Web Sites and Browsers: Face Up to the Scary Truth – See Your Web Site as Other People Do

Have you ever passed a mirror and found a strangerthe older web browsers.
reflected back at you? Most of us have a perceptionLook at your site on different computers including
of how we look, but it's not always realistic. The samePCs, Macs and laptops. All computers will display your
goes for our web sites. Unless we do our homework,site differently. Different video cards, different screen
what we think is the image we are portraying to thetechnology and different monitor settings are factors
outside world is not what others are seeing.Webthat will affect how your site displays. Web sites
pages can look very different depending on thereflect your company's professional image. If your site
configuration of the visitor's computer. Users utilize ashows improperly or not at all, your company's
broad range of screen resolutions, operating systems,reputation can be tainted. If your site has browser
monitor settings and browsers.Here are some reasonsdisplay problems, visitors and potential customers will
for the differences from computer toleave your site and not look back.Any good web
computer:Everyone uses different screen resolutions.designer will test your site on different browsers, but
Approximately 20% of people use an 800 by 600 pixelyou can also do your part. Whenever you can, look at
screen resolution, but more and more people areyour site on other people's computers. You may be
buying large monitors and are viewing pages onsurprised at what you see!What is a web browser?
resolutions of 1024 by 768 or more. Pages will lookYour Web browser is a translation device. It takes a
totally different on different resolutions, so you mustdocument written in the HTML (the language used to
make sure that your web site designer makes yourwrite web pages) and translates it into a web page.
site work on all resolutions, with NO horizontal scrolling.Differences between browsers are caused by the
Look at your site on different browsers. (See what isdifferent ways they translate the html code. The
a web browser?) The majority of people use Internettranslation is a little like giving two translators a
Explorer to view web pages, but Mozilla and Operasentence written in Spanish and asking them to
are gaining ground. The trouble with web browserstranslate it into English. They will very likely use
comes when they have trouble translating the codedifferent words to translate the Spanish, even though
behind your web site. Older versions of web browsersthey will both get the meaning across.
have particular trouble translating code properly. SomeThe most popular web browsers are Internet
people do not update their web browsers when newExplorer (IE), Netscape and Opera.Colleen Happ
versions come out, so getting your pages to work indesigns effective and affordable websites. View her
older web browsers is important. If there is an error inportfolio at offers free one hour consultations to show
your code, there is a much greater change of it nothow an effective website can benefit your business.
displaying correctly, or it may not even display at all inShe can be reached at 403-807-8225.