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RE: pixels to ems - was RE: Relative vs. absolute units

for

From: John Foliot - bytown internet
Date: Jan 7, 2003 3:45PM

...based on the width of the widest letter in the english alphabet, the "M"
(thus the name - although I always thought that "W" was wider...). Netscape
6/Mozilla 1 actually install with a default font size of 16 pixels, IE's
"default install" (at least on a PC, can't say for Macs) is about the same,
I beleive it's 11 pts +/-

Thus the example page on my site is never guaranteed; as a matter of fact I
state "under normal circumstances"
(http://www.bytowninternet.com/examples/relative.html). That said, icons
such as the PDF icon or text "buttons" could still stand to benefit by
scaling, especially a small icon like the acrobat icon, which is about 16px
square.

However, as always, your mileage may vary and I by no means advocate using
"ems" to size *all* images on your page(s).

JF

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