[mythtv] Mythweb font size and color

Chris Strom mythtv at eeeCooks.com
Thu Feb 10 03:54:23 UTC 2005


On Wed, Feb 09, 2005 at 06:57:12PM -0800, Chris Petersen wrote:
> >IMHO the only time that point size should be used in CSS is when
> >formatting for print.  Specifying a point size for use in a web browser is
> >no different than specifying a pixel size.  What looks good on one monitor
> >may not look good on someone else's.
> 
> pixel-size fonts don't render the same in every browser, either.  I 
> don't mind switching back to pixel heights -- I've just noticed that 
> most OS's seem to have a better job rendering point-sizes into something 
> readable (since most of them know that 9pt looks good, but 11px may not).

I am not advocating using pixel sizes nor point sizes - they are
essentially the same thing.  IIRC Pixel size = point size * dpi / 72.
If your system is set to 75 dpi, then pixel size =~ point size.

I'm suggesting that the font-size be scaled.  Either by percentage (85%)
or em (0.9em).  I believe that there is a bug in IE5.5 that does not
render ems correctly in certain cases, so I usually stick with percentage.

I recognize that you are trying to cram a lot of information into a fixed
space, so some scaling of the font size is in order.  I just think that
scaling with percentages is a more appropriate mechanism than specifying a
fixed size.

> 9pt font is *not* that small.  12 point font is HUGE.  The program 
> listing font in mythweb is something like 9pt (or 11px -- forget if I 
> updated it yet or not) and I still find it cramped at 1280x1024.

Perhaps on your system, 12 point is huge, but on mine, it's a little on
the small side.  Now, I may have to review my settings, but it is not a
problem on most, if not all, web sites that I come across.


> >I have configured Firefox so that the default font looks good on my
> >monitor.  I can comfortably read anything that does not over-ride the font
> >size.  Font that is slightly larger or slightly smaller is still easy to
> >read.  But, by specifying a specific pixel size, my settings are being
> >completely disregarded.  And, on my 1400x1050 14" laptop, it looks too
> >small.
> 
> um, "point" should be a relational size.  If not, then it's a bug in 
> firefox.  If you change the font size in firefox so that it's bigger or 
> smaller, the browser is supposed to render all hard-coded fonts larger 
> or smaller in relation to the default font size.  That's how galeon 
> works, and how firefox works for me when I've tried it (I don't use it 
> very often) -- if I "zoom" even the hard-coded fonts get bigger/smaller 
> along with the rest of the text.
> 
> Thus, if your default font size is 9pt (down from the standard 12), and 
> css says that something is 9pt, your browser would render it down around 
> 7pt (9 * 9/12).  it would be the exact same thing if I said the font was 
> 1.5em (or whatever), since it's all done according to the relation 
> between your default font size and the browser's original default font size.

As I said above, a point is not a relative size.  If you know the DPI
setting of your system, you can calculate the exact number of pixels that
the font height will be.

It got cut off from my initial post, but the Status page has green font
which is difficult to see.  I am not sure if there is a blue-green color
blindness, but it is hard for me to read and I have no color blindness.
The green is especially hard to read in the Job queue - for instance when
a job is running.

Thanks for getting back so quickly.

-Chris (not the real one ;)


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