Do we really care about 800×600 people?

fluid is probably the most balanced solution and not all that hard ta set up either. I went way outa my way to force the defualt theme to be completly fluid so everyone can dig it no matter what resolution they’ve got…if only I can find a good balance for cross browser compatability now…im workin on though ??

I design everthing fluid with adequate base font sizes using em or % CSS relationships throughout. It depends alot as to the purpose of the web site. Marketing sites dictate much different design than informational sites. I do think however it’s time to embrace the 21st century, and let the 8×6 viewers either scroll away or fade away. Dialup users are also dwindling quite rapidly.

I would have to agree with Otto42 ……..

Hi glowlite,

…Dialup users are also dwindling quite rapidly…

Wrong. Patently wrong.

Dialup is standard for practically everyone too far outside of large towns to have access to a lot of phone/internet companies in a lot of competition. This is so even in the US American countryside. It is even more so the case for most of Europe, most of Africa and Asia.

One might get the impression of something dwindling, if one lives in an at least medium-sized city well connected to all backbones and with a good infrastructure, as one’s own friends tend to come from the same area and it’s their responses by which people tend to form opinions on.

E.g. I live a mere 50 miles away from a huge city in Europe, in which I worked and lived but a couple of years ago. Most of my friends are from that city and to them broadband access, flatrates and a large number of choices are “normal”. When they visit me where I now live and notice the modem I still have, their eyes bulge. Even more so when I tell them, that we have no broadband here, nor radio/wire-LAN access points and that I pay quite dearly per minute for online access.

So, as long as you want people outside the larger western culture cities to access sites you design for, you better stop thinking everyone has a 19″ screen and DSL access.

And yep, I noticed lately a lot of sites which cater exclusively to broadband speeds. I click out of them the moment I notice their huge overhead with file sizes.

Oooh, lots of comment here ??

I find a fluid design is best. If it’s fixed width it might cause problems for both big and small screen users.

A good rule to go by is about fifteen to twenty words per line, in a nicely sized font (small fonts are evil!).

Dialup is standard for practically everyone too far outside of large towns to have access to a lot of phone/internet companies in a lot of competition. This is so even in the US American countryside. It is even more so the case for most of Europe, most of Africa and Asia.

-Broadband usage in the US was up to 70% among internet users as of last month. This month it’s up to 73%.
-Among all online households in the US (instead of “users”), it’s right at 50/50.
-Europe is running at about 20% broadband household coverage.
-Percentage of *all* Americans who have broadband at home is 42%. Remember, however, that more than a third of households don’t have a computer at all, and 8% have one but don’t go online.
Sources:
https://www.websiteoptimization.com/bw/0604/
https://www.websiteoptimization.com/bw/0605/

Hi Otto,

what I said – 50/50 isn’t “negligable” as glowlite assumed. And the USA is the farthest along regarding broadband.

The more interesting statistic data isn’t apparently available? How large the percentage of non-urban (= outside the bigger cities) broadband users is. Because sure as hell, these users will wait for a long while before they get anything better.

what I said – 50/50 isn’t “negligable” as glowlite assumed.

Don’t get confused now. 50/50 is among all households. In terms of actual heads, it’s 73/27 among people who actually use the internet at home, and the rate itself is still increasing. So saying that half the people in the country don’t have broadband is inaccurate at best.
-42% of the people in the country don’t have internet access of any kind, at home.
-Of the remaining 58%, almost 3 out of 4 do have broadband, at home.
-Now, 73% of adults say they use the internet at all, so about a third of those use it at work only. And broadband in the workplace is up around 90% among those people.
So, do the math, and this gives you about an 80-85% broadband usage among people who use the internet *at all*, in the USA. Those are pretty significant numbers.

And the USA is the farthest along regarding broadband.

In terms of actual heads, yes, but in terms of penetration, no. The US is 19th and falling in that race. The Pacific Rim countries are way ahead, mainly because of population density, I think.

The more interesting statistic data isn’t apparently available? How large the percentage of non-urban (= outside the bigger cities) broadband users is.

The info you want is here: https://www.gao.gov/new.items/d06426.pdf
According to the chart on page 18: Urban and suburban households tend to be running around 29% having broadband, while rural users are running at 17%. That’s actually a really interesting report if you feel like flipping through it, but the gist of it is that broadband is increasing among rural areas. Mostly thanks to wireless and other technologies which mean that we don’t have to run tons of wire out to the boonies.

Because sure as hell, these users will wait for a long while before they get anything better.

Meh. Depends on how you define “long while”. I’d guess that as more wireless tech comes about and gets better, the rate of adoption of high speed services in rural areas will increase rapidly. While it’s a little bit premature to not consider dialup users, it’s certainly not unjustified to do so. Within the next, say, 4 years, most web designers will have excluded dial-up users as a primary motivating factor in their designs. Well, most have already, admittedly, but I think that that will actually make sense within 4 years. ??

Hi Otto,

I haven’t been delving too deeply into those reports, as PDFs load too slowly for me (sic!). ??

However, I never trust statistics I haven’t forged myself, so to speak ;-). I have quite a few differing news regarding the USA, e.g. the fact that quite a few areas outside of urban regions already have trouble getting a payable phone line, not to speak of DSL or cable, that connectivity prices in rural areas have been lately sharply rising, etc etc.

According to our local statistics I should have the choice between at least 3-4 DSL carriers, my region is even listed as “DSL-enabled”, but the plain simple fact is that there aren’t even the distribution mechanics installed here. Still according to statistics my region has DSL… ?? So you see why I tend to distrust such stats when I often hear completely different tales.

As to web-designers and catering to dialup: 4 years doesn’t even touch it, especially when we are talking professional, and even more so, when we are talking commercial design.

Unless we talk about sites which are seclusive and exclusive to their immediate surroundings and a very narrow clientele, web designers have to cater to many necessities, dialup by the way being in my eyes even more important than accessibility of impaired people in this respect as it touches much more people. If you look at any well-designed, successful commercial site, you will notice that the real pros indeed do cater to analog users. Carefully so. These can bring in the exact same revenue as a broadband user.

Privateers will have to ask themselves for whom they design and whether they can or want to afford to exclude large portions of potential users on the WWW (which doesn’t consist of only the USA either).

Uh huh. Tried Amazon.com on dial-up lately? It’s painful. ??

I see your point and even agree with it, I just don’t think it’ll go the way you think it will. I kinda tend to believe the 15-20% dialup figure, and believe me, I know people in some *rural* areas. I grew up in Arkansas for crying out loud. ??

Admittedly, in Montana or something where you can’t even get a phone line, then getting high-speed connectivity is more difficult, but quite a lot of the US gets cable TV, and cable providers are falling all over themselves to get broadband to these people.

Don’t forget the bell-curve effect. There are probably as many of the “tech-savvy” 1024+ crowd that appreciate a fluid or 800px design as there are people on 800×600 monitors. Just for differing reasons.

For example I just looked up to check as I was writing this, and I have 5 windows open. Two email programs, an accounting program, a spreadsheet and Firefox. I will often also have a word processor and IE open at the same time.

I appreciate fluid & 800px site designs, because they take up _less space_ on my 1600px 19″ LCD. Additionally, even a fluid design with the wrong (fixed pixel) font sizes is more difficult to read at higher screen widths. Go with the %/em size recommendations, above.

If this website was fluid width it would be far less readable. Around 12 words per line (or 72 characters) is easy to read for most people. Sites that throw up a horizontal scrollbar for 800 x 600 users are more common these days but I think it’s thoughtless to force this on the still sizable section of users with 800 wide. Of course pages scroll vertically, and that’s why most mouses have a wheel. Horizontal scrolling is a different thing altogether.

Thanks Otto42, you’ve saved me alot of keystrokes!

We threw all the global data we could obtain in the middle of the table and sifted through it carefully. That was 3 months ago. At that time Canada led the US by slightly more than 1% in bb/dsl users. It seemed the only thing holding the UK back at that time was a lack of infrastructure. Our mission was to gear web design toward the people who actually used the internet.

We also learned in the previous 14 months broadband/dsl users were increasing at the rate of 1%(+-) per month with no anticipated slow down.

lhk seems to be in a situation thats common. But, that small percentage is just that, a small percentage. And it is dwindling quite fast. That segment is slowly falling through the cracks. It’s just not cost effective marketing to attempt 100% saturation.

webva – if designing is a hobby that’s one thing, if it’s for profit then I suggest a dual monitor setup, your worklife and productivity will improve greatly.

PS- I think I still have a 10″ amber monitor around here someplace if anyone needs it.

pcmt said
If this website was fluid width it would be far less readable. Around 12 words per line (or 72 characters) is easy to read for most people.

That’s the point of fluid width, the user can change the width and the line-length to whatever they feel is comfortable & easy to read. Just by clicking corner of your browser window and dragging it. Fluid width doesn’t necessarily mean long line-length, it just means flexible/variable line length & user’s option, reader’s choice.

Since this debate has been completely hashed on this and other forums, it’s funny, but hard to avoid! I just wish I could find a good 3-col, fluid width WP 1.5 theme to play with, cuz that’s what I like best.

I think it all comes down to who’s going to your site, like a lot of people have been pointing out. If your site is titled “post generation X nerds U-nite!” then, well, you know, everyone will be looking at the page in firefox at 1600×1200. but if its a more general public website, then you have to worry about people like my mom who stroll up in IE at 800×600 with glasses on.

Those variable width websites throw on a whole new twist. It’s a hell of alot harder to get away with a good looking and functional variable width site imho though.

“I think the majority of users are using IE, rather than Firefox or another browser.”

Not true. It depends on your site’s audience, doesn’t it? My stats show Firefox/Mozilla about 60%, IE about 30% and 10% for others.