Browser Considerations when designing Sites

[Jaguar]

I recently designed a new site, and i got positive feedback on it. However one viewer said that if u increased the font size in the browser, the site was badly effected. So basically when designing a site what are some of the major things to consider.

I know stuff like the viewers screen resolution (i tend to design for 800*600), and tables with borders in Netscape (the borders cant be coloured), and now taking into account the potential font size increase. Are there any other major things like this that ive missed, to take into account when designing a site?

I know its a pretty vague question, but any thoughts on the subject are welcome :)

[Sar]

People can over-ride all your carefully chosen style settings in IE5.

Tools:->Internet Options:->Accessibilty:->User Style Sheet.

Just tried it using a style sheet I will be using for my redesigned webby, and it makes quite a bit of difference visually.

[Sar]

So basically do what I do, design it the way you want it to look, because there's no way to account for all other peoples personal customisation choices...

[Dahfish]

Hi there,

one other consideration is with regards to graphics. In particular GIF files. Make sure you use the "Web" palette of 216 colours <-- this palette is the universal cross browser crossplatform range of colours. Basically it means that the browser will disply the image correctly as you saved it without introducing and browser dithering. Obviously this is affected if the user happens to be viewing in less than 256 colours on their graphics card ;)

Netscape doesn't support, or should I say didn't (V4.6 & before - after I don't know) the <MARQUEE> tag and renders the text as text ;)

Cheers

DahFish.

[Greap]

<iframe> is also one you have to be careful with. most netscapes dont support it.

[dran]

Jaguar,
You can use style sheets and set font sizes for all of your fonts to a particular size in points like 14pt. This stops font sizing in the browser working I believe. This of course messes up anyone who runs at stupid resolutions on their monitor (1600*1200 for example) because they won't be able to see the tiny fonts :) Unless someone does what Sar said.

Of course if you plan to use flash there are a few problems too, like if people are using anything other than IE or Netscape they probably won't be able to see it. Opera is a good example.

When it comes down to it just try to use HTML 4 and a few graphics for logos etc and it will work with most browsers. Anyway, its content that is king, not the look (says he whose whole site is just graphics and flash).

Dran

[Dahfish]

hmmm dran,

your profile seems rather similar to mine :) kewl

bikes? hmmm tell me more *grins*

I have had problems with netscape and frames - more specifically trying to get the images flush with the frame margins - I have set every margin related tag I can find, but it still does strange things, at full screen (res irrelevant) the images almost align, the you sretch the screen, sometimes it locks and fits, move it a bit it goes out again - god it's annoying! explorer is so easy to write html for!

tbh I still haven't sorted that problem out using V4.6 maybe the later netscapes sort it.

anyway sorry for the pointless ramblings :)

DahFish.