Viewing Walter's Web

Although I make an effort to for my pages to be readable in Lynx, I am a visually-oriented person and my site reflects that. Currently I use some Netscape extensions in order to achieve the desired effects, but as soon as HTML 3.x and style sheets are widely deployed I will of course update my pages to be more compliant.

Browser Requirements

I use tables in many of my pages, so in order to not see gobbledygook your browser must have table support. Here is a test.

Three browsers which currently support tables are Netscape 1.1, AOL 2.7, Mosaic 2.0, and Lynx 2.6.

Video Configuration

My development environment is a Trinitron monitor adjusted to display precisely 72 pixels per linear inch (both horizontally and vertically), and the 216-color dither-free palette. My title graphics never exceed 472 pixels in width, in order to fit the default window size in Netscape and Mosaic browsers. (I feel that making users constantly resize their windows is not a nice thing to do.)

To measure screen geometry and pixel density, I have created a 6-inch square test pattern.

Fonts

I use Netscape Navigator's default font (12-point Times®) when I design my pages, although I also use Netscape's <font size=n> and/or <basefont size=n> tags sometimes to make long blocks of text easier to read. Oh, I'm currently trying out Stone Informal 12pt... characters have a bit more whitespace than Times. :-)

BTW, I use Adobe fonts and ATM. Macintosh users who use Apple's fonts are often dismayed by italic versions of Times® and not-quite-monospace Monaco and Courier. For truly monospaced Courier I recommend using either Adobe's Courier (PostScript) or Microsoft's Courier New (TrueType) font. I also have a 9-point replacement for Monaco with a same-width bold which I use on my computer, though I created it with a DOS cp-437 character set (I designed it for use with AOL some years back, and haven't gotten around to doing alternate charsets for it). If you want to try it anyway, it is available here.

Navigating Walter's Web

Here are some tips for getting around my site.

Table of Contents / Site Map

On each page you will find either a Table of Contents button at the bottom, or an icon third from the right on the 472x36 page banner. Clicking on this will lead you to my Site Map Index, where you can choose from different site maps (text, table, frames, and HotSauce). The table version is a [virtually] hierarchical listing of pages (implemented as an HTML 3.2 table) which includes icons that indicate what type of page a link will bring to you. It is actually a shameless copy of the Macintosh Finder's list view! ;-)

Navigation buttons and menus

Most of my pages have a popup menu for traversing up the hierarchy, somewhat similar to the menu at the top of file open/save dialog boxes. And next to the Table of Contents button is a "URL" graphic image which reflects the location of the page -- sort of a "You are here" thing. (It is also useful if you save one of my pages to your hard drive; a single click will bring you right back to the original.) On pages with a 472x36 page banner, the left side of the banner is linked to the URL. In short, it's pretty hard to get lost here!

Active Inline Graphics

I have some 11-point high graphic links, as follows:

[mailto] = mail form
[ftp_dir] = ftp directory (list)
[ftp_file] = ftp file (download)
[gopher] = gopher

Further Info

See my Colophon.

(wik, October 8, 1996) 37597 visits since 95.12.04