:: Readability and
Text Size
:: Getting Around,
also know as Navigating
:: Your personal
Browser settings
Readability and
Text Size:
Most websites use a small text size
in order to fit more onto the screen. A medium size
was used when designing this site. But you may want
to make it bigger on your computer, and you can! There
are several methods you can use to do this.
Method #1: By changing your monitor's
resolution (also called screen resolution or display
resolution), you change the size of everything, including
text and graphics, all the time, whether surfing the
web, typing a letter, or staring idly at the desktop.
Many people do this to make it easier to read what's
on their computer. First, open the monitor control panel...
Windows/PC: Go to Start menu >
Settings > Control Panel. Double-click Display.
Click the Settings tab. Another way to do this is
simply use the right mouse button to click on the
desktop (what you see when no programs are running,
also known as the windows background). Select 'Prperties'
from the dropdown menu and go to 'Settings' under
the resulting dialog box.
Macintosh: Go to Apple menu >
Control Panel > Monitor.
Then: If the screen area is set to
1024 x 768 pixels, changing it to 800 x 600 will make
everything larger. If it's already set to 640 x 480,
it's as large as it can get. (Setting it to 800x600
or higher will fit more on the screen but everything
will be smaller.)
Method #2: There may also be a separate
text size control in your monitor's control panel. If
there is, it will change the size of the text but not
the graphics. This causes less screen crowding than
changing the entire resolution, but it can be deceptive
when you want to print larger text from your printer.
To look for this control, open the monitor control panel
(described above) and hunt around.
Method #3: Change the default font
size in your web browser. This only affects your web
surfing and/or email; it has no effect on non-Internet-related
activities. Each web browser requires a different procedure.
Netscape Navigator Go to Edit >
Preferences > Appearance > Fonts. Start by increasing
the variable width font size from 12 to 14, and the
fixed width font size from 10 to 12. Increase further
as needed. If you just want to make a temporary change,
go instead to View > Increase Font or Decrease
Font.
Internet Explorer Go to View >
Text Size. Start by increasing the size by one step.
Increase further as needed. You may also need to go
to Tools > Internet Options > General > Accessibility,
and choose "Ignore font sizes specified on web
pages".
Opera Go to Preferences > Document
Window or Document Appearance. There you'll find complete
control over everything.
AOL is similar to Internet Exploder.
Getting Around,
also know as Navigating:
A link takes you to another page when
you click on it. It used to be that all links were blue,
underlined text or blue-outlined pictures. But artistic
considerations have changed that. Mnay websites now
feature Cascaing Style Sheets to greatly enhance you
web experience. If you hold the mouse over something,
and it turns from an arrow into a hand, it's a link.
Try it with the navigation links at the top of this
page!
An internal link takes you to a page
on the same website. An external link takes you to a
page on another website. For instance, most of the links
on this page are internal links. But the links in the
"Links" column are external links: they take
you to other websites. Try one!
Your Personal Browser Settings
MSIE, Netscape, and other browsers
let you choose a default font (e.g. Times New Roman,
Tahoma, Verdana, Garamond, Georgia, etc.). In MSIE 5,
for example, you can change the default font via the
menu -- Tools:Options:General:Fonts. Netscape offers
a similar way for users to change the default font.
Your browser displays the text from
most webpages using the default font you have selected.
If you change your default font while viewing this webpage,
for example, your browser will display this page in
the new font you select.
The HTML instructions in some webpages,
however, instruct your browser to override the default
font, and to use a font specified in the instructions.
Your default font, in other words, determines the font
used for display only as long as the webpage you are
viewing does not override your default.
Examples:
If your browser’s default font is: |
And the webpage: |
Then your browser displays (assuming font
installed on your computer): |
Tahoma |
specifies Verdana |
Verdana |
Tahoma |
does not specify a font |
Tahoma |
The HTML on this webpage instructs your browser to display
this site in the Verdana font (if it is available on
your computer). If you find this font more appealing
than the font used for other webpages, you might want
to change your browser’s default font.
Since the user chooses his browser’s
defaults, defaults are also referred to as user preferences.
Barring good reasons for doing otherwise, it is considered
good practice for webmasters to refrain from overriding
user preferences, and to permit user preferences to
control the display.
Other defaults that MSIE and Netscape
allow users to set are font size, as well as colors
for text, hyperlinks, and window background. As with
fonts, these defaults can be overridden by HTML instructions
in a webpage.
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