Dont Override User Preferences

Some people are very particular about page widths, fonts, text and background colors, etc.

The default background on many popular web browsers is a ugly grey. Quite a few people far prefer some other color. There are 2 correct ways to fix this.

Partial Solution:

Assume there is one "correct" background color (font, etc.) that most picky people agree on. (People who pick other colors are obviously colorblind.) Then the solution is simple -- TheSqueakyWheelGetsTheGrease?. Set things up the One True Way: set *all* 5 page colors with something like

  <html>
  ...
  <STYLE type="text/css">
BODY { background: black; color: white}
A:link { color: yellow } <!-- unvisited -->
A:visited { color: fuchsia }
A:active { color: fuchsia }
  </STYLE>
  </head>

(setting *only* the background color is a bad idea -- see http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/types.html#h-6.5.1 ). You must set *all* these colors if you set a background image.

This makes picky people who agree with those colors happy, and those colorblind people won't care one way or the other.

Unfortunately, people who try to read your web site have multiple conflicting preferences -- some insist on black text on a yellow background, others loathe that combination and prefer something else.

But the standards allow you to specify page widths, font sizes, background colours and background images, all of which can look radically different on different browsers. Because of eye problems I use a black background and pale text, and I would guess that 60% of sites use pale background images, forcing me to turn them off or not see the text.

This sounds like someone set *only* the background image, violating the above W3C recommendation.

Universal Solution

Allow people to set their own preferences.

Just because you (as web page author) *can* specify page width, font size, background colors, etc. in the web page, doesn't mean you *need* to pick any particular background color, etc.

If you can't stand looking at your own pages when they have the default gray background, set your own browser preferences, rather than set those things in the web page.

Wouldn't you rather read text on your own favorite background and foreground colors ? I still don't understand why some authors believe that every reader has exactly the same favorite colors. Some people *like* lots and lots of tiny little letters filling the screen. Other people *like* using very large fonts. Why not give people what they want ? -- DavidCary

(moved from ViewingOnDifferentPlatformsDoesntWork)

I hate web pages that override my choices of Font, Text Color, Background Color, and Font Size. I've chosen the ones that are most readable for me. If those web-site creators want me to read their pages, they should not override my settings. The most common web browser will not let you force the display according to your preferences, but many do: (iCab [http://www.versiontracker.com/moreinfo.fcgi?id=2061&db=mac], OperaBrowser, MozillaBrowser)

It should be noted, that the optimal choice of colors, fonts, sizes and generally style depends not only on the user viewing the page, but too a large extent also on the content that is being presented. It's not a secret that the world wide web technology was initially optimized for presenting CS articles (just look at the number of HTML tags only useful for this), then it started to be "stretched" to make it useful for publishing other things. Styles are one mechanism that allows this flexibility, arguing against them is like saying that all the books ever printed should be, for example, dictionaries.

Does anyone else see the irony in the markup for this page containing:

  <body text=black bgcolor=white>

;-) -- AndySawyer