How to set default font size to small for a page's body?

Beauregard T. Shagnasty wrote:

The whole site is terrible. When AT&T Worldnet was still in charge, that
team of developers would listen to us subscribers and actually implement
changes from good advice. They turned it over to "corporate" in October
and the whole mess has gone downhill fast. I can't show you the new
large, animated Flash ads right in the middle of your Webmail Inbox.

"-a soon-to-be-ex-Day-One Worldnet subscriber"

Use to be a Worldnet-er back in the mid 90's... it was long distance
$.35/minute call. Them were the days of dash browsing after 11:00pm when
rate was only $.11, dump downloads of email and clicking Netscape's
handy "offline" icon... Great advancement today...no broadband but at
least not a toll call. :-\


--
Take care,

Jonathan
-------------------
LITTLE WORKS STUDIO
http://www.LittleWorksStudio.com

Beauregard T. Shagnasty wrote:

Jonathan N. Little wrote:

http://i2.microsoft.com/shared/core/1/css/core.css

I can top that in ... one note? :-)

http://my.att.net/

There is no CSS file; all ~600 lines ar embedded in every page.

un-freakin'-believable

Calling them morons was being kind, I think

--
Berg

On 2008-04-16, Don Li wrote:

On Apr 16, 11:15*am, "Beauregard T. Shagnasty"
a.nony.m... (AT) example (DOT) invalid> wrote:
Don Li wrote:
I've tried

Please read this:http://tekrider.net/html/fontsize.php

.. What did I do wrong?

You decided to pick a size which would make many visitors (including me)
squint at the monitor. If 100% is too large for your own taste, decrease
your own browser's default size. But leave it adequate for me.

I expect your post was just a test. Normally you would move the styling
to your CSS style sheet.

People. Please consider the following factors:
a) the majority of my users are likely not knowing how to set font
size with their browser and I don't intend to provide instruction on
that (once again, they are not you, not tech savvy);
b) the 'small' font size looks good (not the default 100% size) for
the home page (feedback from beta users).

Then you need a wider selection of beta users.

--
Chris F.A. Johnson <http://cfaj.freeshell.org>
================================================== =================
Author:
Shell Scripting Recipes: A Problem-Solution Approach (2005, Apress)

Bergamot wrote:

Beauregard T. Shagnasty wrote:
Jonathan N. Little wrote:

http://i2.microsoft.com/shared/core/1/css/core.css

I can top that in ... one note? :-)

http://my.att.net/

There is no CSS file; all ~600 lines ar embedded in every page.

un-freakin'-believable

Calling them morons was being kind, I think

That's a good example for those who argue, "But X's page must be done
right -- it's a biiiig company!"


--
Blinky
Killing all posts from Google Groups
The Usenet Improvement Project: http://improve-usenet.org
Blinky: http://blinkynet.net

Andreas Prilop wrote:

how broken Wikipedia's
styles are. I don't want to inspect their stylesheets in detail
but it seems they have first set the BODY size to something small
and then the P size to something larger.

That same practice, and how stupid it is, has been discussed over in
ciwas over the last week or so. Seems to be a rash of posts using this
font sizing method lately. It's A Very Bad Thing.

The funny thing about wikipedia's styles, though, is that body text
coincidently ends up at just about 100% when my browser's minimum font
size (17px) is enforced.

body {
font: x-small sans-serif; (17px minimum overrides)
}
/* scale back up to a sane default */ (sane is subjective, I guess)
#globalWrapper {
font-size: 127%; (of 17px = 21.59px)
}

Then subsequent rules put the font-size of many other elements at about
94% (of 21.59). That's 20.29px. My default is 20px, so I don't even
notice their ridiculous styles.

Wikipedia looks really stupid in this way. They don't understand
how to set up a decent stylesheet.

Unfortunately, they are not alone.

--
Berg

On Apr 16, 9:58*am, Don Li <tatata9... (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote:

I've tried
body style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;font-size:0.8em;"
or
body style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;font-size:11pct;"
or
body style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;font-size:80%;"
to no avail. *In IE7 it shows up as Medium. *What did I do wrong?

Thanks.

I'd like to end the 'religious war' by summing it up for the benefit
of future inquirers.
Possible solutions depends on specific needs and environment (not one-
size-fits-all):
a) use font-size 100% with a separate css file (default UA should
really do the same);
b) set default font-size to a smaller one and yet it's still legible
across all pages (of a site or app) provided you have controled use
environment like Intranet and UA;
c) provide a font size manipulation javascript function visibly, like
a (small), A (normal, A+ (large) ...

Don Li wrote:

c) provide a font size manipulation javascript function visibly, like
a (small), A (normal, A+ (large) ...

No, please. This is such a wasted effort. All browsers have this ability
built in. If you really think your users are so dumb they don't know how
to do this themselves, then teach them how to adjust their browser
settings. That's something they can use on other sites, not just yours.

I have yet to see one of the stupid custom font control things that even
came close to my preferred text size.

--
Berg

Don Li wrote:

On Apr 16, 9:58 am, Don Li <tatata9... (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote:
I've tried
body style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;font-size:0.8em;"
or
body style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;font-size:11pct;"
or
body style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;font-size:80%;"
to no avail. In IE7 it shows up as Medium. What did I do wrong?

Thanks.

I'd like to end the 'religious war' by summing it up for the benefit
of future inquirers.
Possible solutions depends on specific needs and environment (not one-
size-fits-all):

That is way the design should incorporate the user's default.

a) use font-size 100% with a separate css file (default UA should
really do the same);

Not sure what you mean by this. You default font for your page should be
100% of the whatever the the user has set his UA default. <100% should
only be used for limited, non-essential text, boilerplate.

b) set default font-size to a smaller one and yet it's still legible
across all pages (of a site or app) provided you have controled use
environment like Intranet and UA;

No, folks have varying acuity of eyesight and preferences within
"closed" environments as out in the wild and woolly Internet. Unless
you're on of those BSOFH and just like to torment your co-workers.

c) provide a font size manipulation javascript function visibly, like
a (small), A (normal, A+ (large) ...

No, JavaScript is almost never the solution. Don't screw with the user's
default font size and there will be now need to of him to fiddle with
microfonts...No need for extra features if you don't cause the problem
in the first place.


--
Take care,

Jonathan
-------------------
LITTLE WORKS STUDIO
http://www.LittleWorksStudio.com

On 4/19/2008 12:46 PM, Bergamot wrote:

Don Li wrote:
c) provide a font size manipulation javascript function visibly, like
a (small), A (normal, A+ (large) ...

No, please. This is such a wasted effort. All browsers have this ability
built in. If you really think your users are so dumb they don't know how
to do this themselves, then teach them how to adjust their browser
settings. That's something they can use on other sites, not just yours.

I have yet to see one of the stupid custom font control things that even
came close to my preferred text size.

In general, use of a, A, A+ on a Web page gives really bad results for a
browser window that is less than full screen and with 800x600 resolution.

One of the capabilities of SeaMonkey and Firefox (both Mozilla browsers,
based on the Gecko rendering engine) is to add the PrefBar extension.
PrefBar allows the user to setup Font-, Font+, and Font= buttons on a
toolbar outside of the displayed Web page (among many other things); the
Font= button restores the original size in case the user forgets how
many times Font- or Font+ was selected.

--
David Ross
<http://www.rossde.com/>

Have you been using Netscape and now feel abandoned by AOL?
Then use SeaMonkey. Go to <http://www.seamonkey-project.org/>.

On Apr 20, 10:34 am, "David E. Ross" <nob... (AT) nowhere (DOT) not> wrote:

In general, use of a, A, A+ on a Web page gives really bad results for a
browser window that is less than full screen and with 800x600 resolution.

Why is it any worse - in general - than a user changing the size of
his text himself? If the method is via PHP to deliver, eg, a bigger
font-size from a stylesheet alternative. In other words, you press A+
and this causes the server to change the applicable css instruction.