RE: Nielsen's Rating

[Arlen -dot- P -dot- Walker -at- jci -dot- com]

>The main question here is how much of the audience are you prepared to cut
>off. Sure, the majority of users these days are at 96dpi (or 100 for the
>dumbing down), but what about the whopping great 40% of users who arent?

Interesting figure, that 40%. I suspect it's based entirely in fantasy, as
I've yet to have a confirmed sighting of even a single system with less
than 90dpi (which was the minimum number under discussion, not 96). Not in
my company, not among friends and acquaintances, not at my daughters'
schools, not anywhere. (That's a sample size of a few thousand machines,
though non-randomly selected.)

But even *if* it were true (which I don't for even one second believe) it's
not relevant to the discussion. You want to design for both? Use a font
that works in both environments. To say that it's possible to use a font in
a PDF that doesn't look good on screen is to say there are lazy or
incompetent designers out there. To say that there isn't such a font isn't
supportable either; there are many "jack of all trades" fonts. If you're
not willing to compromise or make such design trade-offs, then get out of
the industry (or better yet, stay in the industry, as you'll make more jobs
for the rest of us who are willing to collect checks while fixing the
problems that such prima-donnas cause). Again, blaming PDF for a designer's
laziness or incompetence is just stupid. I looked for a kinder word for it,
really I did. But that's what it is.

BTW, the font issue brings yet another set of trade-offs. If the font is so
important to you, with PDF, you can embed the font, so you know the user
has it. With HTML the font had better *not* be important to you, because
you're going to take pot-luck. (This in itself renders the font-based
criticism of PDF absurd: we're going to criticize PDF because we can choose
an illegible font, if we're demented enough, while HTML gets a free pass
because we can't choose any font at all. This is supposed to make sense?)
Is either approach better? As far as I'm concerned, they're a wash. HTML
takes more work on the designer's part to accomodate the user's flexibility
(however, most corporate designers simply remove a lot of the user's
flexibility by locking the design down in fixed size tables or blocks,
which takes less effort than accomodating it, and ends up with a "poor
man's PDF" which has few of the advantages of either HTML or PDF).

My position in all of this seems to have been misunderstood. I'm standing
up against both the "PDF is bad" *and* the "HTML is bad" positions. They're
*both* good choices, just like newsprint, high-rag bond, and slick coated
stock are all good paper choices. You pick your poison and work within the
limitations of your medium. (Plus ca change, Plus ca meme chose -- sorry,
no accents -- is just as true here as elsewhere. The web and electronic
delivery systems in general are like Gutenberg's type. They are at once
something completely different, enabling a revolution in publishing, and
something which is not really different at all, requiring the same sort of
balancing of advantages and disadvantages by publishers.)

Why is it that we seem to have trouble with the concept that there isn't
One True Way of electronic publishing? Is it that we've been drilled so
long with the absurd concept that there is only one acceptable computer
operating system, one acceptable layout package, one acceptable
illustration package, that we've totally forgotten the value of diversity?
I've used woodworking analogies here before, because it's one of my
hobbies. The screwdriver/saw/hammer that best fits my hand will not
necessarily fit your hand well; our hands are different. No one in the
woodworking industry seriously questions that idea. The way the tool fits
you is as important as the way the tool fits the job. The finest circular
saw in the world is rendered useless if you can't wrap your hand around it
comfortably enough to control it; it doesn't matter how many other people
can, the saw is just not a good choice for you.

But when it comes to computers we seem to tie so much of ourselves up in
out tool choices that we just cannot abide anyone questioning them. Maxwell
Taylor's old school of scientific management stressed the fact that there
was only one best way of doing any particular job, and that the purpose of
management was to discover that way and make sure all the workers followed
it. That idea has been completely discredited these days; while it might be
accurate, in a technical sense, it was incredibly debilitating to the
workers, who needed a chance to use their own brains, to bring their own
work styles, to the task of production. But when it comes to computers we
still chant the One Way mantra.

I can turn out competent, even excellent, work in a dozen different file
formats using a gross of different tools. For those of you centering on
"only HTML", "only PDF", "only Frame" or "only <insert item here>" I have
one question which has always puzzled me deeply: What's *your* problem that
*you* can't?

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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