[thelist] .gif text

[Paul Bradforth]

On 6/7/00 at 7:41 pm, pegdaniels at hotmail.com (Peggy Daniels) wrote:

> This is no doubt a very basic question.  My asking it anyway is
> probably going to cause many of you to totally discount anything I may
> have to say in the future :)

Not likely :-)

> Is it ever ok to have .gif text?

Of course, in the right context...

> For example, I'm thinking of logos that are mostly or only text, and
> have to display in a particular font because the words are the whole
> logo (with the obligatory swoosh, of course).  Or, maybe a header that
> appears on all pages, that is some kind of image map with text on it
> too, with the text parts being links.  Is it ok to have .gif text for
> links or whatever, if there are also plain text equivalents elsewhere
> on the page?

Yes: a lot of people would say that you *should* have plain text links
somewhere on your page, for the benefit of people who are browsing with
images off, or for some other reason can't see your graphic navigation
parts.

> If the answer is "no, images should never ever contain text" then I
> have a follow-up question (again, revealing the holes in my
> knowledge):  How is it possible to use any kind of special font if
> it's not in an image?  Not for the body of content on a page, of
> course, but for the other parts like the above-mentioned logo or some
> crazy navbar style that a client wants used.

There are two points of view about this. A lot of people say that all
body text should be HTML text, not GIFs, and they're basically right.
Text loads faster and can be read by robots and can be spoken for blind
people, for instance. On the other hand, there are many gorgeous sites
out there where all the text is GIFs. I don't think you can tie it down
hard. If there's a lot of textual content on the page, then it would be
best as text. But you can be quite liberal with GIF images for
sub-headings and headlines and so on, bearing in mind the final size of
your page.

If your site has only a small amount of text on the pages, I see no
reason why it shouldn't be GIFs. You get ultimate control of typography
this way, and can lay it out *exactly* as you'd like without worrying
about it all blowing apart.

There's an example of a site which I think is nicely laid out and
designed which is ALL GIFs, no text. It's at:

<http://www.alwaysmac.com/mag/dec99/thefurnace/web/thefurnacefreewa.html>


best wishes,

Paul

http://www.paulbradforth.com
http://pbi.freelancers.net