I've noticed that this site used fonts as small as 10 point. I'm sure many members over the age of 50 (I know there are many, and I'm over 60) have problems with this especially with the hi-res large monitors most of use. I must set the minimum font size to 18 pt in my browsers preferences in order to have a pleasant viewing experience and make the page readable. But, that completely messes with the header and menu items on all NPN pages. This place would really benefit from changing the minimum font used by the entire NPN site to 18 point and reformatting the header to reflect that.
Thank you, NPN web designer, for your consideration.
Current look on an iMac 24" with font set to 18 pt above.
Posted by Richard Ditch on October 17, 2012 at 4:46 PM
Why not just hit "command +" key combo on your iMac to enlarge everything if you are having problems reading the smaller font? That's what I do on my Mac as needed at NPN and other web sites. "Command 0" will take the browser back to default.
Thanks for the tip, Richard, but it is not the fix. I adjust font sizes all the time that way, but once you choose a size larger than the one that the web designer chose to use for the correct layout of the page, all the formatting gets wrecked and it looks like the sample I presented. I've tried this on dozens of site, as I'm online most of the day.
Posted by Peter Cross on October 17, 2012 at 7:34 PM
When I have that problem on my PC, I go to the menu bar and hit View, then hit Zoom, and select 125%. It just gets bigger but doesn't affect the formating, etc.
Posted by Richard Ditch on October 17, 2012 at 11:36 PM
Jeffery:
My page formatting doesn't change when I use the key combo - everything just gets bigger and stays put relative to everything else. Here are two of my Safari preference panel tabs - note that I don't have the minimum font box checked on the advanced tab (I'm assuming that's where you have forced your browser to 18 points.
I'm running 10.6.8 on a 20" iMac set to 1680 x 1050.
Thanks Richard. When you go to 10.7 you'll see that the Appearance menu is gone!
Setting the min font size larger does not create the same look as command +. If you think about it, cmd+ raises all fonts on the page by one increment from what they already are. Min font setting only brings the smaller ones up to size. Try it. The real problem on NPN pages is the header which is designed around a small font, and the header gets wiggy (as shown above) when you increase the font size by either method.
Posted by Richard Ditch on October 18, 2012 at 4:00 PM
Jeffery:
That's too bad. I'm not upgrading as I still rely on some applications that need Rosetta to run on the Intel processor and that isn't supported after 10.6.
One thing that I noticed in Windows is that if you increase everything to 125%, it also increases the size of the posted photos and makes everything look OOF. For that reason I keep things at 100%.
Posted by Lon Overacker on October 19, 2012 at 1:17 AM
The flip side Jefferey is not everyone has 24" or bigger monitors. I'm viewing the site on my laptop right now with a 15" display. An 18 font would be ghastly and font size right now is perfect. Of course MOST are not using 15" monitors. Then again, font looks fine to me on my 23" display.
I think it's that 50+ thing.... I've had glasses for a number of years now, and the prescription gets adjusted every couple of years as things slowly get worse (the more I stare at computer screens....) Just sayin'.....
Charlie, I don't know much about peecees, but in Safari (and I hope most other browsers) in the view menu is an option to 'zoom text only'. That way when you're changing text size or zooming in, the graphics and images remain the same.
Lon, my eyes, too. I hate when that happens! Ideally, the web page designer would create a header that would not geek out if the font size changed. It's not hard, but needs to be on the designers mind when the layout is created. One way is to use graphics for words and menu buttons instead of type, but web designers really like to use real text in buttons thinking that it will help search engines rate the site highly. In reality, there's enough stuff on the pages here that the text in the buttons is not making any difference. I've run across this before (I've designed some sites like my company's and my photo site) and the designers don't anticipate what viewers will do, so it remains a problem.
Posted by David Bostedo on October 19, 2012 at 5:23 PM
There are other forum templates that have text size options built in to all the pages. They increase the forum text without changing the header or other peripheral info. That would be nice to have here.
Discussion
10 repliesThank you, NPN web designer, for your consideration.
Current look on an iMac 24" with font set to 18 pt above.
My page formatting doesn't change when I use the key combo - everything just gets bigger and stays put relative to everything else. Here are two of my Safari preference panel tabs - note that I don't have the minimum font box checked on the advanced tab (I'm assuming that's where you have forced your browser to 18 points.
I'm running 10.6.8 on a 20" iMac set to 1680 x 1050.
Setting the min font size larger does not create the same look as command +. If you think about it, cmd+ raises all fonts on the page by one increment from what they already are. Min font setting only brings the smaller ones up to size. Try it. The real problem on NPN pages is the header which is designed around a small font, and the header gets wiggy (as shown above) when you increase the font size by either method.
That's too bad. I'm not upgrading as I still rely on some applications that need Rosetta to run on the Intel processor and that isn't supported after 10.6.
I think it's that 50+ thing.... I've had glasses for a number of years now, and the prescription gets adjusted every couple of years as things slowly get worse (the more I stare at computer screens....) Just sayin'.....
Lon
Lon, my eyes, too. I hate when that happens! Ideally, the web page designer would create a header that would not geek out if the font size changed. It's not hard, but needs to be on the designers mind when the layout is created. One way is to use graphics for words and menu buttons instead of type, but web designers really like to use real text in buttons thinking that it will help search engines rate the site highly. In reality, there's enough stuff on the pages here that the text in the buttons is not making any difference. I've run across this before (I've designed some sites like my company's and my photo site) and the designers don't anticipate what viewers will do, so it remains a problem.