Statistics Rant
I often have conversations with people at work about browser & screen resolution statistics. On this specific topic, I’m absolutely baffled by individuals who determine development guidelines based on nothing but personal preference or public opinion (public opinion being whatever your peers are using). It would be nice to have a conversation with an individual who has made an attempt at basing their opinion on some objective data. Really, how hard is it to acquire some free statistics? Is it really that difficult to figure out that less than 1% of people surfing the web today use Netscape 7.x? Or that a large majority of people using a browser run a screen resolution of 1024×768 or higher? I’m not going to pretend I know exactly how the data should be translated, but it should at least be given some intelligent thought. Don’t even get me started on actually considering a targeted user in regards to the statistics.
If the mouse pointer changes to a hand when you roll-over an image associated with a story the image upon clicking either links to enlarged version of the image or a website associated with the image.
A company with which I am currently employed recently made the decision to switch to a 960 width despite the fact that 1/3 of its users are on 800 width monitors (which really, is around 770 with a browser maximized). And they didn’t even make this decision based on content. Just a “we want to appeal to the future” or some garbage.
Anyway, the HARD part of this whole deal, as you indicated, is making decisions in light of those statistics. Very, very difficult to do. But when you make the decision, at least have a good logic behind it.
Example: All the forms on my site turn a light green when clicked in Firefox/Safari, etc. but not in IE. IE users don’t suffer because of it, but it’s still a nice little bonus for those who are “in the know.”