[Web4lib] 800x600 Browser Resolution

[Keith D. Engwall]

From what I've read on design sites, the general consensus appears to be that both liquid and fixed layouts are flawed, and it's up to you to decide which flaws you prefer (and both sides have very passionate advocates).  Min and max widths, once they are universally supported, appear to be the best solution.

The good news is that IE 7 is reported to support these, so eventually (not necessarily soon, but eventually), this debate will shift over to how to support legacy browsers, and the consensus there is that it needs to look good but not perfect, and *both* of these layouts fall under that category.

Keith

-----Original Message-----
From: web4lib-bounces at webjunction.org [mailto:web4lib-bounces at webjunction.org] 
Sent: Wednesday, August 02, 2006 1:42 PM
To: web4lib at webjunction.org
Subject: Re: RE: [Web4lib] 800x600 Browser Resolution

I've seen this discussed on many design sites. Some are using hybrid layouts with areas that have a max-width (and hacks to get browsers to obey). Some are basing it on font-size so that it can still get larger even with max-width. And I've seen others even make it so that the layout itself changes to more columns or similar layouts depending on the space allowed. Most of these are more complex and require more testing so I'm not surprised they haven't caught on.

I've seen these layouts called elastic, flexible, jello and zoom. A google search should bring up some examples.

Ryan Eby

On 8/2/06, Hankinson, Andrew <HankiA at parl.gc.ca> wrote:
> I think at some point we need to make a "serving suggestion," though.
> Liquid layouts are great in that they allow a user to experience the 
> content in the way they're most comfortable with, but when they become 
> detrimental to the usability of the site, I would question their 
> effectiveness.
>
> We're not *forcing* anyone to experience our content in one way - 
> especially if we're doing completely CSS-based layouts.  However, I do 
> think it's up to designers to think about the esoteric points of 
> usability (optimal line-lengths is not something I overhear in 
> conversations on the bus...) so that the users don't have to.  Doing 
> that means that you have to control some (many?) aspects of the 
> experience, but AS LONG as you don't lock a user into that one way 
> (using tables for layout is the first example I can think of) I think 
> you're fine.
>
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