font sizes

[chart43]

> I work on Windows (unfortunately) . But I regularly view my work in a Mac

(IE5.x and Safari). I do not notice the phenomenon that you describe.
But then, it hardly seems relevant. What's important is that 100% is
right for you on your setup, and right for someone else on their setup,
whatever there os is.

normal in my case results in too big on Windows. My code is all
valid, so too are style sheets.
I doubt you have anything to worry about, but just in case... url?

Brian
and
When not setting a font size, browsers use *their* normal font size
(whatever the user wants, generally speaking; and it's changeable to
whatever they want, if it's not). But they can't do that if you fix a font
size, and relative font sizing is still a problem (they may have to make
adjustments from site to site).

You're doing the right thing by not setting a size, you don't need to worry
about how different the text looks on different browsers in this situation.
No more than some TV show producer should concern themselves about how loud
or colourful their show is, so long as they produce it to the normal
conditions. The viewer can adjust their set as required.

Tim
Thanks Brian and Tim for your replies. There seems to be a misunderstandin g.
It is the least important thing that it looks good on my set up! I would
rather it looked terrible on my set up but great on everyone else's because
the sites I make are not for me to look at but for others all over the show
(on mostly PCs).

I would be very surprised if I did not have something to worry about. I
understand the point about user settings (analogy of volume control). I am
not worried about how folk set their "volume" controls (so to speak). What I
am worried about is that quite generally, the fonts on most pro sites look
good, normal, average, like each other in size whilst mine stand out as
bigger though I do not set any special font size. What is going on?
My concerns are based on the evidence of looking at my sites on PCs and
getting some written and voiced feedback, and also from a site called
iCapture (takes pics of how sites look on different browsers), am appalled
to see my fonts so big.

Yes, of course, an example: http://ihpst.org/may2004newsletter.html

In iCapture looking at how it looks on IE6 on a PC, the nav bar is fine (no
wonder, the fonts are coded small, but the main Ps in the body are enormous!
Actually, same trouble in Safari for Macs (again, through iCapture and
verbal feedback from a friend)

I look at things on my machine on IE 5.1.6, Mozilla 1.3.1, iCab, Netscape
6.2 and set the prefs for my personal viewing for fonts at 10 or 11pt (but
this should be irrelevant to my problem as explained above). It is the
relativities that are stumping me. I set the code for <meta
http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">.

I know there is something I am missing. I have the impression that the pro
sites that look nice in font sizes also are less than pure in their code and
do not rely on simple css linked stylesheets alone, they often make heavy
use of font tags in the html and fancy javascript controls. What's a simple
guy like me that hand-codes and wants to trust the linked css technology to
do? Someone tell me! :)

You should be able to see my style sheet that controls this one example at
http://ihpst.org/ihpst.css

Appreciate any help.

[Alan J. Flavell]

On Mon, 17 May 2004, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:

Tim <ti*@mail.local host.invalid> wrote:

chart43 <ch*****@optusn et.com.au> posted:

I am much tempted to just specify sans-serif in the css at the body
level and be done (but I will experiment a little further...
I have done this for headings on my pages, but notice a problem on
Windows machines: MSIE, as usual, ignores the specs and doesn't see
sans-serif as an instruction to use the preferred sans-serif font,

Actually, sans-serif means a generic sans-serif font.

Yes, and older versions of IE had some spectacularly bad behaviour in
that. Which may have persuaded authors to nominate several plausible
Windows font names ahead of the generic choice, thus bringing everyone
down to the mass-market "common factor". I have the impression that
recent versions have got somewhat better. And since anyone who's
keeping their Windoze secure will have been forced to upgrade to IE6
(and taking a look at server access statistics, not that I'd want to
put *too* much credence on sever statistics), probably we can pretty
much ignore old IE versions now.
and the CSS 2 specification explicitly says:
"User agents are encouraged to allow users to select alternative choices
for the generic fonts."

So it does. And how does the dominant vendor respond?

but will often decide to use a font called sans-serif.

Are you sure you have specified sans-serif correctly, and not using the
notation "sans-serif" with quotation marks (which by definition means a
specific, though probably nonexistent, font with that proper name)?

You know, the CSS specs are fairly vague - and I think deliberately so
- when it comes to matching up a CSS font face specification with some
actual font on the target system.

It could be argued that matching a CSS specification of "sans-serif"
with an actual font "MS Sans Serif" was well within the spirit of the
CSS specification, if no closer name match can be found. Even if the
result is unsatisfactory in several different ways!

Well, it seemed that earlier versions of IE were choosing "MS Sans
Serif" in response to the generic sans-serif specification, but I
don't think that current versions are doing so(?)

[Andreas Prilop]

On Mon, 17 May 2004, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:

Actually, sans-serif means a generic sans-serif font.
Actually, sans-serif means Arial to Microsoft. If you specify "sans-serif"
you will get Arial in Internet Explorer - even if your preferred typeface
is some other sans-serif tpyeface.
I must admit that the description of "generic fonts" looks more and more
confusing to me.

Me too. If don't see any point in specifying a "generic" typeface as last
item in the list.

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[Lauri Raittila]

Andreas Prilop wrote:

On Mon, 17 May 2004, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:

Actually, sans-serif means a generic sans-serif font.

Actually, sans-serif means Arial to Microsoft. If you specify "sans-serif"
you will get Arial in Internet Explorer - even if your preferred typeface
is some other sans-serif tpyeface.

Exeption being if system doesn't have Arial font (someone dislikes it so
much that removed it). Then at least some versions of IE try to find most
similar font, which can be anything (not just one (low quality) font is
done by editing Arial, leaving panorose information as it was...)
--
Lauri Raittila <http://www.iki.fi/lr> <http://www.iki.fi/zwak/fonts>
I'm looking for work | Etsin työtä

[Tim]

chart43 <ch*****@optusn et.com.au> posted:

I am much tempted to just specify sans-serif in the css at the body
level and be done (but I will experiment a little further...

Tim <ti*@mail.local host.invalid> wrote:
I have done this for headings on my pages, but notice a problem on
Windows machines: MSIE, as usual, ignores the specs and doesn't see
sans-serif as an instruction to use the preferred sans-serif font,
"Jukka K. Korpela" <jk******@cs.tu t.fi> posted:

Actually, sans-serif means a generic sans-serif font.
System preferred then? ;-)
I must admit that the description of "generic fonts" looks more and more
confusing to me. And it does not help that browsers often have poor
assignments for them.
I can see there being merit in saying use a sans-serif font for headings
and a serif font for text, for example, and letting which particular font
be picked by the user. Opera's method isn't too bad, though it's
convoluted if you want to see all of your H elements to a specific font
(you have to do it one by one, you can't select a group and pick a face).
but will often decide to use a font called sans-serif. Are you sure you have specified sans-serif correctly, and not using the
notation "sans-serif" with quotation marks (which by definition means a
specific, though probably nonexistent, font with that proper name)?
Yes, just like this:

body {font-family: serif}
h1,h2,h3,h4,h5, h6 {font-family: sans-serif; font-weight: bold;}
There's another non-Windows problem: Sans-serif fonts are generally
harder to read (when they're the same size and weight as serif fonts)
on machine printed text (particularly low-resolution screens, as
nearly all VDUs are).

Pardon? If you are referring to printed text, where do the _screens_ come
into the play?

I said machine printed, as opposed to hand written (even if it is printed
on a screen). Machine "rendered" might have been a better word, though; it
was the machine aspect that I was referring to. It's the absolute
regularity of the rendering that give the eyes trouble interpreting text.

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[Tim]

On Mon, 17 May 2004 10:43:14 +0100,
"Alan J. Flavell" <fl*****@ph.gla .ac.uk> posted:

Well, it seemed that earlier versions of IE were choosing "MS Sans
Serif" in response to the generic sans-serif specification, but I
don't think that current versions are doing so(?)

Mine still is, from time to time (6.0.2800.1106I S on Win98SE).

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[Andreas Prilop]

On Tue, 18 May 2004, Lauri Raittila wrote:

Exeption being if system doesn't have Arial font (someone dislikes it so
much that removed it).

I rather believe in the Yeti than a Windows computer without Arial. ;-)

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