+++
date    = "2022-07-10T10:12:54+00:00"
lastmod = "2022-07-10T10:12:54+00:00"
tags    = [ "webdev" ]
author  = "tdro"
+++

White spaces in {{< abbr HTML "Hypertext Markup Language" >}} trick many into
writing complex {{< abbr CSS "Cascading Style Sheets" >}} --- web development is
trollish that way. Firefox's
[developer tools](https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/devtools-user/) show
generated white spaces! Hopefully your abstraction is munging HTML faithfully.
It's
[easy to fight white spaces](https://css-tricks.com/fighting-the-space-between-inline-block-elements/)
without realising it. That generally leads to using unsuitable
[display types](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/display) and
other shenanigans.

![Firefox Developer Tools](https://res.cloudinary.com/dpszgzqjb/image/upload/v1657447371/firefox-whitespace.png "
  Firefox's white space detector"
)