Forum Moderators: not2easy
Is it "more granular images on the screen"?
Is it simply that screen sizes have increased over time?
Is it an aid to the visually challenged, like myself? (Very nearsighted and lots of detritus (floaters) in my field of vision.)
I see, when I change resolution, that the "size" of the rendering of webpages change: The webpage grows or shrinks, the size of the letters on the screen shrinks or grows.
But a) What's the point? b) Do we suffer, in some way, from the uncertainty of any viewers choice of resolution? c) Is there a resolution that I "should use" and, if so then why?
What is the objective or purpose of varying screen resolutions?
You've resized your desktop, right? Right-click directly on your desktop, select properties, click Settings, play with the screen resolution slider.
What is happening is that you are fitting more or less pixels per inch on your monitor. Since desktop icons, screen savers,and menu items are resolved at 72 pixels per inch, an "inch" at 72 dpi becomes smaller at a higher resolution and larger at lower resolution. This has the effect of making for smoother curves at higher res - to use your anology, less grainy.
The screen resolution doesn't just affect the browser, it affects everything printed to the monitor. Usually this is an option of preference - with higher resolution, all your desktop items get smaller, and now you have more "room" to fit more items on screen.
This preference carries over to gaming, of course, and particularly in desktop publishing applications. A higher resolution is required to apply the correct edits to high resolution images.
As I get older, I'm finding that lower and lower resolutions are more comfortable, the concept works in reverse - desktop items get larger and I don't have to umm. . . put my stupid glasses on . . .
Is it simply that screen sizes have increased over time?
You got it, not only screen size, but the ability of monitors and video cards to resolve higher and higher resolutions on them, and make use of onboard video RAM to provide fast redraw of output to the monitor. I remember in the old days on a 17" monitor, you would change something on screen and the effect would be like a web page with too-large images - the image would unfold from top to bottom, slowly, slowly . . . those days are gone forever.
Is it an aid to the visually challenged, like myself?See glasses above. :-)
But a)(see above) b) Do we suffer, in some way, from the uncertainty of any viewers choice of resolution?
I think suffer is the wrong word. In typical painting, you have the primary colors red, blue, yellow, and neutrals black and white. Your canvas is a fixed size. But what if one of the colors were an unknown, or the canvas size flexible and fluid? You would have to rethink a way to express your idea in some-color-that-represents-blue, but is not blue. You do some programming, right? Think of the resolution as an unknown variable. You can guess that it "might" be between 'here' and 'here', but in reality you do not know, and you want to reach all users with your idea. Do not eliminate some users because they don't fit into your parameters; design so that it works everywhere.
IMO this is an exciting way to work, like the first step out of an airplane at 10K feet. The coolest part about it is somewhere out there someone is looking at your "idea" in a way you will never be able to see - and still getting it. Awesome! :-)
c) Is there a resolution that I "should use" and, if so then why?
See previous, this is the first step to getting out of the box. Too often I see this question posed here, people refer to stats on browser and screen resolution of their visitors, percentages and hard facts they can grasp. The best approach is to let go of this. Design for a percentage of the screen, whatever it may be. This is tempered with one valid point, brought up often . . .
On extremely large resolutions, your page may grow so wide that the text is all one one big wide line, and this now presents a new kind of illegibility. You can control this with a max-width property, but the sad fact is it's still not 100% supported (fact finders, am I correct?) Still, put it in anyway in hopes the browsers catch up - but to do so well, you have to be able to view it at that max width. The way I do this is temporarily hard-code the page in a supported method to that width (<div style="width:1020px;">,) preview it, give it the Hail Mary and add that to my max-width property.
Great questions, hope my blatherings are worthy.
[edited by: rocknbil at 8:34 pm (utc) on Sep. 26, 2006]
I read your posts and am confused again by your terms:
-resolved - do you mean displayed?
What 72 pixels per what inch?
Are you talking about logical inches and fonts?
Items on the screen have a certain number of pixel dimensions. X by Y.
Increase monitor resolution (on the same monitor), those items will appear smaller.
My monitor goes to 2048x1536, however at that resolution, my refresh rate is confined to 60Hz. This bothers my eyes, so I keep my resolution at 1600x1200 with a refresh rate of 75Hz. I get maximum screen real estate, at a refresh rate that doesn't bother me.
That's basically what it's about -- detail vs scrolling vs "size" of the stuff displayed.
A 300px image still takes up 300 pixels. The only difference is the percentage of screen real-estate taken up by those "300px".
It's basically the same reason why some (like myself) use multiple monitors. 1600×1200 is simply not enough for me to be as effective as possible, while also making my job as simple as possible (minimize scrolling, minimize tabbing between applications, minimize stacking of windows, side-by-side comparison, etc).
I suppose this means i should optimize my pages for that.
How does that translate into how wide a web page should be?
I typically keep my browser at 1024×1200
55% of my visitors have their screen resolution set at 1024X768.I suppose this means i should optimize my pages for that.
Designing for a particular resolution should in 95% of the cases be avoided. You may employ restrictions which are applicable for any given browser size, but to outright "design for" is assuming too much. Fluid is best, even if that means "fluid to a certain point". Completely fixed designs are dangerous, as they completely ignore the possibility for someone to have various side bars open, not fully maximized window, etc.
There is, however, one outlook I sometimes take on fixed designs. And that is the fact that many people have varying resolutions for the soul purpose of making things on screen, bigger or smaller. People with a high resolution expect to have a lot of screen real estate, and people with a low resolution expect to have bigger, more legible menus, tool bars, etc.
In that respect, it's logical to think the user might also expect a bigger or smaller website, accordingly.
Just a way of looking at it. :)
-resolved - do you mean displayed?
No, not displayed. they are displayed at whatever physical size they will be based on the monitor's output resolution. The resolution of the file does not change. DPI and PPI are synonymous, they mean dots per inch and pixels per inch, although in printing DPI has two distinct applications in reference to files or imagesetting resolution.
Resolved [dictionary.reference.com] (see #4) is the process of setting specific resolution [dictionary.reference.com] (I guess #12 is a computer-age definition of #'s 5 and 6, and 10.) The image is resolved at 72 dpi; the resolution of the image is 72 dpi. Sorry, I do my best. :-)
