[Python-Dev] Playing with a new theme for the docs (original) (raw)

Greg Ewing greg.ewing at canterbury.ac.nz
Sat Mar 24 02:16:17 CET 2012

Glyph Lefkowitz wrote:

"do I have to resize my browser every time I visit a new site to get a decent width for reading".

If all sites left the width to the browser, then I would be able to make my browser window a width that is comfortable for me with my chosen font size and leave it that way. The only time a site forces me to resize my window is when it thinks it has a better idea than me how wide the text should be.

I prefer sites that don't try to control the layout of everything. When using a site that leaves most of it up to my browser, I never find myself wishing that the designer had specified something more tightly.

However, I do often find myself wishing that the designer hadn't overridden the width, or the font size, or the text colour, or decided that I shouldn't be allowed to know whether I've visited links before, etc. etc.

A web page is not a printed page. It is not rendered at a fixed size and viewed in its entirety at once. It needs to be flexible, able to be rendered in whatever size space is available or the user wants to devote to it. Browsers are very good at doing that -- unless the designer defeats them by fixing something that is better left flexible.

-- Greg

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