More or less, I’d say. Depends on the context, though.

Ryan,

Interesting. And yeah, I can imagine that about IE at least.

Anyway I have some experience using (Windows) laptops at 120dpi (a 17″ laptop monitor at 1920×1600) and it’s not good. Using pixels and em’s in Firefox and Safari is fine, Internet Explorer and Opera are fine if you use pixels but screw up sizing considerably if you use em’s.

My only solution was to stick with pixels.

Definitely!

Alex,

Yep, there a re definitely downsides to using ems as well.

In my experience, development often becomes quite challenging when pixel sizes and em-sizes mix.

Done the right way, I totally agree.
“Because it’s better” just won’t work, obviously .

You can’t force your customers to use better browsers, sure, but as a web developer you do have an educating role in teaching customers about better browsers and why they should not be using IE6.

It might cause friction sometimes, but it will pay off. The more web developers educate their customers, the faster the web as a whole can progress to new technologies such as CSS3.

I, for one, have stopped using ems.

Yes, in a professional development life, in most cases, I don’t really see any other option than using ems or something similar.

Perhaps that might work with friends, but not with customers.
You can’t push your customers to use a better browsers. Most of the customers I work with are using IE and think that it’s a good browser, since they don’t have any experience any solution.problems while using it.

It’s our job to make it work in the browser the customer is using (and all the others of course) and perhaps also a bit for our own pride.

I’ll will defenitily stick with em’s..

Yes, I agree that one becomes a bit jaded a times… We can only hope that the playing filed will become better and better in the future.

It’s really allot easier (IMHO), and makes all the math obsolete. The only reason not to use pixels is to fix a broken browser? Does anyone else see a problem with that? OK ok ok … it’s not the only reason but I can bet you that’s the major reason.

Still in the work world I use ems, %’s etc … because hate it or not IE6 is still out there. I am less and less caring (sad to say), because I feel IF you want text resizing then GET A BETTER BROWSER !!

Olly,

Technically, CSS pixels are relative units

Yes.

Morgan,

Build sites for users, not for user-agents

Definitely.

Tanny,

Wouldn’t using pixels for everything solve the DPI/PPI problem?

Well, no. Because a pixel on one screen doesn’t, size-wise, necessarily match the size of a pixel on anothe screen. So, from a pixel-perfect scenario, it won’t work (whereas you could probably get at least somewhat more consistent results with something like ems).

Steven,

Why not zoom text only by default (the current thing they’re probably using) and the option to go for zoom everything (the new behaviour).

It’s a great question. Why have web browser vendors chosen to do this, and how will it affect us?

Ole,

Personally, I go for layouts that are elastic, in that sense that they have a min-width and a max-width and can scale between those two.

What i don’t do anymore, is to specify the whole layout in em’s. I do it normally this way: All layout-sizes in px and font-size in em’s. It a good compromise, imho.

By changing the paradigm of their interaction we should be treading carefully. Why not zoom text only by default (the current thing they’re probably using) and the option to go for zoom everything (the new behaviour). Why does the new behaviour state itself as the default? When we create a new behaviour each user out there who is impacted has to learn a new way of doing something, so its good to be cautious. And they don’t get confronted with that changed interaction model by choice either, its while they are probably trying to do something with their computer like get on to do some banking. So I always worry when the gadget takes control of my experience and changes it. I never chose to experiment with IE7 Zoom, I actually chose text resizing I believe and the default behaviour had been modified beyond my current expectation.

I guess you can tell page zoom gives me a headache lol… sorry about the rant Robert.

Second, I’m not sold on page zoom. IE7 page zoom gave me a User Interface Nightmare when I tried to use it recently. Nobody seems to be mentioning the effect on users of being confronted by a rapidly zooming interface. Done well I can see the benefit of page zoom for some people but lets not think its the answer to anything. In fact it raises a bunch of its own usability issues IMO (scrolling was mentioned, orientation issues and the ability of people to effectively maintain their mental map comes to mind).

Finally, can we ever rely on the user having page zoom in a browser (there are so many out there)? And can we rely the user understands how to use it?

So I’ll stick to the status quo here for a while. I can’t envision page zoom in the immediate future will exhonerate me from my responsibilities. Ems work fine.

Now to my answers.

1. As long as IE6 is out there, for users, it would be nice to continue to use relative units. However from informal interviews, very few people know how to size text in IE6.

2. Wouldn’t using pixels for everything solve the DPI/PPI problem?

Most of us, or at least the readers of your blog, as well as Rogers blog, are in it for the long haul. We do this because we have passion, take pride in our work, and actually have a desire to add value for our clients.

You can argue that using relative sizing allows you greater flexibility and better long term compatability across many user-agents and devices … at least that’s one of my hopes for the work I am currently doing for clients.

You could also argue that using relative sizing, allows a wider audience to use the content provided on a site… I like to think so, but realistically, have my doubts that many less-than-perfect sighted people know how to use text resizing.

Personally, I greatly enjoy reading sites, where I can scale everything in MY favourite browser, without having to figure out an obscure setting, install some other browser or weird add-ons, or wait for the IE team to finally catch up.

Build sites for users, not for user-agents

Admittedly, that statement can be re-used in a wide variety of scenarios.

- Text sizing: Users first, browser (features) second
- SEO: Users first, search engines second
- more examples?

However, I don’t think more browsers implementing page zooming is what affects the choice to use pixels or not for font sizing. The issue is really with Microsoft’s refusal to let Internet Explorer resize text sized in pixels (which is still a problem in IE 8). As long as a significant number of people are still using IE 6, which has neither page zoom nor the ability to resize text in pixels, I think it’s hard to justify using pixels for font size.