Setting font sizes versus letting browser decide

What practice do you employ? Why?

[Webwork]

I've read different blurbs regarding advantages and disadvantages of setting font sizes and using points vs. ems vs other.

I'm leaning towards setting font sizes in an external CSS using pixels.

Please feel free to knock me about the room, as my father once did, for the purpose of educating me about my mistakes.

[dragonlady7]

I use relative font sizes so that the user can resize the text to his or her own preference using the "text zoom" or "text size" menu option under "view" in their browser.
I figure the user knows better than I do how big they need the text to be so they can read it. I wouldn't presume to make that decision for them.

[BlobFisk]

A few threads worth reading through on this very topic:

[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]

I was an avowed pixel user, but during my accessibility research I found that pixels are far too restrictive for users with visual disabilities, so I switched to em's.

SuzyUK's article [webmasterworld.com] above outlines nicely some arguements for using relative units. And this thread [webmasterworld.com] on em's is also a must (in msg 4 SuzyUK outlines a nice formula for calculating em font sizes).

HTH

[MonkeeSage]

I set the sizes in px units usually (14px Sans-Serif for body text, 22px for headings, &c.). NN / Moz / Opera have no problem scaling the text with the text-zoom feature when px units are used, but IE refuses to scale the text.

To get aprox. the same sizings w/ scaling in IE, I use 0.99em for the body and 1.8em for the headings.

Jordan

[richardb]

If you can use % Sometimes, however, it’s a trade off design V accessibility.

Please feel free to knock me about the room, as my father once did, for the purpose of educating me about my mistakes.

You too! Never worked did it?

Rich

[MonkeeSage]

BlobFisk:

Nice links! I just tried SuzyUk's formula and I must say it worked very well! Thanks for the info!

I always thought ems had more to do with width and kerning than anything, but I see that I was mistaken...got some reading to do on ems!

:D

Jordan

[your_store]

When working with em's it is always a good idea to set the base font size in percentages on the body tag. This prevents a problem in Win IE that shows miniscule text when using font sizes less than 1em.

Owen Briggs has some great info on his site [thenoodleincident.com], including these 264 screen shots [thenoodleincident.com] of various font sizes in all the browsers.