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Author Still at it
artist

2003-12-23, 3:28 am

http://www.practialdesigns.com/critique/mockup_00/

--
AIM: GCCFurryBoy
mellorya@yahoo.com
http://www.practialdesigns.com/

"Neither hope nor fear" - Isabella d'Este
"For to do either is to fall to the beast" - Joseph Richmond
"The Cow Kings a Bastard! Long live the Cow King!" - Joseph Richmond
Toby A Inkster

2003-12-23, 5:28 am

artist wrote:
quote:

> http://www.practialdesigns.com/critique/mockup_00/



Now that I like again.

But add a bit (about 0.5em?) of left and right padding to each <a> in the
menu bar.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
Contact Me - http://www.goddamn.co.uk/tobyink/?page=132

Farlo

2003-12-23, 3:29 pm

artist <mellorya@yahoo.com> wrote:
quote:

> http://www.practialdesigns.com/critique/mockup_00/



A sans-serif font would look better.
The menu is a little hard to read.

Looks great otherwise. Really nice.

--
Farlo, the Urban Fey Dragon
artist

2003-12-23, 4:29 pm

Artist, the good little Microsoft drone heard Farlo <hall.j.m@att.net>
say...
quote:

> artist <mellorya@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
> A sans-serif font would look better.
> The menu is a little hard to read.
>
> Looks great otherwise. Really nice.



The menu uses sans-serif. I don't specify any fonts, only families.
As for body copy, studies have proven that it's easier to 'read' serif
fonts because we recognize the letters based on the ascenders and
descenders.

Hmmmm.

Also, I'm wondering if the background on the body copy div is even
needed.




--
AIM: GCCFurryBoy
mellorya@yahoo.com
http://www.practialdesigns.com/

"Neither hope nor fear" - Isabella d'Este
"For to do either is to fall to the beast" - Joseph Richmond
"The Cow Kings a Bastard! Long live the Cow King!" - Joseph Richmond
Nico Schuyt

2003-12-23, 4:29 pm

artist wrote:
quote:

> http://www.practialdesigns.com/critique/mockup_00/



Good!
Nico


Farlo

2003-12-23, 5:30 pm

artist <mellorya@yahoo.com> wrote:
quote:

> As for body copy, studies have proven that it's easier to 'read' serif
> fonts because we recognize the letters based on the ascenders and
> descenders.



That's for print. Web fonts are a bit fuzzier, makinf sans-serif a good
choice. Also, I recommend calling out specific fonts - with font families
as a backup.

--
Farlo, the Urban Fey Dragon
Eric Bohlman

2003-12-23, 6:29 pm

artist <mellorya@yahoo.com> wrote in
news:Xns945A97048DAA2melloryayahoocom@24.24.2.166:
quote:

> The menu uses sans-serif. I don't specify any fonts, only families.
> As for body copy, studies have proven that it's easier to 'read' serif
> fonts because we recognize the letters based on the ascenders and
> descenders.



That's true for print and for *very* high-resolution displays, but on
typical screen displays the serifs aren't rendered crisply enough (since
there's only a couple pixels available for them) and that actually
interferes with readability; it makes the text look slightly fuzzy. When
we all have 300-dpi displays, then serif fonts will be more readable on
screen as well. But for now, the research seems to show that sans-serif is
more readable for on-screen display of large amounts of text.
artist

2003-12-23, 9:29 pm

Artist, the good little Microsoft drone heard Eric Bohlman
<ebohlman@earthlink.net> say...
quote:

> artist <mellorya@yahoo.com> wrote in
> news:Xns945A97048DAA2melloryayahoocom@24.24.2.166:
>
>
> That's true for print and for *very* high-resolution displays, but on
> typical screen displays the serifs aren't rendered crisply enough
> (since there's only a couple pixels available for them) and that
> actually interferes with readability; it makes the text look slightly
> fuzzy. When we all have 300-dpi displays, then serif fonts will be
> more readable on screen as well. But for now, the research seems to
> show that sans-serif is more readable for on-screen display of large
> amounts of text.



Really?
Not that I disagree with the logic, but do you have any links?
:)

--
AIM: GCCFurryBoy
mellorya@yahoo.com
http://www.practialdesigns.com/

"Neither hope nor fear" - Isabella d'Este
"For to do either is to fall to the beast" - Joseph Richmond
"The Cow Kings a Bastard! Long live the Cow King!" - Joseph Richmond
Farlo

2003-12-24, 12:28 am

artist <mellorya@yahoo.com> wrote:
quote:

> Really?
> Not that I disagree with the logic, but do you have any links?



TRy it for yourself - eventually, you'll see the difference.

--
Farlo, the Urban Fey Dragon
artist

2003-12-24, 1:29 am

Artist, the good little Microsoft drone heard Farlo <hall.j.m@att.net>
say...
quote:

> artist <mellorya@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
> TRy it for yourself - eventually, you'll see the difference.



I have tried, I prefer serif. :)



--
AIM: GCCFurryBoy
mellorya@yahoo.com
http://www.practialdesigns.com/

"Neither hope nor fear" - Isabella d'Este
"For to do either is to fall to the beast" - Joseph Richmond
"The Cow Kings a Bastard! Long live the Cow King!" - Joseph Richmond
kchayka

2003-12-24, 8:28 am

Farlo wrote:
quote:

>
> I recommend calling out specific fonts - with font families
> as a backup.



For body text? Why? My browser lets me set what font to use for
generic families. I would rather see my preferred sans-serif than the
usual Arial/Helvetica or whatever else the author picks.

Uzers rule, dude. :)

--
To email a reply, remove (dash)un(dash). Mail sent to the un
address is considered spam and automatically deleted.
Farlo

2003-12-24, 9:28 am

kchayka <kcha-un-yka@sihope.com> wrote:
quote:

> For body text? Why? My browser lets me set what font to use for
> generic families. I would rather see my preferred sans-serif than the
> usual Arial/Helvetica or whatever else the author picks.



By not calling out a specific font, it is guarenteed that you will see what
you want to see. I'd prefer that you at least had a chance to see my page
as it was meant to be seen. I'm not a "bells and whistles" designer, but
fer pity's sake, leave me my basic fonts! =D

--
Farlo, the Urban Fey Dragon
jake

2003-12-24, 1:28 pm

In message <Xns945ACEC2DB5F6melloryayahoocom@24.24.2.166>, artist
<mellorya@yahoo.com> writes
quote:

>Artist, the good little Microsoft drone heard Eric Bohlman
><ebohlman@earthlink.net> say...
>
>
>Really?
>Not that I disagree with the logic, but do you have any links?
>:)
>



Take a look at 'Font Types and Sizes' under 'Website design' at
http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/
for a lot of references to scientific studies on fonts.

Verdana seemed to get good reviews ;-)

regards.
--
Jake
kchayka

2003-12-24, 1:29 pm

Farlo wrote:
quote:

> kchayka <kcha-un-yka@sihope.com> wrote:
>
>
> By not calling out a specific font, it is guarenteed that you will see what
> you want to see. I'd prefer that you at least had a chance to see my page
> as it was meant to be seen.



What is so special that the particular sans-serif font makes that big a
difference to you? Logos and maybe headings are one thing, body text is
something else. FWIW, every browser I have installed uses different
default fonts, none are Arial/Helvetica. A page that uses the default
font looks better to the user. A page that uses the default looks more
personalized for the user. That sounds like a good thing to me.
quote:

> I'm not a "bells and whistles" designer, but
> fer pity's sake, leave me my basic fonts! =D



Just don't tell me your basic font is Arial. That's dullsville, man.
Or Verdana, which is bad for many reasons. Folks who don't change
browser settings are likely getting Arial/Helvetica for generic
sans-serif anyway, so what's the point in specifying it?

If you're not going to use anything imaginative, why bother? If you're
using something less ordinary that I do have installed, I may hate it
(like Comic Sans - ish!). If I don't have it installed, I get my
default so it makes no difference. You have no way of knowing how the
user will see it.

--
To email a reply, remove (dash)un(dash). Mail sent to the un
address is considered spam and automatically deleted.
artist

2003-12-24, 7:28 pm

Artist, the good little Microsoft drone heard jake
<jake@gododdin.demon.co.uk> say...
quote:

> In message <Xns945ACEC2DB5F6melloryayahoocom@24.24.2.166>, artist
> <mellorya@yahoo.com> writes
>
> Take a look at 'Font Types and Sizes' under 'Website design' at
> http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/
> for a lot of references to scientific studies on fonts.
>
> Verdana seemed to get good reviews ;-)



Wow, that site is a mess. If I hadn't been activly looking for
information, I would have left immediatly.


--
AIM: GCCFurryBoy
mellorya@yahoo.com
http://www.practialdesigns.com/

"Neither hope nor fear" - Isabella d'Este
"For to do either is to fall to the beast" - Joseph Richmond
"The Cow Kings a Bastard! Long live the Cow King!" - Joseph Richmond
jake

2003-12-25, 7:28 am

In message <Xns945BB5FF99EF6melloryayahoocom@24.24.2.166>, artist
<mellorya@yahoo.com> writes
quote:

>Artist, the good little Microsoft drone heard jake
><jake@gododdin.demon.co.uk> say...
>
>
>Wow, that site is a mess. If I hadn't been activly looking for
>information, I would have left immediatly.
>
>


Which just goes to show that no matter how bad the site is, if it's got
(or may have) the information you want -- you'll hang around long enough
to read it ;-)

regards.
--
Jake
artist

2003-12-25, 2:28 pm

Artist, the good little Microsoft drone heard jake
<jake@gododdin.demon.co.uk> say...
quote:

> In message <Xns945BB5FF99EF6melloryayahoocom@24.24.2.166>, artist
> <mellorya@yahoo.com> writes
families.[QUOTE][color=darkred]
ascenders[QUOTE][color=darkred]
on[QUOTE][color=darkred]
slightly[QUOTE][color=darkred]
to[QUOTE][color=darkred]
large[QUOTE][color=darkred]
> Which just goes to show that no matter how bad the site is, if it's got
> (or may have) the information you want -- you'll hang around long


enough
quote:

> to read it ;-)



Yup.
I never did find the information though. It would have been nice to read,
but it's not worth *that much* work.


--
AIM: GCCFurryBoy
mellorya@yahoo.com
http://www.practialdesigns.com/

"Neither hope nor fear" - Isabella d'Este
"For to do either is to fall to the beast" - Joseph Richmond
"The Cow Kings a Bastard! Long live the Cow King!" - Joseph Richmond
Toby A Inkster

2003-12-29, 2:29 pm

Farlo wrote:
quote:

> I'd prefer that you at least had a chance to see my page
> as it was meant to be seen.



Argh! Please no! I *hate* it when deezyners do that.

Usually they are Mac users who think Helvetica looks so much nicer than
Arial (and it does on the Mac) so they do something like this:

font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;

Well-intentioned, but ultimately foolish -- because on many other systems
Helvetica sucks:

http://www.goddamn.co.uk/tobyink/sc...dana-is-strange

Note, that even though all the fonts are 40pt, Helvetica looks smaller on
my system and it lacks anti-aliasing. (This is because it's a Type 1 font,
and the others are TrueType.)

So Mr W-I Deezyner's page is now displayed in an uglier font than I'd
otherwise expect and is a bit too small.

But if Mr Deezyner had simply done this:

font-family: sans-serif;

Then I'd get my own chosen[1] sans-serif font in all its anti-aliased
glory, and it would actually look a lot closer to what Mr Deezyner
presumably wanted.

[1] And people who hadn't chosen a sans-serif font would get the default
sans-serif as chosen by their browser programmers -- usually a sensible
default such as Arial on Windows systems, Helvetica on Macs and we're
moving towards the Vera family of fonts in many Linux programs.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
Contact Me - http://www.goddamn.co.uk/tobyink/?page=132

Farlo

2003-12-29, 9:29 pm

Toby A Inkster <UseTheAddressInMySig@deadspam.com> wrote:
quote:

> Then I'd get my own chosen[1] sans-serif font in all its anti-aliased
> glory, and it would actually look a lot closer to what Mr Deezyner
> presumably wanted.



I bow to the superior logic of Mr. Roboto. Why even design a page at all?
It would all be so much more efficient as a streaming series of binary
content in the default font ...

0100101011010100010101101010 ... etc.

--
Farlo, the Urban Fey Dragon
Toby A Inkster

2003-12-30, 12:29 am

Farlo wrote:
quote:

> It would all be so much more efficient as a streaming series of binary
> content...



It already is that.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
Contact Me - http://www.goddamn.co.uk/tobyink/?page=132

Farlo

2003-12-30, 2:28 am

Toby A Inkster <UseTheAddressInMySig@deadspam.com> wrote:
quote:

> Farlo wrote:
>
>
> It already is that.



Make it redundantly so ... for the organic scanner sitting in front of the
monitor.

--
Farlo, the Urban Fey Dragon
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