Do you prefer fixed with of full screen websites?

Murder he Wrote

Murder he Wrote

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Personally, as someone who views websites and designs them i cannot stand full screen sites (Such as Amazon.com, or eBay). I tend to find they have far too much empty space, which would be sorted if it were fixed width.

What do you think?
 
It partly depends on the width of the screen since larger can be likely to get more free space. But for me I don't really mind much.
 
That depends on how much content the site has, but I prefer the fluid ones, with a min and max size..
 
I've only created on full width (fluid width) design and that was for zyetendo, everything else I've ever created was fixed width, I prefer it that way mainly for the reasons you said christian, too much empty space.
 
I guess the other advantage of using a fixed width design is the ability to add a cool background to the <body> tag, whilst adding a secondary background to the content / container DIV.

Since the fixed-background error (FF3) was fixed, i have started incorporating fixed backgrounds into my forum styles and web templates. I think it ads a really nice touch ~cool~
 
Maybe for websites non fixed are better but with forum styles fixed are the way to go.
 
I prefer fluid width sites completely. My screen is a very big one, so fixed width sites seems to have too much empty space outside the content area.
 
Definitely fluid width. Having a widescreen monitor, fixed width sites actually have a lot of "empty space" for me. With a fluid width, at least you know it works for every resolution.
 
Well, that's not entirely true. If it's coded wrong (three columned layout with divs instead of tables for navigation bars), it can look horribly wrong fluid, and sometimes not even work, though that's rare.
 
Zyenet said:
Well, that's not entirely true. If it's coded wrong (three columned layout with divs instead of tables for navigation bars), it can look horribly wrong fluid, and sometimes not even work, though that's rare.
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Lol I was referring to it being coded correctly. Anything coded wrong is going to look terrible.
 
Brain of J. said:
Zyenet said:
Well, that's not entirely true. If it's coded wrong (three columned layout with divs instead of tables for navigation bars), it can look horribly wrong fluid, and sometimes not even work, though that's rare.
Click to expand...
Lol I was referring to it being coded correctly. Anything coded wrong is going to look terrible.
Click to expand...

What draws you to that colnclusion?

I've probably coded a lot of my phpBB3 styles wrong in one way or another, but i've only ever had compliments about them ~wink~
 
It has really never mattered to me, as long as navigation around the site is easy, and the content of the site is useful.
 
Fluid width is the only way to go IMO. Fixed width websites are usually built so they look good on the webmasters computer but that means they may not work on others. A div with an 80% width takes the same amount of space (80%) on any browser, a fixed width of 800px may take up ALL the screen (if your res is 800x600) or no space is you have a wide screen (2280 x whatever).
 
I've actually started using both methods on my websites now. A finished a website for someone yesterday, where the header was full screen and shrunk as the page shrunk. The center column below it was then set to 800px fixed, so in any screen resolution the site will display properly without the guest having to scroll over or anything ~razz~
 
I prefer Fixed Width, as somescreen don't display properly if you have a fluid width and it prevents the bottom scroll -😉-
 
Sorry for the major bump, but I'd rather not create a new topic for this.

I prefer fixed width over fluid. They just appeal to me a lot more. You know exactly how it will look on other monitors, as the text and content won't be spread out across a screen with a large resolution. What the designer sees is what the user sees.Though I really dislike when the width is too thin, to the point where the whole site sits in the middle of my browser.

There needs to be a nice balance, somewhere between 760-960 pixels wide. The only problem with these, is that if you have users with small monitors, they're pretty much screwed and will have to scroll vertically (which will ruin the experience for a user and they will most likely leave). Then again, how many people still have monitors that small? Even large corporations such as Apple and Microsoft have started (in '08) developing for users with 1024 resolution, and dropped anything smaller.

There is also research indicating that long lines of text are more difficult to read:
The ideal line length for text layout is based on the physiology of the human eye... At normal reading distance the arc of the visual field is only a few inches - about the width of a well-designed column of text, or about 12 words per line. Research shows that reading slows and retention rates fall as line length begins to exceed the ideal width, because the reader then needs to use the muscles of the eye and neck to track from the end of one line to the beginning of the next line. If the eye must traverse great distances on the page, the reader is easily lost and must hunt for the beginning of the next line. Quantitative studies show that moderate line lengths significantly increase the legibility of text.

Web Style Guide - Basic Design Principles for Creating Website
Patrick J. Lynch and Sarah Horton
2nd edition, page 97.
Click to expand...

The third alternative would be to use Elastic, but it takes a lot more work and in the end may not be worth the hassle.

I'll stick with designing for users at 1024 resolution and higher, making fixed-width sites.
 
I use both

set a fluid width, e.g 80%

but add min-width:800px so it looks good on smaller screens

it won't work on ie6 but that won't matter soon
 
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