Re: Nielsen's Rating

Subject: Re: Nielsen's Rating
From: Arlen -dot- P -dot- Walker -at- jci -dot- com
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2001 14:43:03 -0500


>You can use fonts in a PDF that would be a strain on the 72 dpi
>output monitor but would look great at 300dpi laser printer.

Let's dispel the myth of the 72 dpi monitor right now. That's a dot pitch
of .35mm. Most monitors these days are .28mm or better, which is more like
90 dpi. Flat-screen LCD monitors, rapidly replacing CRTs, go as high as
130dpi (Dell XUGA is one). Odds are high your monitor is more like 100dpi
than 72. And that'll keep changing; IBM shipped some flat screens over
200dpi recently, and that's far from the limit. We'll see screens with the
same resolution as the low-res lasers (300dpi or better) in general use
well before the decade's out.

>People, PLEEEAASSE validate your arguments. There are hundreds of people
out
>there probably gobbling this info up as they venture into online
publishing
>or look to fine tune their processes. Let's not feed misinformation back
>into the community!

Why not? The 'net is loaded with bad information anyway. You think anyone's
going to notice more? ;{>}

Ever notice how problems with web pages are the fault of the designer,
while problems with PDF are the fault of the format? People, every medium
has its limitations, and you must learn them accept them and work with
them. Is it hard? Yes, but that, I should think, is what you're being paid
for. If it were easy, anyone could do it. When you go to produce a printed
manual, the kind of paper you're planning on using affects the kind of
colors and illustrations you can use. Why do you suppose HTML or PDF would
be magically exempt from that?

It's a poor craftsman that blames his tools. That includes file formats.
You *can* build a pdf file that looks and acts just like an HTML page. You
*can*, given sufficient control and effort, build an HTML file that looks
and works quite like a PDF. (Hint: scalable graphics can be duplicated in
HTML by making a large graphic, then having the browser scale it down in
its initial appearance. Javascript can be written to allow you then to
magnify the image. If the browser supports something like SVG, so much the
better.)

If an HTML file is cruddy, it's the author's fault, not HTML's. If the PDF
file can't be read without effort, again that's the author's fault, not
PDF's. If you're going to play the blame game, at least point your finger
in the right direction.

(BTW, check out Opera for some good HTML things. Opera brings the scale
factor to the browser, allowing you to enlarge/reduce the entire page, not
just the text.)

Have fun,
Arlen
Chief Managing Director In Charge, Department of Redundancy Department
DNRC 224

Arlen -dot- P -dot- Walker -at- JCI -dot- Com
----------------------------------------------
In God we trust; all others must provide data.
----------------------------------------------
Opinions expressed are mine and mine alone.
If JCI had an opinion on this, they'd hire someone else to deliver it.


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