Browser sizes

[Sara]

I was reading in another thread about how people view the pages we design in so many different resolutions. I finally went and got this: http://www.applythis.com/ Browser Master is wonderful and has saved me tons of headaches in the past year or so. I lost it for a while, but, finally found it again and reinstalled it.

:)

[Aaron]

Thanks, Sara. I'd been wondering if there was something like this out there.

[Palmer]

I usually just have the table stretch to fit the window, whatever the size is. That way you don't have to worry about the resolution.

Palmer

[dnxnet]

that works except when you are using graphics for table corners and things like tat, because then paercentages ruin a good effect.

[Palmer]

In that type of design, make the table corners a fixed width and the middle table a width of 100% and that is the only part that will stretch. Check out my portfolio on my design site, that's what I'm talking about. Resize the browser window and see how it stretches...

http://www.morningstarwebdesigns.com/portfolio.htm

The middle table is 100% width but the other cells with the curved corners are fixed width. :)

Palmer

[dnxnet]

On my site, doing that was a nightmare, so i just made different sites to suit different resolutions. problem solved. :)

[mort]

Palmer,
This may not be a problem for newer browsers, and I haven't checked it, so feel free to tell me I am wrong. But...
I tried doing what you were suggesting on a site a while ago, and although it would display fine in ie, netscape would make the cell/table that I set to 100% to 100% of the screen, and so the page would spill off the edge.

[Palmer]

Don't cha just love Netscape? :p What you did *wrong* was use the 100% width for the cell on the right. The wasy you need to do it for Netscape is have a cell on the right and a cell on the right a certain fixed width, then the middle one you set to 100%. What you say you have no need for the cell on the right? That's fine, just put an invisible spacer.gif in there and set it to the width you want the margin, say 6 pixels.

What the browser does is look at the fixed widths first, then fills in where it sees a percentage width. It ends up looking like this...

<table width="100%">
<tr><td width="150">spacer.gif 150x1<br>Navigation stuff</td><td width="100%">content</td><td width="6">spacer.gif</td></tr>
</table>

Palmer

[Sara]

Welcome Aaron! I really like how you can use it with IE and NS and I even sized down an Opera to see how it would look. I have a site I'm totally revamping and it has a static menu on the left with a frame set. It's really important to have it fit and be viewable to all in my opinion. Just one can tell 10 about it. :)

[fhaman]

A simple Solution is to just design the site static for 800*600 resolution.

The simple fact is not many ppl use anything below that and any1 using a higher resolution will be able to see it fine.


U can use percentages for width but there are many problems associated with doing that

[VxJasonxV]

You COULD, but...then 640 users (like the tons here at work) are completely SOL. And people running greater than 1024 (like I like to) have so much white space it's annoying.

Getting percentages to work right is my suggestion. There are problems, but there are also workarounds.

[steviedifranco]

if you have a large resolution and are looking at a site with not a lot of content, its going to look funny as well. there's an up and down to everything you've talked about...i think you should just do what you are most comfortable with.

i'm just kinda getting started in web design, i've only been doing it for about a year, could you take a look at my site and some of the sites i've done and tell me what you think? my main site is www.ohioconnect.net and all my other sites branch off of that.

also, tell me what you think the downside is to one of these sites which I've created using a LOT of frames:

www.grovergroupllc.com
www.thestratisgroup.com

if there is any way i can be of help to any one of you, just let me know.

[Palmer]

Hey I'm from near there :)

If you're looking for a critique of your site, this is what I noticed that should be changed...

Remove the green marble background. Either use just a color or go with white. Re-do the logo and get rid of the beveling. If you must use a drop shadow, make it one or 2 pixels right and same down. You might increase the cellpadding on pages like the why page and add a few photos to break up the monotony. It's jus a lot of text and bumps up against the edge of the page too much.

The rest is real good I think you did a fine job. :) I should probably put my web design site in your directory. I'm from Stow.

Palmer

[matu]

Hmm... I either like to make my sites static, or create different layouts for different resolutions and place a redirect script based on the viewer's screen resolution on the splash page.

[VxJasonxV]

Just like what Mr. DNX did. (The whole, diff. per resolution thing)

[pete3005]

My opinion is that it is best to use a fixed width of 760px, reason is that 96% of users run either 800 x 600 or 1024 x 768.

You can then add JavaScript to change the div widths if they have a larger screen res.

Also I don't see how a flexible site can work properly, it either looks cramped up at 800 x 600 or really weird at anything over 1024 x 768.

I also wonder why people are using tables for layout... tables were design for tabular data ;)

CSS-P is the way to go, seperating content from presentation :)

I don't support NN4 for my sites, just IE5+ and Mozilla, NN6+, Opera 7+. In the UK due to all ISPs using IE by default, any UK site aimed at UK only customers doesn't recieve many NN4 users. I know however that Germany and maybe the US is different.

Pete :)

[matu]

I like tables. lol

[SmackDaddy]

I like food.

[dnxnet]

*throws a fish stick at smack*

Here, eat big boy!!!! EAT!!!!

[steviedifranco]

i've been playin around with sizes and i've determined whats best in my opinion:

-make the page fit the whole screen
-make the page small enough to fit a 640x480 for a couple reasons:
1) it will fit on any computer, so almost NOBODY will have a hard time viewing the site
2) 640 pixels = about 7 inches, which means when printing, the text doesn't run off the page. i hate printing a site and having the change the page setup to landscape in order to have it print right.

those are just my thoughts. the page can still look nice and most importantly can be printed easily.

[pete3005]

You can have a site at 760px that will print properly. Just use a different CSS for printing so that you elminate any elements on the page that you don't wish to be printed.

http://www.meyerweb.com/eric/articles/webrev/200001.html

Pete

[Sara]

I have been making pages 800 x 600 resolution for a while now. I have not had anyone tell me that they couldn't see something on the page for any reason.

I don't have anything that anyone would want to print, if I do, I just zip up a word file. :D

Sara

[pete3005]

Statistics show that around 49% of people use 800 x 600 and about 42% of people use 1024 x 768. Therefore a site with a fixed with of 760px does not cause horizontal scrollbars at 800 screen res and still looks good at 1024 screen res.

I really don't see the point in designing for people who run at 680 screen res, you can't please all the people all of the time. How far do you go, do we still design for people using NN3 with JavaScript and Cookies turned off???

I believe in going for the majority without turning people away. Those on lower screen res than 800 will just have to scroll horizontally.

I also wouldn't design different pages for different screen res sizes either. That would be a maintenance hell unless you automate it somehow.

Just my 2 pennies worth :)

Pete

[steviedifranco]

pete thanks for the css2 tip, that can be very useful. i agree with you in not designing pages for different resolutions, it takes way too much time.