Well said. Also, ~25% users use Firefox, which has tabs at the top, and a vertical side bar, which all take up space.Originally Posted by Marko
Steve
Well said. Also, ~25% users use Firefox, which has tabs at the top, and a vertical side bar, which all take up space.
Steve
Crap!
Take a look a here http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp
I just did. Take a look, I mean.
It says there that Firefox had 24.9% share in June of 2006, down to 25.7% in May 2006.
So, what exactly did you refer to as "crap"?
The 25% figure is crap and I'll have to add your ability to read a document as well since like most of the people quoting incorrect numbers you haven't bothered to read what it says.
It makes me laugh that all those developers out there are busy testing their web sites on every minority browser without realising that the only people using them are other developers who are doing just the same thing.
Your example takes my breath away David,(excuse the expression, but otherwise I would probably offend someone by misusing God's name). If someone wants to be really convincing about LF I think it would be like David suggests. "repeat the misuse three to five times" to understand my reaction when I looked at the big ones ...Wow!
It makes me laugh that you suppose you know my profession. Anyway, you're way off the topic of this thread.
Now, what I would find interesting is if you have identified your user group (specific to a fine art web-site customer), and have quantitative data on which target resolutions, or even browser & version, and enabling technologies (ie, flash compared to traditional thumbnails) sell the best. Now THAT is something that would be very interesting indeed.
It was these exact figures I was basing my comments upon. This shows Firefox use for June this year at 24.9%, and the rest of the year over 25% for all except one month.
So perhaps your choice of wording needs some more thought and consideration.
Steve
No, You need to learn to read a document before posting the figures in it and misleading people by not including the caveats as to the derivation of the figures.
Last edited by robc; 27-Jun-2006 at 17:13.
There is a range of browser usage share data from different sources at the bottom of this page. The numbers vary a bit, as you'd expect, but in general show Firefox as having a share of the broader market that is about half of what it holds in the W3Schools user base.
OK, back to the original topic:
The Web is a medium in its own right. In order to best utilize it, one has to be aware of both its strengths and its limitations. Displaying graphics was not what it was originally intended for, and while possible it is still one of its great limitations.
One of the limitations is the working resolution of an average computer monitor, regardless of the browser or even the platform. The other big limitation mentioned earlier in this thread is color management, even for b&w photographs. The third big obstacle is the transfer rate.
Resolution is a problem simply because there is not enough of it at this stage of mass technology. One of the biggest monitors currently available on the mass market, Apple 30" Cinema Display, offers only 2560 x 1600 pixels at the cost of about $3000 including the video card. That's ~4 Megapixels. Clearly sufficient only to digicam users, and maybe even to middle-of-the-road dslr and/or 35mm users. It's not nearly enough to accurately represent any larger formats.
Color management is even thornier issue, because it is, as far as I know, available only to the Mac browsers. This is not even a matter of capabilities, but of intent. Unless or until all operating system and browser manufacturers decide that color management is important, it will make accurate representation of images over the web spotty at best.
Finally, the transfer rate. How big is the image file you would deem "accurate" and how long would it take to transfer over the currently average internet connection, even if the previous two issues were resolved?
I have no doubt the state of technology will eventually make it realistically possible, although for that to really happen there needs to exist a mass demand. The only thing that will make average Joe consumer demand to have fast and accurate representation of large resolution images available at low cost and reasonable speed, will be the movies. And even then, I'm not sure it will be the same set of demands.
So, in the real world, we need to think in terms of creating the best possible approximation of large format photographs for the Web within the constraints of the Web as a medium and keeping in mind the way our target audience will display it.
That is very different from trying to find the best way to show large format photogrpahs on the web, as the original poster asked, but this is the best answer I can come up with.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks