Text too big for containers!

[qqq]

Hi - I have one user who, when they view my site, it looks awful.
Specifically, it seems that text characters are larger on his screen than on
others - this causes the text to 'grow' beyond its container, which then
elongates that container (vertically) so that it then overlaps with elements
that are lower down on the page (which are positioned absolute).

Here's a simple example:

<span id="Label1"
style="background-color:Transparent;font-family:Arial;font-size:36pt;font-weight:bold;height:64px;width:505px;Z-INDEX:
104; LEFT: 136px; POSITION: absolute; TOP: 16px">Tennis Mixers @ MIT</span>

This works fine on most machines (shows on one line as intended), but on the
problem machine it wraps to 2 lines! FWIW the problem machine is running:
IE Version 6.0.2800.1106
OS Version NT 4.0 service pack 2

Can someone please explain what's going on here? I presume it's to do with
the conversion between 'pts' and 'px' but don't understand what.

Thanks much, Paul.

 

[Thomas A. Rowe]

Sound like the user has changed the default text size in their browser.

--
==============================================
Thomas A. Rowe (Microsoft MVP - FrontPage)
WEBMASTER Resources(tm)

FrontPage Resources, WebCircle, MS KB Quick Links, etc.
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[qqq]

Thanks - I see in IE how to change fonts (Options/General/Fonts), but not
how to change font SIZE. How would this be (un) done in IE 6?

-Also the problem affects large fonts (36 pt) and small (12 pt) - would
this still be an issue?

Paul.

 

[Thomas A. Rowe]

In IE, View Menu | Text Size

The default is medium, any other setting, the user had to change it.

Personally, I would never use 36 point text. If you don't want it to wrap, etc. make 36 Pt text in a
graphic in a graphic application, save as a GIF file, then import back into your web.

--
==============================================
Thomas A. Rowe (Microsoft MVP - FrontPage)
WEBMASTER Resources(tm)

FrontPage Resources, WebCircle, MS KB Quick Links, etc.
==============================================

 

[Andrew Murray]

36 pt font size is pretty big anyway, when usually you'd be using 10pt or 12pt.

 

[qqq]

Well I checked with the user and the View|Text Size setting is already at
'medium' and the html sample below (when run on its own, as a simple 2-line
html file on the local computer) still wraps to 2 lines!

As I mentioned before, when he views my full site, he also has problems with
even 'regular -sized' fonts. Any more ideas?
(He has a 15" screen set at 1024 * 768)

Paul.

 

[Craig Schiller]

Paul -

In Internet Explorer, it is possible to change the text size "on-the-fly" by pressing the control key
while rotating the scroll button. This changed setting won't show up in the View | Text Size dialog. And
it's very easy to do accidentally. I've done it myself. I think there's a good chance your user has done
this without knowing it.

HTH,
Craig