Type sizs on Mac and PC

[SpaceGirl]

Quoth the raven named Luna:


Apparently so.


Not in my experience. Are you referencing the site at:
http://www.mindspring.com/~lunachick/

IE's View > Text Size does nothing.


Probably ~85% of your visitors will use Internet Exploder. You've
handicapped them all, especially those with visual handicaps.

So, are you going to handicap everyone else who's NOT visually impaired?
Please tell me then why I cant resize the text in the novel I'm reading at
the moment.

 

[SpaceGirl]

It's been explained that it works for me because I'm on a Mac. I've also
handicapped my users by using Flash on the main page, since not everyone
uses Flash, and by my color choices, since not everyone likes those colors,
and by using graphics, since some people use text-only browsers. Every
choice made in designing a site will alienate some users. If this makes me
an uncaring bitch, so be it, but it's more important to me to have my font
the size I want it than to make it usable for visually impaired people.
Nothing on there is important, it's a vanity site.

*grins*

 

[Steve Pugh]

Ah, that's strange. Since most people have PC's as opposed to Macs, if
there's a problem with the way IE works I would have guessed it would be
the other way around. Like Microsoft's priority would be to make software
work well on PC's rather than Macs.

The development team behind Mac IE 5 had a much better grasp on web
standards and usability issues than the team behind Win IE.

The decision to make pixel sized text non-resizable in Win IE was
almost certain deliberate and was probably based on the concept that
if a designer wants text to be 9 pixels high then they _really_ want
it to be 9 pixels high regardless of what the user wants. Many threads
have shown that there are designers that want just this.

Maybe IE 7, when it finally arrives, will put the users' needs ahead
of the designers' desires.

Until then users can either suffer, or disable all font sizing, or
switch to a browser with more useful controls - for example I use
Opera with a default font size of 14px (i.e. 2px smaller than the
standard on most browsers) but with a minimum font size of 12px, so
all smaller text gets automatically zapped up to something comforatble
to read).

Steve

 

[SpaceGirl]

The development team behind Mac IE 5 had a much better grasp on web

standards and usability issues than the team behind Win IE.

The decision to make pixel sized text non-resizable in Win IE was
almost certain deliberate and was probably based on the concept that
if a designer wants text to be 9 pixels high then they _really_ want
it to be 9 pixels high regardless of what the user wants. Many threads
have shown that there are designers that want just this.

Maybe IE 7, when it finally arrives, will put the users' needs ahead
of the designers' desires.

Until then users can either suffer, or disable all font sizing, or
switch to a browser with more useful controls - for example I use
Opera with a default font size of 14px (i.e. 2px smaller than the
standard on most browsers) but with a minimum font size of 12px, so
all smaller text gets automatically zapped up to something comforatble
to read).

Steve

There could be good reasons for this. Imagine you have some nice images that
make a nice tidy console with some medium sized text in it. Someone doubles
the size of the fonts. What happens to the images on the page? They get
blown apart. Now in the olden days where pages weren't so graphic heavy and
far less vain it wouldn't have mattered so much. But these days design has
become a big selling point of many sites, and the average punter wont be to
impressed if the site disintegrates if they mess with the font sizes. If
people have a real issue with the size of typefaces it begs the question...
why don't you reduce the bloody resolution on your monitor?

 

[Leif K-Brooks]

You can use CSS to specify a pixel size for the font, that way it will be
the same on both macs and Pcs.

No it won't. Not everyone uses the same screen resolution, or size. Just
stop worrying that it looks different.

 

[Leif K-Brooks]

Mac displays type slightly larger than a PC which tends to mess up
html tables and such. What is the common solution for this? I'd like
to get type to display at the same apparent size on both platforms.

Fix your broken design and stop worrying if things look a little
different. The web is about things which look nice and are functional,
but not pixel-perfect.

 

[SpaceGirl]

Fix your broken design and stop worrying if things look a little
different. The web is about things which look nice and are functional,
but not pixel-perfect.

I wish. Clients tend to want pixel perfect. And they are the ones paying for
the designs in the first place.

 

[Bernhard Sturm]

Maybe IE 7, when it finally arrives, will put the users' needs ahead
of the designers' desires.

there will be no more IE 7. IE will be finished with version 6. M$ is no
longer providing a separate browser. IE will be part of the OS in the
future (longhorn).
If somebody asks about the anti-trust trials against M$... then we are
in the middle of US politics: G.W. Bush has exchanged the judges, and
now M$ is again allowed to knit OS and browser together!

cheers
bernhard

 

[Bernhard Sturm]

It's been explained that it works for me because I'm on a Mac. I've also
handicapped my users by using Flash on the main page, since not everyone
uses Flash, and by my color choices, since not everyone likes those colors,
and by using graphics, since some people use text-only browsers. Every
choice made in designing a site will alienate some users. If this makes me
an uncaring bitch, so be it, but it's more important to me to have my font
the size I want it than to make it usable for visually impaired people.
Nothing on there is important, it's a vanity site.

ACK all of this.


bernhard

 

[SpaceGirl]

there will be no more IE 7. IE will be finished with version 6. M$ is no
longer providing a separate browser. IE will be part of the OS in the
future (longhorn).
If somebody asks about the anti-trust trials against M$... then we are
in the middle of US politics: G.W. Bush has exchanged the judges, and
now M$ is again allowed to knit OS and browser together!

cheers
bernhard

Which may not be a bad thing. Who wants a separate browser anyway? The web
*should* be tied into our desktops. As much as we all hate MS, IE was a
*good* thing for the WWW. The result was most people having access to the
net via something that sort-of-worked; yes IE mucked up the standards, but
it *worked* (and still does). Things like AntiVirus, DVD playing software,
Web Browsers should all be part of the OS IMO.

 

[altamir]

Soon as we get away from pixel based design the better. Windows 6 uses
a scaled desktop ("avalon"), with a device independant measurement
system. Office 2003 is an example of this... it can be scaled up and
down just as if you were zooming in and out of an image in PhotoShop.
Unfortunatly we have to wait a while yet for this to be usable.

We don't have to wait. Opera 7.x has got this zoom feature. It's great. You
just press + or - key.

 

[Steve Pugh]

There could be good reasons for this.Imagine you have some nice images that
make a nice tidy console with some medium sized text in it. Someone doubles
the size of the fonts. What happens to the images on the page? They get blown apart.

Only if the page was badly constructed. Making a console that adapts
to variable sized content within it is hardly rocket science. After
all, you just know that two weeks after launch the client is going to
stick a new piece of copy in there with more words than the original.

Now in the olden days where pages weren't so graphic heavy and
far less vain it wouldn't have mattered so much.

Oh, where I come from that sort of thing was the old days. These days
I see more and more sites adopting a nice lightweight, flexible layout
with far fewer graphic heavy layouts.

But these days design has become a big selling point of many sites,

Good design on the web includes flexibility.

and the average punter wont be to
impressed if the site disintegrates if they mess with the font sizes.

And the average punter (a) messes with his font size at all? and (b)
is impressed by sites that she can't read?

If the user tries to change his font size then presumably he has a
good reason for wanting to do so. The skill in designing and building
web sites is making sure that the visual styling does not
disintergrate when the user changes the font size, or window size, or
any other variable.

Steve

 

[Bernhard Sturm]

Which may not be a bad thing. Who wants a separate browser anyway? The web
*should* be tied into our desktops. As much as we all hate MS, IE was a
*good* thing for the WWW. The result was most people having access to the
net via something that sort-of-worked; yes IE mucked up the standards, but
it *worked* (and still does). Things like AntiVirus, DVD playing software,
Web Browsers should all be part of the OS IMO.

another can of worms, as this is okay, as long as it's all based on open
and free standards, and I can decide which browser/dvd player/av scaner
will be used by the OS. If it's all just dictated by M$, then I think
it's a very ugly thing. (who is counting the confidential user
information that has being transferred from winXP to the windows media
player to a word document in the past?

bernhard

 

[Steve Pugh]

there will be no more IE 7.

Yes there will.

IE will be finished with version 6.

Standalone IE is finished (other than security patches).

M$ is no longer providing a separate browser. IE will be part of the OS in the
future (longhorn).

Yes, and that will be IE7. The fact that you have to upgrade your OS
to get it doesn't make it any less IE7.

Steve

 

[Steve Pugh]

Things like AntiVirus [...] should all be part of the OS IMO.

Hands up everyone (heck, anyone) who'd trust anti-virus software that
was part of Windows?

;-)

Steve

 

[Bernhard Sturm]

Yes, and that will be IE7. The fact that you have to upgrade your OS
to get it doesn't make it any less IE7.

so we are all using file explorer 9 (if i counted the versions correctly)?

;-)
bernhard

 

[Toby A Inkster]

There are good design reasons for you locking font sizes, and usability
issues for not. Books, for example, are printed in a fixed type face

That has to be the most stupid argument for fixed font sizes I've ever
heard!

Most books are printed in a fixed font size because that is a limitation
of the technology -- you just cannot make a book where the font size is
changeable by the end user.

That said, many popular books are available in large print editions,
allowing the reader a choice of two font sizes.

 

[Toby A Inkster]

Like Microsoft's priority would be to make software work well on PC's
rather than Macs.

Microsoft have more competition on Mac than on Windows, so have more
motivation to innovate.

Hence IE 5 for Mac kicking IE 5 for Windows' ass.

 

[Toby A Inkster]

set your font-size in pixel, then you don't have to worry about
resolution. a pixel is 1 pixel on a monitor, is 1 pixel on a mac, on a
windoze machine, on linux, on mobile phones... ;-)

A pixel can be 2 pixels in Opera 3+, or 8 pixels, or 1.5 pixels, or
whatever the end user wants it to be.

What's a pixel on paper? 1/360th of an inch? That would be logical on a
typical 360dpi inkjet printer.

 

[Hunter Elliott]

Things like AntiVirus [...] should all be part of the OS IMO.

Hands up everyone (heck, anyone) who'd trust anti-virus software that
was part of Windows?

um, MS used to do that in the DOS days.