[thelist] is the web-safe palette dead?

CodeBitch codebitch at macedition.com
Tue Mar 26 00:37:01 CST 2002


On 26/3/02 4:33 PM, "thelist-request at lists.evolt.org"
<thelist-request at lists.evolt.org> wrote:

> From: "Andrew Gianni" <andrew at newkenmore.com>
> To: <thelist at lists.evolt.org>
> Date: Mon, 25 Mar 2002 17:06:41 -0800
> Subject: [thelist] is the web-safe palete dead?
> Reply-To: thelist at lists.evolt.org
>
> I haven't been paying that much attention, and I only recently joined this
> list, so I'm assuming this has been hashed and rehashed, but it's a changing
> issue and even Lynda Weinman says it's not important anymore for most
> situations:
>
> http://www.lynda.com/hex.html
>
> I'm sure there are people who hold strong opinions on this topic, so I hope
> I'm not opening a can of worms.
>
> Andrew

Strangely, it's the one "web standard" most people actually follow, even
though it NEVER really worked for many unix machines.
Some resources:
http://www.morecrayons.com/about/
http://www.macedition.com/cb/cb_20010219.shtml
And the articles linked here: http://www.morecrayons.com/resources/

It will surprise nobody to learn that I agree with Lynda. Web designers can
and should look outside the web-safe palette if the color you want isn't in
it, especially light colors like beige or muted colors like warm grays.  The
"web smart" palette I proposed last year and Kirk Franklin has implemented
at morecrayons.com is one possible way of selecting colors without being
overwhelmed with the 16 million choices implied by full range of hex codes.
It's probably a good idea to use web-safe colors for big areas of color, but
colors from an expanded palette are fine as part of a total color scheme.

I'm interested in other people's views on this, and on the proposed "web
smart" palette. To pre-empt any questions on this, this palette was proposed
on entirely psychological grounds and is not intended to exactly match
whatever colors might be on some 16-bit display.

Best regards,
CodeBitch




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