Non resolution specific? Options

[jobsw32]

I like the idea but how does that work in practice? Many popular media sites seem to cater happily for 1024x768 but 800x600 seems to have fallen by the wayside.

how much should I care if the site overflows at 800x600?

[Christian J]

I like the idea but how does that work in practice?

Not sure I understood the exact question, but see http://htmlhelp.com/faq/html/all.html#screen-size

Many popular media sites seem to cater happily for 1024x768 but 800x600 seems to have fallen by the wayside.

Probably they try to adapt to what they believe is the smallest common screen resolution. Of course many users prefer browser windows that are much smaller than that.

how much should I care if the site overflows at 800x600?

It's very annoying if you must scroll horizontally in order to read every single line in a block of text.

It's mildly annoying if you can read the block of text, but must scroll horizontally to see e.g. the nav menu.

It's a blessing when you can hide a column full of advertizing simply by making the window narrower.

[jobsw32]

I use 1280x1024 for my desktop on a 19" and I'm thinking that nowadays most have at least 17" flat screens but I could be wrong. I wonder if there are any figures that provide this information. I thought it was lore that iE has 80% of the market and Firefox 20% and everyone else is like less than 1%.

I like it when the site dynamically adapts to the resolution of the user but what codie tricks would I need to make it happen? At the end of the day some designs will accomodate that but others won't.

What I mean is you have to plan your site around the various technical dohickys and so sacrifice elements that you might want.

Is there a template somewhere that demonstrates the code you need to make a site dynamically adapt through resolutions?

[Darin McGrew]

FWIW, the most recent stats on Wikipedia list MSIE at 64.64%, FF at 25.30%, Safari at 4.30%, Chrome at 3.19%, Opera at 1.50%, and everything else at 1.12%. Note that the WebKit engine (Safari and Chrome) totals to 7.49%. The WebKit engine is also used by a number of mobile browsers.

Yes, people are using bigger screens. My display at work is 2560x1600, IIRC. But the latest info I saw indicated that the larger the display, the less likely it is that people use full-screen browser windows. I often have a couple browsers (each with multiple tabs), a terminal window or two (multiple tabs each), and several IM windows all visible at the same time. The browser never gets the whole display. (It often gets the full height of the display, but less than half the width of the display.)

People are also using smaller screens. My mobile device is 320x480 (or 480x320, depending on how I hold it). Yes, I often browse "regular" sites with it. The mobile versions of many sites are too stripped down, too feature-free for what I want to do with them.

Anyway, the usability advice I've read indicates that you should optimize for windows that are about 1000px wide, but allow your layout to adapt gracefully to both narrower (800px) and wider (1600px) browser windows. I can't find a citation for that right now though.

[jobsw32]

I think can easily accomodate half windows, the page I'm working on likes being smaller on a larger screen but doesn't much like being larger on a smaller screen.

I'd say if you were designing for 800x600 you would use a 640x480 sized page. You can zoom in a touch then if you want to.

I can't imagine that people are going to want to support every device in the universe when there is so much time and cost involved in developing sites.

Think will just have to live with there being unreachable little niches of incompatibility all too much art and too little science!

Starting to think that a lot of what's around today is going to end up binned as the web doesn't seem to be keeping up with demands, something else that is 'can do' is needed.

This post has been edited by jobsw32: Nov 27 2009, 05:14 PM

[pandy]

I like it when the site dynamically adapts to the resolution of the user but what codie tricks would I need to make it happen?

Wrong question. Right question is what codie tricks you should avoid, so the page can behave naturally. Answer is fixed widths and too big images.

In all honesty, today it may involve more than that. Like the choice of layout method. Floats that let the page rearrange itself in smaller windows may be a solution sometimes but it isn't the only solution.

I can't imagine that people are going to want to support every device in the universe when there is so much time and cost involved in developing sites.

Why would it cost more and take more time to do it this way?

[jobsw32]

people don't work for free and they aren't born with the know how. They are designing sites for mobile devices because someone who wants them is paying them not because they care.

On the other hand I'm designing a site out of my own interest on my own time not paying anyone else to do it and if I'm that miserly so's everyone else.

So at the end of the day you're designing a site that others are going to profit from for nothing, their devices are supported but they have not paid you anything but they are charging you to use their service so they win. There's no incentive you're just throwing money at people who aren't going to give you anything back.

Fine until you're hungry and want to buy something.

[pandy]

I don't understand what you are talking about. How would it cost you to design a site one way or the other? Neither do I understand why you asked the question in the first place if you are so set on what you think. And why are you mad? You sound mad.

[jobsw32]

yes I'm mad to spend time on it but I am anyway. I'm paying my isp subscription other isp rent-a-box and soon to be triple broadband tax the gov. is minting. not mad but mad. I don't understand either. Suppose It's a chore. I've already made the site and struggled to understand w3 and now have to read again and struggle to understand that. I don't know. I'm mad.

[pandy]

But surely your ISP and gov fees and taxes don't affect your site's cross-resolutionness. I'm mad at the spy laws my country got more or less overnight, but that has no impact on how my pages display either. Wish I could put a notice up saying "This site looks like crap because of IPRED. It's out of my control.".

Yeah, it's pain to start over. But in this game, that's what we often have to do.

[jobsw32]

could quit the internet, I'm only wasting my life and the world existed just as miserably for centuries without it. then I would pay nothing and be doing other things that might be better for me.

[pandy]

Come now, it isn't that bad.