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Posted by Jim Higson on 12/07/81 11:26
Alan J. Flavell wrote:
>
> On Mon, 12 Sep 2005, Jim Higson wrote:
>
>> The problem is, if I trust my users to have setup their browser properly,
>> how many will have?
>
> For the users of Billware, they -all- have it set up the right size, and
> here's my logic. Those who made a choice, got the size that they wanted
> (within a certain tolerance); those who didn't make a choice have -paid-
> Bill to set the right size for them - who are we to argue? Surely a
> company as large as MS have studied their customer base closely enough to
> know what default text size to set for them? If they needed to be asked
> at installation time, Windows would ask them to choose - it asks them
> enough other questions before the installation is complete, after all.
This is a good point, except of course if Bill noticed most sites use
smaller fonts and adjusts accordingly. :S
Anyway, the group has persuaded me to give my main text the default size
now.
> For the users of other OSes, in my experience, initial text size can vary
> a lot, according to what installation choice was made of display
> "resolution" etc.[1]; there may well be a dpi calibration, but the
> installation dialogs usually don't take the user through setting it, and
> many don't choose to calibrate the display with it. Instead, if they're
> dissatisfied with the text size, they typically configure the
> applications, rather than the display system. That's been my observation,
> anyway.
>
> [1] this won't change when we're all using panels, bearing in mind that
> the expensive panels have higher values of pixels per inch, and thus are
> apt for higher dpi settings, even though they're the same physical size.
> (IBM are already over 200 pixels per inch for top-end displays.)
Actually, I find this only true for laptops. I have a pretty high-end panel,
costing about £500 a while back, but it is only 1280*1024 at 19 inches -
the same number of pixels as a typical 17 incher. I've just checked a few
shops and most 19 inch desktop panels are still using this res.
If you know of a desktop TFT, 19 inches or bigger that does very high pixels
per inch please let me know. It's about time someone put a laptop
resolution panel a desktop casing.
> And we should never forget those with impaired vision, who have to set
> very non-standard sizes to be able to use the web at all. Are they, like
> the rest of us, to be asked to set their text size 50% larger (or
> whatever) than they wanted it, so that headstrong authors can pull it back
> down again to what they *really* needed?
>
>> And of those who have set their font size, how many
>> will have set it while looking at the typical site which scales it down?
>
> "Me, Sir", I use Mozilla's friendly minimum font size setting to defend
> myself against unreasonably scaled-down fonts, and recommend anyone seen
> in a similar position to do the same.
>
> [But I have to remember to turn that off again when I'm asked to review
> someone else's web site...]
>
>> At a quick count, about 60% of the CSS Zen layouts on the front page are
>> too small for me to read if I set the font-size to be how I like it at
>> 100%.
>>
>> Eg:
>> http://www.csszengarden.com/?cssfile=/176/176.css&page=0
>> http://www.csszengarden.com/?cssfile=/178/178.css&page=0
>>
>> Now, these are not pages styled by amateurs.
>
> That's true...
>
>> Their authors should be the ones who understand accessibility and
>> respecting user preferences more than anyone.
>
> Oh, really? I'm sorry, but I have to disagree with this. The
> csszengarden is a spectacular demonstration of what -can- be achieved with
> CSS - but under what are practically laboratory conditions: it is in no
> way a role model to be used, as it stands, for production use on the web.
>
> Its contributors, like all of us, have their strengths and weaknesses, and
> furthermore they are somewhat limited by the rules of the zengarden.
>
> Given that very few of us are experts in all of graphic design,
> typography, accessibility and web technologies, I'd risk saying that the
> best web pages, by and large, are the product of co-operative work
> between, at least, two people: a graphic designer with some understanding
> of the web, and a techie with some sympathy for graphic design.
Another good point. Good at making things look good with CSS doesn't
necessarily mean they are using it correctly.
>> Is there any reason very small text would be considered to the
>> spirit of the web standards?
>
> No.
:)
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