none resizing pages, how do we keep pages with divs form resizing? Options

[Derlin]

Hey, I'm using divs and css to make my page layout. But one problem is that my header is an image, so when i resize the window thats displaying my page, all the divs and stuff try to squeeze together so that I can still see the width of the page no matter how small the browser window is or how long the page gets (cause when you squeeze stuff it gets longer and narrower).

I was wondering what the code was that made it possible so that your page is always the size of the screen its displayed on. For instance,
msn.com. Even if you resize the browser window, the page itself will not resize, instead, you will have to scroll both side-to-side and up and down to see parts of the page in a smaller browser window.

Is that effect possible using css and divs? or is it soemthing that only table page layouts can do?

[Derlin]

I figured it out, nevermind. Sorry for wasting anyones time. It turns out it was because I was using em units to size my divs. i changed them to pixels and they stopped resizing!

[Darin McGrew]

I figured it out, nevermind. Sorry for wasting anyones time. It turns out it was because I was using em units to size my divs. i changed them to pixels and they stopped resizing!

That is not a good thing.

See also the FAQ entry For what screen size should I write?

(And note that modern browsers can force your fixed-width layout to adapt to the available display area regardless of what you do.)

[Derlin]

How is this a bad thing? Could you explain it a bit more? From the faq link you gave, I gleaned that my page may be a bit too big, but thats all.

[Derlin]

Actually, after reading a bit more, I know to perhaps make my font not in absolute sizes, but why is making th page layout a definite size that bad when compared to it goign all buggy when I do resize it?

[Darin McGrew]

Well, a layout that goes "all buggy" when resized is worse than a fixed-width layout, but ideally the layout will adapt to whatever size display area is available to it (without going "all buggy").