Only using AP Divs on a page? CS4

Question

I'm structuring a page right now and was curious if AP Divs are generally just used as containers? Or can I get away with using all AP Divs, structured one on top of the other- I have a header, content, and footer AP Divs.
*I'm doing a liquid layout as well.

Answer 1

In reply to Dunbaraj,
yes use <div>s to lay out the page and position and style those <div>s using CSS.:
http://www.w3schools.com/css/
In reply to Murray *ACP*,
Hope you can see that the tongue in cheek over, over enthusiast response was an attempt to HIGHLY discourage the use of absolute positioning in laying out Web pages. The OP was focused strictly on AP (or more appropriately, PA) divs as containers… no mention of using a declared position for other elements..
Can’t tell you how many posts we get over at
http://www.webdeveloper.com/forum/index.php
asking why their page / menus, whatever don’t align correctly. The use of absolute positioning is real problem with beginner Web developers. While it may seem intuitive and easy to do so, the parent element thing throws them a curve, along with the fact that’s its just not good practice to do page layout that way.
“either misleading or wrong.  For example, if an absolutely positioned element is the child of an absolutely positioned element, that child will be located relative to the ancestor's location, not the 'browser window'”
Sorry if my explanation of the “parent rule” was not clear.
"The thing missing from your positioning is that unless the parent element also has a declared position, the child will do 1 of 2 things"
In other words, if the parent does NOT have a declared position, this is what will happen.
If position:relative, it will position as desired but space will be left as though that element was still in the natural flow. So you may move the 500 X 100 element down and over, but a 500 X 100 space will be left, as though it was still there.
So:
#child {
width: 400px;
height: 200px;
position: relative;
left:100px;
top:100px;
background-color:#cccccc;
will move to the left 100px and down 100px, BUT will also leave a blank space where #child would have been if left in the natural flow.
And
#child {
width: 400px;
height: 200px;
position: absolute;
left:100px;
top:100px;
background-color:#cccccc;
child is positioned relative to browser window and that position does not change even if window contracts or expands.
This parent rule applies to both AP and RP <div>s and is the foundation of learning to correctly use declared positioning.
But I appreciate your comments and discussion!
Best wishes,
Adninjastrator