[WEB4LIB] browsers and screen sizes

[Thomas Dowling]

> Jakob Nielsen argues that users will still be using Netscape version 3
until
> early 2001 (http://www.useit.com/alertbox/990418.html).  Does anyone
know of
> a site that tracks what percentage of users are using what browser?  A
> similar question is what percentage of users is using what
size/resolution
> monitor.
> We are designing our library's website, and I'm trying to win a
usability
> argument.
> Thanks,

I once had the honor of posting to Web4Lib a script that would generate a
real-time "snapshot" of recent browser activity.  The current revision to
that script is at <URL:http://www.ohiolink.edu/~tdowling/browsers.cgi> and
the source is free for the taking.  It requires a Perl CGI environment and
a log file that stores user agent headers in some way that can be
described by a regular expression.

In playing around with this, I've found that different servers, with
different services, get different percentages of various browsers, and
that on-campus and off-campus use are markedly different.

Avoid fixed width pages wherever possible.  Too wide or too narrow, they
suffer usability problems, and at a bare minimum, you'll face a 50%
variation from users' narrowest windows to their widest (~600px to ~900px)
and quite possibly a 100% variation (~600px to ~1200px, or three quarters
of a 1600x1200 screen).

Thomas Dowling
OhioLINK - Ohio Library and Information Network
tdowling at ohiolink.edu