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1. Re: How is the text made to not change in size on these pages?
Marian Driscoll Oct 7, 2009 6:10 AM (in response to Ron Lanham)You are probably using Safari or Google Chrome, which does not scale the text. These webkit-based browsers only scale the layout on this page.
The font size and page layout scales on most any other browser.
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2. Re: How is the text made to not change in size on these pages?
Jacob Bugge Oct 7, 2009 6:50 AM (in response to Ron Lanham)Ron,
I see no scaling in IE8, just a slight difference in the leading (space between lines) of some of the text.
I believe this is one of the silly sites where the text size (relative to the other elements on the page) is fixed through a text.CSS (CSS = Cascading Style Sheet) where every font-size is set in px or similar absolute measure.
This means that you may scale the whole page, but not the text alone: the last defense of a designer wanting to preserve the appearance presented to the visitors without reflow and other funny effects.
In other words: it is possible.
Said by someone unable to even contemplate creating anything but silly sites.
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3. Re: How is the text made to not change in size on these pages?
Marian Driscoll Oct 7, 2009 7:23 AM (in response to Jacob Bugge)Jacob Bugge wrote:
Ron,
I see no scaling in IE8...
How are you scaling? I can scale with no problem in IE8, FF3.5 and Opera. I simply CTRL + mousewheel to scale.
Jacob Bugge wrote:
This means that you may scale the whole page, but not the text alone
That is the way it is supposed to work in modern browsers. They zoom the entire page so that layout, images and text all scale together. There is no reason why anyone should want to scale the text while maintaining a single layout scale. Such a transformation to the page would make layouts go wonky as text would outgrow the areas it was designed to fit. It is only WebKit-browsers (Safari and Google Chrome) that oddly scale layout but not text.
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4. Re: How is the text made to not change in size on these pages?
Jacob Bugge Oct 7, 2009 7:51 AM (in response to Marian Driscoll)Marian Driscoll wrote:
Jacob Bugge wrote:
Ron,
I see no scaling in IE8...
How are you scaling? I can scale with no problem in IE8, FF3.5 and Opera. I simply CTRL + mousewheel to scale.
I can scale the whole page but not the text alone, but IE8 also has a special item, the dropdown View>Text Size.
Jacob Bugge wrote:
This means that you may scale the whole page, but not the text alone
That is the way it is supposed to work in modern browsers. They zoom the entire page so that layout, images and text all scale together. There is no reason why anyone should want to scale the text while maintaining a single layout scale. Such a transformation to the page would make layouts go wonky as text would outgrow the areas it was designed to fit. It is only WebKit-browsers (Safari and Google Chrome) that oddly scale layout but not text.
If you look at this page: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101114/episodes in IE8, you are able to change the size of the text alone, relative to the other elements on the page, and you are also able to change the whole page by using zoom, keeping the relative size of text and other elements (either the original relative size or another one).
There used to be many sites where you could change the text alone, and people have been advised in this forum not to fight against that option.
I am pleased to see that the general opinion seems to have changed.
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5. Re: How is the text made to not change in size on these pages?
Marian Driscoll Oct 7, 2009 8:49 AM (in response to Jacob Bugge)Jacob Bugge wrote:
I can scale the whole page but not the text alone, but IE8 also has a special item, the dropdown View>Text Size.
Ahh... the scale text vs zoom page issue.
Browsers are moving to and favoring zooming options over text scaling as text scaling has always caused problems with layout. I assumed folks were weaning themselves from scaling text. The text scaling concept is a bit odd as such scaling does not scale the browser interface or other elements of the operating system. Someone with special vision needs would ideally set their overall system display to a lower resolution to make all content appear more readable. They would not alter just the content of web pages. It would be silly to have 72 point type in a web page while the rest of the computer interface text in application menus and buttons is still at 8 to 10 points.
The golden rule is that there is no way as a designer to lock a design. This is more true now than ever as usrs can both zoom and scale. Maybe scaling text options will fade away from browsers and we might find some relief as designers.
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6. Re: How is the text made to not change in size on these pages?
Ron Lanham Oct 7, 2009 12:17 PM (in response to Marian Driscoll)I see now that this only applies to Safari (i.e. no separate scaling of text when "Zoom Text Only") is checked.
My own site allows this option though... even though I have a fixed pixel size set for my fonts. Strange.
Actually I find the "Zoom Text Only" option useful since often I will sit far back from my primary 30" monitor and some sites' text is so small that it makes it difficult to see, but if I increase the entire page some pages may expand past the horizontal dimensions requiring me to side scroll.
I do understand how many (most?) designers don't like their text size increased without also increasing the overall design.Thanks for all of the posts.
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7. Re: How is the text made to not change in size on these pages?
Jacob Bugge Oct 9, 2009 3:02 AM (in response to Ron Lanham)For my part you are welcome, Ron.




