Redesign of dlang.org

[H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d]

On Wed, Apr 23, 2014 at 05:32:00PM -0400, Nick Sabalausky via Digitalmars-d wrote:
> On 4/23/2014 2:12 PM, Walter Bright wrote:
> >On 4/23/2014 10:02 AM, H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d wrote:
> >>On the contrary, I find almost all websites have broken layouts
> >>because I enforce a minimal font size of 16pt (I have a
> >>high-resolution screen) -- they insist on font sizes that are far
> >>too small.
> >
> >This is why teams need some old codgers like me around. We don't see
> >so good anymore, and need larger fonts.
> >
> >The teeny-tiny fonts all come from people under 25 :-)

I can still see relatively well, but I prefer not having to squint at
the screen to read text on a webpage just because some clever web
designer decided that 6pt fonts are a good idea. That's why I configured
my browser to enforce a minimum font size of 14 pt (or was it 16pt?),
regardless of what the stylesheet says. It's the only way I could even
tolerate reading certain sites.


> I certainly won't disagree that small fonts can be hard to read, but
> on the other end, I've seen a lot of newer websites with gigantic
> fonts, and I find that painful to read as well.

Any examples?

Usually when I run into a site with (1) microscopic fonts, (2) giant
(often multicolored) fonts, (3) no whitespace, or (4) has more
ads/filler than content, my fingers have an almost instinctual ctrl-W
(close tab) response. Sometimes not even one word registers in my brain
before I move on to the next site.

In fact, I'm of the arrogant opinion that websites should not specify
ANY font size except a relative size to the browser's default, because
chances are, whatever size you choose will look horrible on *somebody*'s
device. Browsers come with a default (and user-configurable!) font size
for a reason. Web designers would be foolish to disregard that.


> >Ironically, the most unreadable web pages I've seen were on
> >apple.com.  Haven't looked at it recently, but they'd use a tiny
> >font, and make it light gray letters on a white background. It was
> >literally painful to try and read it.
> 
> Grey-on-white is ridiculously common and should be jailable offense.
> I'll never understand the the reasoning behind that readability
> destroyer.

Worse yet, I've actually seen sites that use red on gray (or the other
way round -- it's too painful to recall). Or lime on turqoise. Or any of
various other horrible combinations. Aughh... my eyes hurt just thinking
about it... On the bright side, most sites that pick such colors usually
don't have any useful content to offer either, so the ctrl-W kneejerk
(fingerjerk?) fixes the problem quite quickly.


T

-- 
"No, John.  I want formats that are actually useful, rather than
over-featured megaliths that address all questions by piling on
ridiculous internal links in forms which are hideously over-complex." --
Simon St. Laurent on xml-dev