Why Pixel Perfect is Impossible: Unpredictable Web Browsers
As we saw in the first instalment of this series, the web has a number of properties which make it significantly different to print. A number of those properties are ultimately due to technical limitations that all computers have to some extent; however, some of them are caused by the web browser that your users are using – these are what we’re going to look at for this part of the series.
What is a Web Browser?
For those of you who don’t already know the answer to this question, the program on your computer which you use to view websites is a web browser. The important point to note is that there is a distinction between the website and the web browser. As you move from one website to another, the content changes, but the web browser doesn’t. There are a number of different web browsers available, the most common of which are: Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari and Opera.
Why Web Browsers are unpredictable
As far as a user is concerned, web browsers aren’t unpredictable. Every site they visit looks and behaves just as they expect – even if they decide to use a different browser. Look closer though, and you can notice small differences – maybe a column is a little wider, or the text slightly larger.
Overall, these differences are unlikely to be noticed by the general public. There are some people who are likely to notice though: the people who actually designed and built the site. If the designer of the site has come from the print world, then they will be used to the “perfect design” they have created being replicated exactly – any deviation is simply unacceptable.
The problem here though is that every web browser builds the page in a slightly different way; in addition, each browser has different capabilities – it simply might not be possible to recreate the design in Internet Explorer 6, for example (IE6 is nearly 10 years old – the web has moved on quite a bit in that time).
What can be done?
Because there are 5 different web browsers in use today (7-8 if you count different versions), each using different technology to power them, it is unreasonable to expect that a design will render exactly the same in all of them. Unless your design allows a little flexibility, the best that can be hoped for is that the differences are kept to the minimum.
We have plenty of experience in providing designs which will look at home in any browser, whilst maintaining the overall look and feel you want for your website. Check out our portfolio in a couple of different browsers, and you'll see what we're capable of!