Monitor res question

[jaguide]

Hi,
I'm a freshie here.
Should I design pages for a 800x600, or 1024x768, or is it better to do both and have the browser pick? I'm curious how everybody deals with this issue.

[Charles]

The only acceptable solution is to make a page that works well on all screen resolutions or when there is no screen at all. Write your page using HTML 4.01 (http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/) Strict and CSS2 (http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/). Which is to say, so not use tables for layout. Use CSS instead.

[Aronya1]

Originally posted by Charles
The only acceptable solution is to make a page that works well on all screen resolutions or when there is no screen at all. Write your page using HTML 4.01 (http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/) Strict and CSS2 (http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/). Which is to say, so not use tables for layout. Use CSS instead.
While Charles is right, this is easier said than done for most of us. My suggestion is to test your site primarily at 800 x 600. If it looks good at that resolution, it should look good at a higher resolution, also.

[Charles]

Originally posted by Aronya1
While Charles is right, this is easier said than done for most of us. Only because you've already learned one way. It is actually easier to learn how to make a fluid page. And knowing how to do both, I can assure you that the fluid method is easier.

[Aronya1]

I agree completely re: learning a different method after you've been taught one way. Oh, to be young again...

[Vladdy]

First, screen resolution has little to do with the window size allocated to your web site. My desktop PC runs at resolution 1600x1200 (21" Sony Trinitron is a nice display :cool: ) but I rarely have my browser occupying more than half of the available screen width.
Second, while your site needs to be flexible enough to adjust to browser window size, it is a good idea to put some limits on how narrow and how wide your site can be displayed. The narrow limit is obvious - almost any design will break if it tries to fit within 100px. The wide limit is useful for people who prefer to browse with their browser maximized. Text spanning too far from left to right is uncomfortable to read. The important part here is that these limits should depend on font size and be specified in ems, not pixels (there are cases when a web page contains a wide graphic, that justify using lower width limit in pixels). These limits can be set in CSS using min-width and max-width properties or in case of the damn IE using their proprietory expression() construct with the width attribute.

[Paul Jr]

Since we're on the subject of fluid layouts, I have two questions.

1) If entirely possible, what are the pro's and con's of using Precentages (%) entirely; and nothing else?

2) What's the difference between em's and percentages?

[Vladdy]

Percentages and ems are interchangeable ONLY when applied to font properties such as font-size and line-height.

When you use percentages for box properties such as width, height, padding, margin, those are the percents of the containing box size. They may be appropriate in some cases. ems are the font units, so when you use
body
{ min-width: 30em;
max-width: 50em;
}
it makes the width of you document scale nicely with the font size.

[Paul Jr]

This may be a bit of a stupid question, but which would be best, em's, or percentages? Is there even a best? This has troubled me for quite some time...what to use for what to make sure the layout is fluid.