a thought on assumed minimum screen sizes

It has been my experience that when people are running 800×600, they probably are running full screen. 800×600 is typically a 13″-15″ screen size. To not have it maximized would limit 1) what you cna do in the browser and 2) what you would be able to do outside the browser. The only time I run my browser un-maximized is at work. With a 12″ monitor and a mind numbing 1200×1024 screen size.
TG

You can also do things like detect the type of userAgent (or screen size) and modify what gets output based upon that, cut columns, rearrange layout, import a different CSS file, etc.
-d
https://www.chait.net

I tend to assume a minimum of 640×240. That’s the size of a HPC screen – which, incidentally, has MSIE4 in rom and therefore, CSS support, even if it’s partially broken. ?? I still see people use a 640 screen from time to time on desktop, as well. I might plan my sites for bigger screens but I try to make sure they’re usable on the smallest ones.
One interesting trick I’m using right now which someone else might find useful:
If you have access to your Apache configuration, (I don’t think this can be done through htaccess – am I wrong?) add css to the list of files which have to pass through PHP before being served (AddType application/x-httpd-php .php .php4 .php3 .phtml .css) which gives you much greater freedom on what to do with your CSS, since you can embed php code in it. This lets you avoid the nasty css hacks and just feed specific browsers the specific css sections that they can cope with while still keeping it all in the same file.
Caveat: You have to start all your CSS files with <?php @header (“Content-Type: text/css”); ?> – otherwise, Firebird thinks they aren’t really CSS and ignores them, since by default PHP returns text/html.

KAShirow,
I use the php header trick to serve up a random header image on my site. The only line in that file, though, is the one that sets the background image for the header.
Personally, I don’t think it’s the best idea to serve *all* of your CSS in this manner, as it cannot be cached by the browser, thus bypassing one of the great features of an external style sheet: the quick response of a page that is loading the CSS from cache.
One idea is to only put those parts that are dynamic in the php files. You could even have all your styles in one default style sheet (that, say, works for more modern browsers), then call the php style sheets to serve up alternate code for the other browsers. In other words, take advantage of the “cascade”. The browsers that don’t need the “hacks” can take advantage of the cached styles, while the others will get only partial caching.
-Tony

As to width lets not forget bookmark sidebars . Or folks on laptops/notebooks. Let us also not forget wap. Regardless of size the code will break at some point. It’s just if you put your block quote immediately contigious to your div limit it will break sooner rather than later. Doesn’t make sense when you have got 15 % unused real estate either side. tcervo a quickie: You can run *frames* in css where only the new part of the page is called.The rest stays put in your window.
Loads like lightning.