Hold on there Jake…

December 23, 2002

Summary: Jakob Nielson makes a good point about letting users resize text, but incorrectly places the blame for this on Cascading Style Sheets.

I was reading Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox, December 23, 2002: Top Ten Web-Design Mistakes of 2002 and enjoying it. He nailed a lot of things right on the noggin’.

But he blew it big time on one of them. He wrote:

4. Fixed Font Size
Style sheets unfortunately give websites the power to disable a Web browser’s “change font size” button and specify a fixed font size. About 95% of the time, this fixed size is tiny, reducing readability significantly for most people over the age of 40. Respect the user’s preferences and let them resize text as needed. Also, specify font sizes in relative terms — not as an absolute number of pixels.

Now I agree that there is a fascination with overly small font size on the web. I agree that font sizes should be set in relative terms and not in pixels (mainly because Internet Explorer can’t resize pixels).

But where he is absolutely totally wrong is in blaming this on Style Sheets.

  • Fonts have been fixed size for much longer than style sheets
  • Style sheets have given rise to the ability to use relative sizes much easier than ever before
  • Blaming this on style sheets is like saying that cars are bad because they can hit people.

Oh, and what is meant by disable a Web browser’s “change font size” button? What web browser is he talking about? Internet Explorer? IE6/Windows doesn’t have a “change font size” button, but it does have a Text Size button.

No website should be able to disable a button. What I assume he meant was that setting font sizes in pixels renders the button useless. Since software is supposed to work for you (not the other way around), it sounds like Jakob should be talking to the folks who make a lousy browser.

  • If your web browser doesn’t give you control, perhaps you should use a different one
  • Opera makes resizing web text easy, even font sizes set in pixels, allowing you to increase/decrease by 10% or 100% with the touch of a button, and return to 100% by another button
  • Mozilla/Gecko-based browsers also make font resizing easy

CSS is a great technology that allows for faster page downloads (something Jakob always wants) and the ability for users to override the page style (something FONT tags never did). They should not be blamed for those who misuse them.

  • http://www.vaneerden.com Bill Creswell

    Saying IE’s browser “doesn’t give you control” is kind of a funky twist too. I used px and pt when I desire as a webmaster to control the font to control to the layout. I have the freedom to use em and % when I have allow the design of the site to allow it, preventing site viewer from accidentally destroying the layout.

  • http://members.outpost10f.com/%7Ejor/ Jor

    Well, 9 good points, and one misconception — not bad.

    He also didn’t take into account Opera and Mozilla both allow you to specify a minimum font size, as well as a user stylesheet where you can specify even more accessibility features. (Like Opera 7’s ‘accessibility’ stylesheet — some really good ideas in there!)

    I just tested by the way, and MSIE6’s ‘change text size’ setting indeed does not work on sites styled with CSS. One more reason to switch to Opera, or, if you have the RAM to spare, Mozilla!

  • http://www.hiredgoons.ca Tridus

    IE’s text resize does work on sites with CSS, but it doesn’t work if any of the text is using a fixed size (pt or px).

    Its pretty lame really.

  • http://nontroppo.org Ian

    There is even an annoying bug in their relative font-size implementation whereby if you define a font as being other than 1em, then resizing the page in IE leads to huge shifts in font size - you have to give 100% to IE and then give the em declaration using a child selector trick to real browsers.

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