[thelist] Design Resolutions

martin.p.burns at uk.pwcglobal.com martin.p.burns at uk.pwcglobal.com
Wed Feb 21 11:29:30 CST 2001


Memo from Martin P Burns of PricewaterhouseCoopers

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Subject:  Re: [thelist] Design Resolutions



Wahey Seb! Good to see you're not hibernating!

Coming on Thursday to beervolt? (info on thechat, but essentially
Wagamama's in Soho)

Back to on-topic stuff:

>As far as resolutions go, the current minimum requirement for Windows
>is 640x480 VGA, which in plain english means 16 colours. (Yes, 16,
>not 16 bit.)

Moreover, when you install Windows, this is the default. Some OEMs
even have this as their default install, even if they have installed more
effective drivers (more likely 256 colours, but still very poor)


>But everyone knows that the only people viewing websites at that
>resolution are those suffering from seriously outdated hardware.

Or garbage default installs. Of course, many users suffering from this
are not sufficiently technically literate to change the settings themselves.

>It's worth noting that as of this year, Microsoft Windows (consumer
>version) will ship with a requirement of XGA,

But how long will it be until this is the de facto standard? Sure,
buyers of new kit will have this (they won't have a choice),
but what about the people whose existing kit is fine for their
needs?

MS are already having real problems getting users (consumer and
business) to upgrade to Office2k, as Office97(/98) does pretty
much all you need for most applications, unless you really *do*
need millions of records in Excel/Access for analysing *really*
big datasets.


>But hey, these are all just rough ideas. If you want accurate
>figures, you need to research your audience. Poll them, solicit
>feedback, whatever. You might be designing a site for hardcore Linux
>hackers who (in my experience, ie: at home) run ridiculously high
>resolutions like 2048x1600 at 32 bit but only use 1/4 of the screen
>for their browser, or then again, you might be aiming at Sony C1X
>Picturebook owners with their tiny 20 column movie-os style screens.

Yup - relying on general stats such as "x% of users have y OS" isn't
particularly useful unless you have absolutely no data about *your*
proposition. And unless you are launching something from scratch,
you *should* have that data (even if you haven't done the analysis).

And the way to support both of the above types of user scenario is
to ensure that your content is held and manipulated separately from
its presentation.
<comic class="marvel">
This is a job... for ContentManagementSystems-boy!
</comic>

Cheers
martin


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