Getting a table to size correctly.

[Domestos]

Hi,

I am having problems sizing a table correctly.

For an example of what I am trying to do... (see the columns expand and
disband as you change the size of the window but the centre columns keeps a
minimum width)

http://www.scalemodel.net/

Now would this page be considered bad design?

 

[Neredbojias]

To further the education of mankind, "Domestos"

For an example of what I am trying to do... (see the columns expand
and disband as you change the size of the window but the centre
columns keeps a minimum width)

http://www.scalemodel.net/

Now would this page be considered bad design?

Yes, although the page shows lots of promise.

- There is no need to limit the center content to a min of 400px.
- The right-hand content should be boxed separate and centered therein
and/or made symmetrical to the left.
- The top bordered nav items should probably be centered and allowed to
overflow aesthetically.
- The ebay-logo float-over should be addressed.
- You seem to have a combination of a 2- and 3-column design with 3-column
content.

As for the table/no-table issue, you could probably make a structure with
an outer div min-width'ed to the 800px you want (but shouldn't want.) IE6
would need a hack, but that is becoming less of an issue with Microsoft's
new policy of enlightenment. For the record, if I were to make _that_
page, I wouldn't use a table.

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

For an example of what I am trying to do... (see the columns expand and
disband as you change the size of the window but the centre columns keeps a
minimum width)

Try playing with this example:
http://benmeadowcroft.com/webdev/csstemplates/3-column.html

http://www.scalemodel.net/

Now would this page be considered bad design?

I think so; it's a frames site.

 

[Blinky the Shark]

So how do you browse then...

Quite comfortably, with my browser(s) using about the right-hand thwo
thirds of my screen (full height) and email/news apps using about the
left half (full height). They overlap a bit, but both modes (browsing
and communications) are always visible for a one-click focus switch from
one to the other.

Similarly, when I reply to a Usenet post, my editor opens up on the
right half, with my news client still readable on the left. See:

http://blinkynet.net/stuff/comp/splits.jpg

You'll notice the title bar for my email client at the top of the screen
above my news client window.

Nothing *ever* "cascaded"; rarely anything other than watching a film on
DVD ever full-screened -- the two choices that you apparently think are
all that one can do because you've seen little buttons for them.

 

[Domestos]

Try playing with this example:
http://benmeadowcroft.com/webdev/csstemplates/3-column.html

That is what I am trying to avoid - when the page gets too thin, the red box
on the right first goes behind the text and then blends into the yellow box
on the left... IMHO that is bad design !!!

 

[Jonathan N. Little]

Quite comfortably, with my browser(s) using about the right-hand thwo
thirds of my screen (full height) and email/news apps using about the
left half (full height). They overlap a bit, but both modes (browsing
and communications) are always visible for a one-click focus switch from
one to the other.

Similarly, when I reply to a Usenet post, my editor opens up on the
right half, with my news client still readable on the left. See:

http://blinkynet.net/stuff/comp/splits.jpg

You'll notice the title bar for my email client at the top of the screen
above my news client window.

Nothing *ever* "cascaded"; rarely anything other than watching a film on
DVD ever full-screened -- the two choices that you apparently think are
all that one can do because you've seen little buttons for them.

I really browse *fullscreen* either with multiple apps laid out with a
bit of overlap. You do your site a disservice making such narrow
assumptions on how visitors will view it.

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

That is what I am trying to avoid - when the page gets too thin, the
red box on the right first goes behind the text and then blends into
the yellow box on the left... IMHO that is bad design !!!

Page too thin? Do you mean a narrow window? Here, about 480 px wide:
http://k75s.home.att.net/show/3column.jpg

Nothing odd there... works exactly the same in Firefox (as pictured), in
Opera 8.5, and IE6.

 

[Leonard Blaisdell]

Try playing with this example:
http://benmeadowcroft.com/webdev/csstemplates/3-column.html

That is what I am trying to avoid - when the page gets too thin, the red box
on the right first goes behind the text and then blends into the yellow box
on the left... IMHO that is bad design !!![/QUOTE]

It is hardly bad design. There is a certain point in the horizontal
narrowing of all web pages where the design breaks down. Content either
coalesces as in the above example, jumps down or disappears.
Yet it's still a far more forgiving medium than the printed page.

leo

 

[Blinky the Shark]

I really browse *fullscreen* either with multiple apps laid out with a
Really?

bit of overlap. You do your site a disservice making such narrow
assumptions on how visitors will view it.

I do?

 

[Jonathan N. Little]

missing word "DON'T"

I do?

Sorry bad snip! Comment direction intended for Domestos, maybe I should
top post! ;-)

 

[dorayme]

That is what I am trying to avoid - when the page gets too thin, the red
box
on the right first goes behind the text and then blends into the yellow box
on the left... IMHO that is bad design !!!

It is hardly bad design. There is a certain point in the horizontal
narrowing of all web pages where the design breaks down. Content either
coalesces as in the above example, jumps down or disappears.
Yet it's still a far more forgiving medium than the printed page.

leo[/QUOTE]

I agree with Leo. But, to be fair to Domestos, table layouts
don't have this particular breakdown. However, there are things
that can be done to miitigate it in css driven col designs.

There are other ways to 2 and more cols that float either one or
all left and provide wrappers and careful margins to avoid this
overlap. Not in the present design though; which uses trickier
absolute positioning to gain strategic advantages to do with
where one can position the content in the html (first! so that
the most important part of the doc is available to those people
and things that do not or cannot rely on the usual visual browser
aids...)

There are also devices such as min-width to help out in other
designs..

The point is that one needs to weigh up the pros and cons, one
can, over time become impressed enough with the advantages oif
separating style from content that a few odd things happening
with unrealistically narrowed windows is a small price to pay.

 

[Leonard Blaisdell]

I agree with Leo. But, to be fair to Domestos, table layouts
don't have this particular breakdown.

Sure they do. Drag a window with a table in it far enough to the left
and the table contents start to disappear once all the columns have
collapsed to their minimum.
My blather was universal and not constrained to non-table layout.
Geeze! ;-)

leo

 

[dorayme]

Sure they do. Drag a window with a table in it far enough to the left
and the table contents start to disappear once all the columns have
collapsed to their minimum.
My blather was universal and not constrained to non-table layout.
Geeze! ;-)

leo

Then your blather was wrong. A table layout of the material on
the site I was discussing would not do the directly "crazy"
things OP was referring to. I have no time now, but if you are
not convinced I will cast it all in a table some time. How about
you doing it Leo and I will take a look and see you have not
cheated

And don't Geeze me! I have enough problems with religion.

 

[Leonard Blaisdell]

And don't Geeze me! I have enough problems with religion.

;-)

leo

 

[dorayme]

Then your blather was wrong. A table layout of the material on
the site I was discussing would not do the directly "crazy"
things OP was referring to. ...

And don't Geeze me! I have enough problems with religion.

OK Leo, since you have Geezed me again since - I am a glutton for
punishment - we need to appreciate some differences. In this
church here, there is not always the greatest sensitivity to how
things look to folk without "the knowledge". If content
disappears from a table in a window that has been quite unusually
narrowed, this is likely to be easily understood by all, the
scrollbars appear and there is a perception that it is the user
himself to a large extent that has caused this "difficulty" (how
the hell _could_ a nice big landscape appear in a very
deliberately narrowed window). In the case of the css template
under discussion, the perception of Domestos is quite
understandable, it looks from his point of view as if the design
is badly broken, the maker not really competent. Strange things
overlap other things.

To me, at the moment, (it was not always so), these strange
overlaps are a thing of beauty, of satisfaction, they happen
because they should happen given the design and the design has an
intelligence that pays off in the larger scheme of things (I am
not saying I favour this design over more regular floats and no
absolute positioning). It is quite a different thing from the
point of view of someone that does not understand the issues at
all at all. You need to make a leap in imagination about other
people's perception - things that you earthling men are not good
at

And these perceptions are important. In making a commercial site,
for example, you need to take them into account. You need to make
concessions to folk other than the denizens of alt.html, you need
to make decisions to boost the confidence of the public in a
certain competence. There are the execs who see the site and they
are paying for it, there are the customers. All of these people
have not a clue. With a table layout as distinct from this
particular template, there would not be such raised eyebrows.
There are other col designs not table-based that largely avoid
"crazythings" (in other words I am not defending tables
absolutely). If you cannot see this, you are too far gone a
church disciple and time to take stock.