Different Behaviors: Firefox vs IE

[locus123]

There is an article on :A List Apart by Eric Shepherd which features a design of a hybrid navigation menu which i would like to use.

I have modified it to fit my purpose but there is something that i have noticed about a behavior across IE and firefox.

If you press CTR_kEY + PLUS_KEY, the navigation expands beautifully in IE but does so terribly in firefox.

Is it possible to get it exoanding in firefox the way it does in IE.

if its possible i would really love to know how to make this behave the same way in both browsers, as i have had this with some of my designs as well.

thanks in advance.

[penders]

If you press CTR_kEY + PLUS_KEY, the navigation expands beautifully in IE but does so terribly in firefox.

Are you trying this in IE7? The Ctrl +/- shortcut in IE7 and FF do two different things. In IE7 this is a shortcut for the 'zoom' feature which enlarges everything, including images. In FF, however, this is a shortcut for the 'text resize' feature which only resizes the text (in IE7 this is now limited to a menu option).

I'm currently on a FF1.5 machine, but AFAIK even FF2 does not have a 'zoom' feature.

[locus123]

thanks man, now i see what's going on here, i really thought they were doing the same thing.

And yes, its IE7, and FF2, sorry i did not mention that.

Is there a way you can control how your text resizes in FF? Can any control be exerted over this at all?

I guess what i am asking is, can i write my code (CSS or mark up) insuch a way that will make the CTRL_KEY+PLUS_KEY in FF behave like thye zoom in IE, so that my fonts will increase in proportion to each other and not overlap, as it does now?

Or maybe even have other parts of the page increase with the font, is there anyway to do this?

[vincevincevince]

You'll need to change all dimensions into 'em' units - then it will scale just perfectly.

[Xapti]

Yeah if you size your images and divs all with EM units instead of like pixels, everything will scale with font size. background images will not be blown up though. Oddly enough, I think IE7 does blow up background images, which seems really stupid to me, because it causes all sorts of problems until CSS3 background properties come out (even then it could be a problem).

[Robin_reala]

For what it's worth, trunk builds of Firefox currently have a page zoom feature like IE7, and it's being seriously considered as the default behaviour for Ctrl&+/- for Firefox 3 .

[vincevincevince]

Robin_reala - thanks for adding that - something I was not aware of. I must say I'm disappointed by the news - whilst it will bring accessibility benefits it's going against long established standards. I've never thought it right that something specified in pixels can be scaled... defeats the entire meaning of a pixel if it occupies a subdivisible space on the screen.

[Robin_reala]

Actually, 'pixel' has a special meaning in CSS :) See:

[w3.org ]

The basic premise is that a 'CSS pixel' is equal to a normal pixel at 96dpi and with the viewer being at an arms' length distance from the screen. If the situation differs greatly from this then the UA is free to redefine the number of device pixels per 'CSS pixel' to make the site more usable.