On 2/7/09 17:07, Felix Miata wrote:
Zoom, minimum text size and magnifiers are defense mechanisms. The basic
problem is the pervasive offense - not respecting users' font size choices by
incorporating them at 100% for the bulk of content. Thus, an even better way
to address presbyopia is to design to make defenses unnecessary in the first
place.
I'm dubious about the rhetoric here:
* Why should we treat browser default font size settings, which many
users seem not to realise that they can change, as users' font size
choices? If users want to force a font size everywhere, they can and
that is indisputably a user choice.
* Why should we characterize user acceptance with reservations of
publisher styles for the page, the web, or their entire system as a
defensive measure? I think this language reinforces the popular
(mis)conception that publisher styles are the natural presentation of
the publisher's content, rather than a skin the user should be able to
reject or use with modifications. Why not see this as a partnership
rather than a battle?
* Like font size, typeface and colors can radically affect the
legibility of text and can be overridden by settings in popular
browsers. Would you describe publisher typeface and color suggestions as
an offence against user choice? If no, then why not?
(As an aside, none of this undermines the clear usability advantages of
designing for legibility when creating publisher skins.)
I'd suggest that bigger problems in modern web design are the use of
publisher styles that:
1. Prevent user acceptance of publisher styles with reservations. For
example, use of background-image (which may need to be disabled for
legibility reasons) to render headers and controls, with their text
hidden, or positioned off-screen, or overlaid by another element where
it won't be seen. I've railed against this, but I can't see this getting
better until we develop a fast and reliable technique for detecting
whether background-image will be applied with JS or CSS3's modifications
to content are widely implemented:
http://www.css3.info/image-replacement-in-css3/
2. Far worse, prevent user rejection of publisher styles wholesale. For
example, loading multiple application states (e.g. a form, its error
messages and sucess messages) into the DOM simultaneously, then using
the display property to determine which get shown to the user - rather
than using DOM methods to add and remove fragments to the DOM as required.
These do turn turn the partnership into a conflict.
--
Benjamin Hawkes-Lewis
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