on 26/11/02 11:04 AM, Brian V Bonini ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > On Mon, 2002-11-25 at 18:26, Justin French wrote: >> on 26/11/02 2:41 AM, Brian V Bonini ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: >> >>> Also, try to use relative sizes, if you use fixed sized like 10pt. you >>> will have size discrepancies on different platforms. If you use a >>> relative scheme like 12px it will render more consistently.... >> >> 12px is NOT a relative size, and will mean that users with vision >> impairment, etc etc will have trouble resizing the text to suit their >> preferences... The relative sizes are things like "small". >> >> http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS2/fonts.html#propdef-font-size > > px is obviously a relative unit (relative to the users screen) unless > your going to try to say everyone views stuff at the same dpi. It's late > so perhaps I'm missing it but I do not see anywhere in the spec that you > cited where it says px is absolute. However I will quote loosely from > the spec: "values with relative units (em, ex, px) must be made absolute > by multiplying with the appropriate font or pixel size," > > So, go ahead and try what I suggested THEN tell me it's not right. Using > px WILL make it more consistent across win, linux, mac, etc.. and will > not inhibit the browsers ability to enlarge the text size at all...
I don't think I was being clear enough at all :) 12px is 12pixels... there is no way for it to *reliably* be reset to 14px, or 10px by the user on all browser. In the current versions of IE for Win, using the text size larger smaller or % options in the menus has no effect whatsoever if values like 12px or 12pt are given. If you specify 12px, and I decide I need it bigger, I don't have many options, other than totally overwriting your style sheet with my own (no thanks!, and beyond most web users). The good news is that because 12pt and 12px are so prolific on the web (and so evil in terms of accessability), browser manufacturers are now beginning to make px and pt variable sizes as well. That is to say, in IE5 Mac, NN7 (and maybe 6), and some other browsers DO LET YOU CHANGE THE FONT SIZE FRONT THE MENUS, selecting smaller, larger, 120%, or whatever. The bad news is that the latest versions of IE6 (at least 3 months back when I did some major CSS testing) did not let users do this. It's well documented, and people like Zeldman and A List Apart have spent months campaigning for IE Win to match IE Mac and NN on this. Here's a snippet from http://www.zeldman.com/daily/0702b.html > To satisfy the demands of accessibility within the context of normative > practices in commercial web design, IE/Win needs to do what IE/Mac did in > March, 2000: implement Text Zoom, so visitors can resize any web text. Will > Microsoft ever make this change to IE/Win? We can only hope. And this one from http://www.zeldman.com/daily/0502c.html > Pixels solve these problems by delivering a guaranteed base size. But what if > that base size is too small for some readers? > Opera has always offered its users the ability to easily scale any web > page via Page Zoom. In January 2000, WaSPs Todd Fahrner and yours truly > persuaded the appropriate engineers to add a similar feature (³Text Zoom²) to > IE5/Mac and Mozilla/Netscape 6. Thus nearly all current browsers allow users > to resize text set in pixels. If text is too small, hit a button, a command > key combination, or a drop-down menu, and voila! Instant legibility. > Alas, MSIE for Windows does not allow web users to resize text set in > pixels. We will keep pestering Microsoft to add that feature to its Windows > browser. Until they do, alternate style sheet widgets enable designers to work > around this thorny accessibility problem. So, I stand partially corrected, the user CAN override ALL font size by digging into the accessibility menus, but I seriously doubt many do. If the latest versions of IE *DO* allow text zooming via the menus, again I stand corrected, but there are millions of web users out there on IE5 and IE6 without text zoom. IMO, specifying a px or pt font size is taking away the users right to choose what font size they prefer to read with, IF they are using IE4/5/6. > No, the problem he stated was the inconsistency of sizes on different > platforms. A totally addressable issues regardless of what the user has > done with the default font settings. A totally addressable issue *IF* you're prepared to laugh at accessibility guidelines. FWIW, I *have* and *do* specify px and pt font sizes on some of my sites, mostly to meet client desires, but I do so only after pointing out the issues and letting them make an informed descision. Coincidently, that's all I was trying to do here... point out that specifying fixed text sizes like pt and px are not a magical solution to all problems. At least until IE and whichever other browser catch up on the text zoom thing. Cheers, Justin French -------------------- http://Indent.com.au Web Development & Graphic Design -------------------- -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
