At 5/31/2007 08:31 PM, Tim Offenstein wrote:
Anyone have a recommendation on what size screen to use as a
baseline when designing for a new site? 800x600 or 1024x768 or something else?
Ideally, I believe the baseline should be no assumption of screen
size. Look at the spectrum of user agents: screen readers, Braille
readers, handhelds, PCs, Macs, etc. Which populations of users will
you choose to deny access to your sites? Design your sites so that
they can be read on any of these devices and you'll be at the top of
your field.
Sure, read the stats, but don't misinterpret them. They won't really
show you who to target. All they'll show you is how many people you
can exclude by building fancy stairs and no ramps.
Even if you could predict the screen size of a visual user agent, you
still wouldn't know how large the user will size their browser
window. Window size is more significant than screen resolution. A
lot of PC users (including myself) maximize their windows by default,
but that's by no means universal. For some interesting stats analysis see:
Actual Browser Sizes by Thomas Baekdal
http://baekdal.com/reports/Actual-Browser-Sizes/
Even if you could predict screen size and window width, you still
wouldn't know how large the user has sized their text. How easy is
it to enlarge text so that it spills out of your column widths,
overlaps with other text or disappears off-screen, and becomes unreadable?
With ingenuity you can design a page that works well with a wide
variety of window widths and text sizes. Consider sizing page width
in ems and max-width at 100% to let the page expand up to but not
exceeding window width. Consider floating columns side-by-side so
that they stack vertically when the window is too narrow for a
multi-column layout.
There's much, much more, but that's a start. I strongly recommend
you join the CSS-D listserve and read their wiki:
http://css-discuss.incutio.com/
Regards,
Paul
__________________________
Paul Novitski
Juniper Webcraft Ltd.
http://juniperwebcraft.com
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