I’ve been brushing up on my web-development reading and discovered my new favorite web guru, Andy Clarke, and his site A Beautiful Web. Two articles especially hit home with me: Time to stop showing clients static design visuals, and Five CSS design browser differences I can live with.

I won’t go into the technical details of these articles, but here is the key concept: Websites don’t have to look the same in every browser.

I could not agree more.

There’s a misconception, even by people who build websites today, that there must be pixel-perfection on every screen, in every browser. Andy has a few good theories on why he thinks this is so:

• a deeply embedded feeling that the web shares print’s need for pixel perfection
• the desire of brand stewards to control every aspect of a design
• a misunderstanding among clients and managers, perhaps reinforced by an old-fashioned workflow that has its roots in print design and pre-press

Unlike other media, in web work we have no control over the end user’s environment, which ultimately determines how the website will render. We can’t control the font size you use. We can’t control your screen size. Most of all, we can’t control the browser you use, let alone which version of that browser.

Web sites should be designed to be fluid, flexible, and adaptable to accommodate these variables. Pursuing a rigid and browser-identical website is a losing battle for client budgets, project scope, and future maintainability.

Let me emphasize that I am not advocating an inferior experience for some site visitors. I’m talking about visual differences due to how browsers interpret and display HTML and CSS. If you are still hung up on your website looking the same in every browser, you may want to reconsider what your website is supposed to be doing for you and your site visitors.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 9th, 2008 at 11:57 am by Park&Co and is filed under | Internet Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.