Re: New problem with Firefox

David:
I appreciate your hanging in there with me. You are right about the
evaluation page and the text that became an image. I agree that the
evaluation page has an extra added disadvantage, but unfortunately that
appears to be a small part of a bigger problem. The article you referenced
on scaling shows how IE handles different resolutions by scaling. So IE can
easily display both 96 and 120 with proper scaling (and I'm sure other custom
settings in between). Firefox apparently can't (or won't) do this.

I have discovered that there is a serious problem on all the pages when I
publish the site with a 96dpi setting and view it in Firefox at a 120dpi
setting -- in fact it is chaos. Take a look right now at 120dpi and you
will see what I mean. (Viewed at 96dpi it is absolutely perfect). Vice
versa: when I publish at 120dpi, Firefox sees it great at 120 but has
jumbled forms and text too small for the graphics when viewed at 96dpi. But
on IE7, everything works no matter how the site is published, either 96dpi or
120dpi -- makes no difference. And I've got to tell you, IE7 looks great.

I am puzzled as to why 96dpi is considered "normal" when it is a lower
resolution that makes small text even smaller and more difficult to read.
120 is much more comfortable for reading and viewing in general, so why is it
not the default? I don't recall ever re-setting my dpi since purchasing this
computer about four years ago, so it must have been 120dpi out of the box.
I'm sure there's a good reason (no I'm not sure at all -- often there seems
to be no good reason for lots of things inside these boxes).

I am interested in -- as a temporary only fix -- the idea of publishing two
versions, one at 96dpi and one at 120dpi, and then put a warning at the top
of my home page that says "if you are having difficulty viewing this page,
click here." But the long term solution is to abandon Publisher for web
design and try the Serif WebPlus to see how it works. If 96dpi is the
default setting I'm sure complaints will start to come in from Firefox users
if I stay with 120dpi. On the other hand, those people used to viewing our
site on Firefox at 120dpi are in for a shock now that I have re-published at
96dpi. I'm going to leave it up that way for a while to see how many
complaints we get.

The new Firefox 3.0 is to be released tomorrow. Maybe they will have
decided not to play such hardball on poor MSFT. I know they're the ones who
are in compliance with the standards, but I can hope they'll try to live and
let live. I think they'd gain even more market share if they helped solve
the compatibility problem.

One final question: Is there any way to use Firefox as the browser for Web
Preview in Publisher? That way I could design pages for Firefox knowing that
IE can display them as well. Thanks again, and any suggestions are welcome.

"DavidF" wrote:

CWWJ,

One of the reasons I wanted the Evaluation page was that I think at least
part of the problem has to do with your design, and I wanted to test that
before suggesting a fix. But, if you go to
http://www.burdin-adr.com/index_files/Page637.htm and look at the form where
you have "Neutrality, Empathy, Managing the...etc" that correspond with four
*option button* choices of Excellent to Poor. On the web page try to left
click, drag select the text "neutrality...etc" and you will see that
regardless of which browser you cannot select the text because the whole
text box has been converted to an image:
http://www.burdin-adr.com/index_files/image15541.jpg
As a general rule with Publisher webs, if whatever you are doing in your
design results in the text being converted to an image, then you need to
change your design. In this case it is at the minimum exaggerating the
96/120 dpi problem. Remember how I told you that when you Publish your pages
at 120 dpi, then one of the results is the graphics and images on the page
are "enlarged" in FireFox. The fact that your list of "Neutrality, Empathy,
etc..." has been converted to an image, and is enlarged and as a result
doesn't stay in line with your button choices.

So, try this. Instead of using a separate text box with different shading
for your "Neutrality, Empathy, Managing the...etc" text lists, build the
form as per the more normal way. Drag that text box that you are currently
using off into your scratch area. Go to Insert > Form Control > Text box.
Put "Neutrality" in that text box and align it horizontally with the four
*option button* choices of "Excellent, good, fair, poor". Then again go to
Insert > Form Control > Text box for "Empathy". Create a new text box for
each. Then republish the page and test it in FF and see how it looks. I
betcha it will line up better.

I want to keep the focus on this particular page for now, with the suggested
redesign, rather than stray off onto discussing other pages, and different
browsers and such. But here is a different, and probably a better
description and discussion of 96/120 issue than I have provided before:
Adjusting Scale for Higher DPI Screens:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms537625(VS.85).aspx
And remember that Publisher produces different code for non-IE browsers
which means that FireFox deals with this scaling issue in a different way
than IE does. So as I said above, fix the text that has been converted to an
image on your Evaluation page, and republish, and test the page in FF to see
how much that helps, before we start discussing other pages....

DavidF



"CWWJ" <CWWJ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:EAC0D520-DFCE-4076-B453-436B6DB5E3E6@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Yeah, David, I will be happy to do that. I have used yousendit several
times
to send large files. I will not get around to it til later today or
tonight
however. Thanks so much for your concern about this issue. The sad thing
for me is that Publisher is so easy to use and creates a good-looking if
somewhat limited web site. But these underlying problems: the huge
padding
at higher resolutions -- on widescreen monitors it looks ridiculous -- and
the inability to easily center plus the forms problem, are really serious
issues. Do you know anything about the new FireFox 3.0? What little I've
read indicates they have made changes to solve some cross-browser
problems.
I think it is being released next week.

Incidentally, I was kidding about the class action lawsuit -- I am certain
that all the warranty disclaimers are included in those terms of agreement
that no one ever reads -- but failure to warn in a more visible way than
in
the birdseed bold print of a warranty might be viewed as negligence by
some
sharp lawyer.

"DavidF" wrote:

Wanked, winked, weird, whatever...we are getting confused with semantics
here I believe. The layout of the page and the form may be messed up and
jumbled, but the form is still functional/usable...if you can figure out
which buttons, boxes and form controls go together. This 96/120 dpi issue
affects the *layout* of the page, not the *functionality* of the form.

Would you do me a favor? Make a copy of your Publisher file and delete
all
the pages except for Evaluation form page at:
http://www.burdin-adr.com/index_files/Page637.htm . Then use
www.yousendit.com to upload the file, and email the link to that file to
yourself, and then post that link here so I can download your Pub file. I
want to do some testing and see if possibly I can escalate this with
MSFT.
This page is a great example of why they need to address this 96/120 dpi
issue. When you use yousendit.com you DO NOT have to sign up to use the
services, and I use it all the time to send links to large files for
downloading, rather than attach them to an email.

DavidF

"CWWJ" <CWWJ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:CEEA1E21-88C2-4E73-ADDA-BD49468C8A2F@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I'm not sure what you mean by "layout wanked." That can be understood
as
a
good thing or a not-so-good thing, depending upon your point of view.
If
this is a negative comment, then let me simply repeat what my
experience
has
been viewing my web site on several different computers, some with IE6
and
FF2, some with IE7 and FF2.

The only failure I experienced was with FireFox 2 when accessed with my
display set at 96dpi. The forms pages are jumbled (although usable)
and
other pages have cosmetic problems like text too small in a big text
box.
However, FF2 worked perfectly when I was set at 120dpi

Both versions of IE -- IE6 and IE7 -- displayed entirely correctly in
both
120dpi and 96dpi. The forms worked properly, all buttons and boxes
were
in
the proper place, and all pages looked and functioned properly. Just
last
night (as I reported) I used both IE7 and IE6 at 96dpi on two computers
at
another location, and both worked perfectly.

As for what other web sites look like, I visit probably fifty or sixty
a
day
and I sometimes can detect a site that may have been created in
Publisher.
If the content of the page is over to the left with lots of white space
on
the right, it could be a Publisher site because Pub can't do centering.
I
am
much more likely to see weird jumbled things when I am using FireFox
than
with IE, so I suspect there are other web authoring tools that have the
same
limitations as Publisher in terms of cross-browser compatibility. I
haven't
spent a lot of time switching back and forth between 96 and 120, but
then
I
don't visit lots of sites with forms pages either.

Finally, just to sum up: I have had only one problem: viewing my web
site
at 96dpi on FireFox2. When I view it on FireFox2 at 120dpi, I have no
problem. I have had no problem with either IE6 or IE7 at either 96dpi
or
120dpi.

"Rob Giordano (Crash)" wrote:

Ok let's review:

IE7
@ 96 dpi - layout wanked
@ 120 dpi - layout wanked
FF2
@ 96 dpi - layout wanked
@ 120 dpi - layout wanked

think about this...view any website other than yours (try Google, MS,
CNN...whatever) with your monitor setting at 96 dpi, then change it to
120
dpi...does it wank out the layout?

--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rob Giordano
Microsoft MVP Expression






"CWWJ" <CWWJ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:CF21E805-63E3-4E5C-AC23-155FB7F33D2E@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
John:
I am writing this from the crisis center where I work as a volunteer
on
a
brand new Dell at 96dpi with a widescreen monitor and both FireFox
and
IE7.
Our website works perfectly on IE7. Remember that the site was
created
with
a setting of 120dpi, so if there was going to be a problem I would
see
it
here. The forms are jumbled on FireFox as they have been all along
when
accessing our site on a 96dpi setting, but they are perfect on IE7,
and
so
is
everything else (except the left registration is even more
pronounced
with
a
widescreen). So I am still baffled as to why you are having an IE7
problem
at either resolution. Maybe it has something to do with the fact
that
toilets flush in reverse in Australia?

"John G" wrote:

Well I just looked again (9:00AM Australian eastern time Friday)
and
the evaluation form still has the buttons all in the wrong places
wiith
IE7
and FF2
and the Submit and Revise buttons are still over the line starting
"Would
you like to reveal"
(I did refresh and try on 2 machines at 1024 X 768 and 96dpi)

How did you set your screen resolution to 1024 X FOUR68 or was
that a
typo??

--
John G.
Wots your REAL problem?
"CWWJ" <CWWJ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:A4E6D513-7671-452C-B59B-96A14B70F2A0@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
David and John G.

One final thing. I downloaded IE7 this morning and accessed our
web
site.
Used the forms with no problem whatsoever, so I don't understand
John's
insistence that they "fail" with both FireFox and IE7. However,
I
note
a
peculiarity in IE7 -- when viewing a web site (this one we're on
right
now,
for example), only the top half of the page is visible; the
bottom
half
is
just white space. You have to scroll down to see the rest of the
page.
This
is disconcerting at best. Anybody have the same experience? I
am
at
96dpi
and with a screen resolution of 1024x468. What gives?

"DavidF" wrote:

Hiya,

I agree with your computer guys. I don't like my workaround
anymore
than
telling people that they have to use IE in order to view a page
properly,
which you see on some web sites. I also think the issue of
centering
your
pages or laying your pages out so that they simulate centering
is
not
really
that important, if your forms pages are still jumbled for some
users
in
some
browsers.

This key issue is how the Publisher html coding engine fails to
produce
code
that works equally well whether it is produced or viewed on a
screen
or
monitor set at either 96 dpi or 120 dpi. Until now most people
have
been
able to live with the pages produced at 96 dpi, as most screens
and
monitors
came at that setting, but that is increasingly not the case
these
days.
Also
I have no reason to doubt John G when he says that IE7 also now
.