Hux
Joined: Dec 02, 2002
# Posts: 1207
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-20 19:20
On another note; Should one redesign(gratis) a web site that was built for a client several years ago for smaller resolutions (whatever it si that is below 800x600 can't recall right now lol), and now looks like a little scratch pad on a bigger resolution screen? Or do you try and get them to fork over money for a redesign?
|
 |
Curt
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 3734
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-22 09:30
If you are feeling very cheritable go ahead and update it. It depends on the client and how much business they've sent you in the past. If they've paid you well and you can afford to do the redesign in short order, it's a nice gesture. Depends on how much work it would be.
But for tightwads, I'd make them pay if they want it updated. If a tightwad doesn't wanna pay, then leave the site alone.
Nobody can really advise you on this. It's up to you.
|
|
excell
Staff
Joined: Mar 19, 2001
# Posts: 14512
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-28 12:26
If they are active clients then I usually advise any re-design work necessary to coincide with a SEO refresh if ever needed. Kills 2 birds with one stone. If they are getting good results from their site they don't mind improvements of any type. It depends on your relationship with the individual client. If on a webmaster maintenance agreement then that sort of thing should probably just be a part of your services. as Curt says, it depends 
|
|
Linear_Existance
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 32
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-28 12:44
Just out of interest what resolution does everyone here use?
My res is permanantly on 1280x1024 however my PC is cool and I have 4 desktops which are all in different resolutions so I can check my design work without fussing around.
I think if you design in 1280x1024 or 1600x1200 you get a better idea of how everything will look in lower resolutions. Basically the smaller you make everything the higher the quality and the more appleasing to the eye it will be. Obviously if you do design in a high res though you need to make sure that you check it in the lower resolutions to make sure it all fit's.
Again back to the original question is it time to design for 1024x768. I would say no on the basis that the older generation and sporadic web users tend to use lower resolutions because thats all they need.
I think we are past 640x480 now and we can ignore anyone who uses that. My monitor wont even go lower than 800x600 so that tells you something.
I would suggest that for at least another year or two we should keep at 800x600 especially for certain sites like holiday sites because it tends to be sporadic users or OAP's that look for holidays so the lower the res the better.
|
|
Curt
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 3734
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-28 16:07
IMO, 800×600 is a good standard even if people are using higher resolutions. Think about hardcopy mags. They could make the magazines 2 feet wide and 3 feet long, but the publishers don't. Why, because sometimes it's just too big no matter how much room you could make for a page. I'd rather scroll down than be required to scroll back and forth because the page is too wide. You can't go wrong with 800 pixels wide.
Not only can most people use it, it's a comfortable width too. It's easier to follow shorter width sentences. How many times have you found some reading material on a web site that had very wide paragraphs due to page width? Since the paragraphs were so wide, you likely ended up losing your spot in some paragraph causing you to skip a line or mistakenly re-read the line as you tried to follow the content. Shorter lines of text are easier to follow.
The nature of browsers lends them to downward scrolling as being more efficient. Long and more narrow—better than wide and shorter at least for informational material. Unless you have a necessity to use 800+ pixel wide pages, it would seem best to stay with 800 (770 actual pixels).
My screen is at 1152×864, but I set my browser at about 850 pixels wide to keep my desktop icons within easy reach. I don't want to be forced to open my browser any wider.
|
|
Linear_Existance
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 32
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-28 16:22
This is what I use the shortcut icons at the bottom for Curt. I agree though but most people who design in 800x600 make the writing and images so big it just looks stupid.
|
|
patrickh
Joined: Oct 05, 2001
# Posts: 2187
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-28 16:49
Just out of interest what resolution does everyone here use?
At work I use 1280x1024 on a 19" monitor.
At home I use 2560x1024 spread across two 17" monitors.
Just bought a new laptop from dell and it had a funky default resoution, something in the neighborhood of like 1400x1100.
|
|
Linear_Existance
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 32
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-28 17:23
That how I want it, sadly ive just moved house and I cant bring all my monitors so im stuck spanning accross desktops for now in 1280x 1024. Good though because I can do my design work and everything else without alt tabbing all the time and opening / closing windows.
|
|
Hux
Joined: Dec 02, 2002
# Posts: 1207
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-29 00:43
The reason for the common trim size that you see in magazines has little to do with user experience and everything to do with cost. It is an exponential leap in cost to jump up sizes due to paper costs. THe first thing most publications will do to cut costs is decrease the trim size.
Now, getting back on track: I can't recall seeing a site that was designed in 8x6 that looked stupid...ok, well let me rephrase that, I don't recall one that was filled with oversized images and fonts. Linear I submit that you are probably doing somethingy goofy with your settings and the result is oversized and stupid looking.
[ Message was edited by: Hux 04/28/2003 04:46 pm ]
|
|
Curt
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 3734
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-29 01:51
The reason for the common trim size that you see in magazines has little to do with user experience and everything to do with cost
True about costs to a large degree, but mainly true because the standard size is 8.5×11 or other variation thereof which makes it cheap. If 2 ft. by 3 ft. was the standard it would be cheap. My point was regarding the size is that it's more practical and comfortable using a smaller standard size than a larger non-standard size and just an illustration to draw a parallel 
At any rate, 800×600 is a good practical size. nuff said.
|
|
thevirus
Joined: May 06, 2003
# Posts: 172
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-29 03:10
im personnaly just suggest making your tables at 100% that way it looks the same for everyone and you could insert some php or somthing to make the text bigger when someone is using a bigger screen resolution its a very simple solution
|
|
crash
Staff
Joined: Dec 02, 2003
# Posts: 10626
|
Posted: 2003-Apr-29 05:17
That's not always a pratical design solution thevirus. And you don't use PHP to adjust your font sizes, you use CSS for that.
[ Message was edited by: crash 04/28/2003 09:18 pm ]
|
|
stevenjm
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 824
|
Posted: 2003-Jun-04 12:43
don't flame me I am only reasonably new to this. But what if you made your images slightly larger than need be and then for instance <img src =whatever width="20%"(for example> the images would maintain their aspect ratio and stay the same size on different resolutions. could you not combine something like this with %html and %css and have it come up the same for different resolutions(or close to the same)?
|
|
stevenjm
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 824
|
Posted: 2003-Jun-04 12:50
resized browsers aside of course
|
|
excell
Staff
Joined: Mar 19, 2001
# Posts: 14512
|
Posted: 2003-Jun-04 13:06
I don't think your image would look very good across resolutions Not even sure if it is technically possible to do that.. is it??
|
|
stevenjm
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 824
|
Posted: 2003-Jun-04 22:33
Thus the reason for making the images larger than need be(so they will still look good at high resolutions)sure it would increase loading time but for pages that are not that heavy on graphics it would be fine. It works , I experimented before I posted.
|
|
stevenjm
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 824
|
Posted: 2003-Jun-05 05:40
further(only an idea) you design sites that are not that heavy on graphics for 1024x768. You use the above %width for images(so that they keep their aspect ratio) use with a combination of html% and css% .Resizes nicely for any backwards resolution .and you put an invisible css box around the page of a percentage value ie 100% then you include javascript that will detect screen resolution and use it to alter the surrounding box to a fixed width at any resolutions above 1024x768.(you would then have the most popular resolutions covered and the quality of your images would be still be perfect even at higher resolutions due to the fixed width css box that the javascript would bring into play at higher resolutions) This is assuming of course that javascript can do this.
any higher resolutions than 1024 and we would virtually have to do away with graphics anyway.(unless the whole world converts to broadband)
|
|
stevenjm
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 824
|
Posted: 2003-Jun-05 07:28
update. - image resize works fine out of a table but put it in a table and its a different story. Any ideas?
|
|
Curt
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 3734
|
Posted: 2003-Jun-05 17:37
Steven, I'm assuming you are talking about sizing the image down for lower resolutions right? Suppose you could do that so that the page layout is more consistant between different resolutions. Not sure it's worth it though.
update. - image resize works fine out of a table but put it in a table and its a different story. Any ideas?
Not sure I'm fully understanding what sort of table layout you are speaking of here? Depending on what you are talking about, it may or may not work.
|
|
stevenjm
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 824
|
Posted: 2003-Jun-06 00:39
yes I am talking about sizing the images down for low resolutions so that they resize larger for higher resolutions. it works and also works for a resized browser. But if I try the same image technique within a percentage sized table the image does not want to resize(ie image in cell from left edge to right edge with text underneath in same cell using percentages for table and cell). perhaps in percentage size css boxes with css positioning instead of tables it might work. not really wanting to do anything in particular just trying to find a technique for designing a page that will look almost the same at different resolutions(1024 downwards anyway)
|
|
Inbox
