Message-ID: <44184d86$1@kcnews01> from Joseph Kesselman contained the
following:

And this is really all you need to say. We also know that Microsoft has
totally destroyed sensible email communication with its Outlook products
and that Betamax was better than VHS.

I have a lot of sympathy for the purist view - I think the aims are
laudable and support them. But I've recently been doing some scripting
for a web design company who are stacked out with work. And the reason
they are stacked out with work is their locked down pixel perfect crisp
design. Bad practice it may be but these guys are delivering what the
customer wants. And unless you can manage to change things through
legislation the customer will continue to decide how web pages should
look and perform.
--
Geoff Berrow 0110001001101100010000000110
001101101011011001000110111101100111001011
100110001101101111001011100111010101101011

Martin Underwood wrote:

Not true. *CSS* gives hints and suggestions as to formatting. HTML
Strict gives no indication of formatting, although there are certain
conventions that many browsers follow. HTML Transitional is
deprecated, and thus not recommended.

If you want that much control over the document, use PDF.

The advantages of HTML over PDF are numerous. I would hate to see the
flexibility of HTML degraded.

I like the fact that when I go to one website, I can disable
stylesheets and thus turn off the clashing colours. I like the fact
that I can go to another and disable stylesheets, and thus turn off
Arial 8pt. I like the fact that I can serve different versions of a
page to different media.

Why are you writing a web page? Because you want people to read it. So
don't make it difficult for them to read it.


However, I think you may be conflating two separate issues.

One is that of fixed vs fluid design, and this is where the philosophy
debate starts. As you can tell, I am firmly in the "fluid" camp. The
vast, probably overwhelming, majority of PDF documents I have come
across would be much better served as HTML pages, with all the
advantages thereof. Only a tiny number actually needed the precise
document layout control that PDF offers. And that's fine - if you do
need to replicate a precise layout, that's what PDF is for. But why do
you need it? What is important is to convey a message - if the page
appears slightly differently in different browsers, so what?

The other is that of browser bugs. The W3C has defined standards for
HTML and CSS. Some browsers don't apply those standards as they are
defined. Whether you have a system where formatting is a matter of
suggestion (HTML+CSS) or definition (PDF) makes no difference if you
have a browser that draws boxes the wrong size and writes the text in
the wrong size.

--
Stevie D
\\\\\ ///// Bringing dating agencies to the
\\\\\\\__X__/////// common hedgehog since 2001 - "HedgeHugs"
___\\\\\\\'/ \'///////_____________________________________________

Martin Underwood wrote:

But surely that's the sensible thing to happen...

If you want to change the size of the window, that must be because it
is not the right size now. So you're not happy with the layout as it
is now. If you change the size of the window but the text stays
exactly where it was, what have you achieved?

--
Stevie D
\\\\\ ///// Bringing dating agencies to the
\\\\\\\__X__/////// common hedgehog since 2001 - "HedgeHugs"
___\\\\\\\'/ \'///////_____________________________________________

Martin Underwood wrote:

Because it isn't.

Why isn't a hammer designed to tighten screws?

The web was designed to transmit documents. It now transmits a much
wider range of pages, but also transmits them to a much wider range of
media. The sort of document that you are proposing would not easily
translate to small-screen devices such as PDA or WAP, which are
rapidly increasing market segments.

Then send it as a PDF, or send it as a bloody PNG!

If you want people to sit back and coo at how pretty your website is,
that's fine. Personally, I'd rather that they could read my site. And
that means that it has to be flexible to their reading needs.

What you are asking for simply isn't feasible.

If I get a Word document that has pictures and paging and columns and
that kind of stuff - which I assume is the sort of layout you are
looking to reproduce - and I do a blanket font reduction of 2pt, it
almost invariably _will_ mess the layout up. Pictures will be in the
wrong place, and will be out of proportion. Tables will move. Pages
will break where breaks were never intended.

Trust me, I know this. Today I had to print a 100page .doc - so I
reduced the font by a couple of points, and it took me quite a while
to sort out the resulting mess - and that was with a very simple
document - and I am _very_ good at that kind of thing.

--
Stevie D
\\\\\ ///// Bringing dating agencies to the
\\\\\\\__X__/////// common hedgehog since 2001 - "HedgeHugs"
___\\\\\\\'/ \'///////_____________________________________________

On Tue, 14 Mar 2006 23:10:23 +0000, Martin Underwood wrote:

That is what CSS is for.

--
JDS | jeffrey@example.invalid
| http://www.newtnotes.com
DJMBS | http://newtnotes.com/doctor-jeff-master-brainsurgeon/

On Wed, 15 Mar 2006 16:48:10 +0000, Martin Underwood wrote:

Because other things are available and have been worked out for the
*layout* part. Namely CSS.

--
JDS | jeffrey@example.invalid
| http://www.newtnotes.com
DJMBS | http://newtnotes.com/doctor-jeff-master-brainsurgeon/

On Wed, 15 Mar 2006 17:59:57 +0000, Geoff Berrow wrote:

Who says you can't have both pixel perfect design AND standard-based
document formatting?

--
JDS | jeffrey@example.invalid
| http://www.newtnotes.com
DJMBS | http://newtnotes.com/doctor-jeff-master-brainsurgeon/

"Geoff Berrow" <blthecat@ckdog.co.uk> wrote in message
news:mpkg129osu3mc95g95iopg1e457jj9a0ie@4ax.com...

It is quite ironic: HTML started life as a document markup language, when
the concept of a document was shaped by printing on paper. In a traditional
document you start at the beginning, go on until you reach the end, and then
stop (with occasional asides for footnotes). HTML allowed interactive
documents that could never exist on paper - a printout would bear the same
relationship to the live document as a stuffed animal does to a wild one.
So the concept of a document changed, and HTML, which had been the leader of
change, was dragged behind.

In the traditional document, form and content were relatively easy to
separate. A complex modern "document" such as a page on a large e-commerce
site, makes enormous use of purely visual clues to guide the user. I have
no doubt that even in such a case, there is still a content that can be
separated from the form, and I even believe that it is a good thing for the
designer to try to do it, but it might not be a trivial job.

So it's hardly surprising that the person who pays wants as much control as
possible over form as well as content, and doesn't want to pay for the time
and thought of someone to take away some of their control over the form.

--
Tony W
My e-mail address has no hyphen
- but please don't use it, reply to the group.

With neither quill nor qualm, Martin Underwood quothed:

They must be set in percentages then. Were they set in pixels, they'd
(generally) remain fixed.

Text-sizing is a different matter. Unfortunately, the prognosis is
gloomy.

--
Neredbojias
Contrary to popular belief, it is believable.

In article <bsmg12pjti76ag1fa1mlktu2smv3j1epkj@4ax.com>, Stevie D
<stevie@sjd117.freeserve.co.uk> writes
I still remember many years ago, after just leaving school and getting a
temporary job in a furniture making factory (whilst waiting on my
University degree starting), being both rather shocked but at the same
time impressed that these professional furniture makers were in fact
using hammers to drive screws in.

The used small screws on the hardboard backing of their furniture in
preference to panel pins, which could be prone to popping after time,
and to save time they ditched the pneumatic/electric screw drivers and
just hammered the little buggers in. With practise, one hit, never comes
back out