside of a paragraph, or displaying a "further information" box inside of a block of text in a news article). So why exactly is float required for columned layouts? Because there's no other solution. It's a hack, and it's unreliable.

As someone who's experienced the standards movement -- and who has heard (and agrees with) the statements that tables should not be used for layout since they are meant to display tabular data -- this float issue rings a familiar tune.

You would think that an entire standard built, in large part, because of its predecessors inability to render layout without the misuse of certain markup would at least try to address that issue -- i.e., a property specifically designed to create columned layouts.

Additionally, the outcry over this incorrect use of float has been surprisingly mild compared to the tables backlash. Let's look at the logic here: Tables are not meant for layout, using them for such is an abomination; Float is not meant for creating columned layouts, but using it for such is okay as long as it's under the veil of standards. Seems ridiculous to me.

Lets hope the next standard (CSS 3) includes something that should have been included in version 1 so we don't have to continue to perpetuate the same crime under a different name.