Shulou(Shulou.com)06/01 Report--

In this issue, the editor will bring you an analysis of the problems related to the use of English design methods to design Chinese web pages. The article is rich in content and analyzed and described from a professional point of view. I hope you can get something after reading this article.

Regardless of the particularity of Chinese fonts, simply copying the design method of English web pages will often reduce the readability of Chinese web pages (called readability in English). Here are three readability problems caused by the use of English design methods to design Chinese web pages.

Regardless of the particularity of Chinese fonts, simply copying the design method of English web pages will often reduce the readability of Chinese web pages (called readability in English). Here are three readability problems caused by the use of English design methods to design Chinese web pages.

one. A relatively large font size

In English pages, fixed font size is called "frozen font sizes". Using fixed font size is an obvious mistake, which has been studied by many interaction design experts. The use of relative font size is so correct that the text of Chinese web pages is also designed as relative font size. This practice is mainly concentrated in the design of the Chinese version of the English website. However, for Chinese, the relative font size is not as good as expected.

Many font sizes cannot be clearly displayed in Chinese. For example, 10px's Arial font shows clear English, but 10px's Song Chinese becomes a black pimple; for example, 20px's English is big and clear, but 20px's Chinese will show obvious aliasing and uneven stroke thickness. I was once in "words, how old can you be?" Chinese font sizes are discussed in this article. 12px, 14px, 16px (or 18px) are ideal for displaying Chinese characters. In fact, the effect of the 12px-16px-sized Song style is good.

Relative font size allows text to be displayed in more than one actual font size (font size in pixels), adjust browser settings, and the text size can be scaled. Let's take a look at what Chinese looks like when using relative font sizes:

The relative font size is divided into-7,-6,-5,-4,-3,-2,-1, standard size, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, a total of 15. Among them, the font size below "- 2" is as small as "- 2" and the font size above "4" is as big as "4". In fact, there are only-2,-1, standard size, 1, 2, 3, 4, these seven relative font sizes. Let's test the display effect of each relative font size one by one.

In IE browsers, for example, if the text on a page is set to a relative font size, it can be scaled in five different sizes: "minimum, small, medium, large, and maximum." The following table shows the actual font sizes (in pixels) displayed by different relative font sizes in different settings in IE browsers.

As you can see from the table, no relative font size can always fall within the 12px-16px range, that is, if the IE browser's "text size" option is gradually adjusted from "minimum" to "maximum", then, no matter what the relative font size is set to, it will not always be able to maintain the ideal display. You can also see from the table that the font size displayed sometimes falls into the 12px-16px range when the text is set to "- 2,-1, standard size, 1, 2" in the browser's "text size" process. Multiple font sizes of different sizes are often needed in a page to distinguish different content. Which relative font sizes should be chosen? There are not many choices for Chinese designers.

The use of relative font size design gives autonomy to users, which is obviously good, but the use of relative font size in Chinese web pages is not as effective as that in English web pages. In other words, in fact, Chinese users do not have as much autonomy as English users. When choosing "text size" in their browsers, Chinese users should not only consider which size is suitable for them to read, but also pay attention to the display effect of the selected text size.

The Chinese version of some English websites is designed according to the relative font size of the original English version, which will have a bad effect: no matter how much users adjust the "text size" option of the browser, there is no way to make all the text on the page clearly displayed (that is, in the 12px-16px range).

two. Italic character

Italics is a common way of expression in English. For English users, the frequency of "italics" and "bold" is almost the same. From the design of Microsoft's office series software, we can see that the "bold" function "B" button and "italics" function "I" button are placed in an easy-to-click position. However, there has been no concept of italics in Chinese since ancient times. Perhaps the modern revolutionaries' handwriting and cursive script impressed us so deeply that we easily accepted the italic way of expression.

For printed manuscripts, italic Chinese is not a big problem, because printing is displayed at a higher resolution. On the monitor, however, the display is 72 pixels per inch. This difference is experienced by almost everyone who has used word software. It is very difficult to read the italics in the document on the monitor, and it is much better to print it out.

The browsing of web pages is dominated by monitors, so italic Chinese is a very bad way of expression. However, this bad way was picked up without thinking in the process of copying the English website.

The blog's BSP is in the vanguard of this practice, and almost all Chinese blogs have "italic" buttons in the toolbars for writing new articles. Adding a feature will make it more difficult for the user to learn the interface; adding a useless feature will reduce the user's efficiency; adding a bad feature will mislead the user into editing a bad article. "italics" is a terrible feature.

In English blogs, trackback addresses are often in italics, which is a conventional expression, so this way of expression is also copied in Chinese blogs. The poor performance is matched with the poor function. At present, the traceback function is not available in the services provided by most Chinese blogs. Developers may think of it this way: anyway, users will not be able to see what is written on the bottom line of the article. Naturally, they will not need to use this function.

We can taste western food, but there is no need to pray before dinner as Westerners do. The goal of learning is to emerge from the blue, not to imitate.

three. Too small font size

Too small text often appears on the Chinese version of English websites. As mentioned earlier, the English font can be clearly displayed in the size of the 10px. When designing the Chinese version, we only mechanically copy the English version of the design, translate the text into Chinese, and use the 10px style.

In short, the coding problem in the construction of English websites is a problem that many domestic websites have not dealt with well. There will be no garbled codes when browsing at home, but there will be garbled codes abroad. We generally use UTF8 coding to design English websites and GB2312 to use Chinese.

The above is the analysis of the problem of using English design methods to design Chinese web pages shared by the editor. If you happen to have similar doubts, you might as well refer to the above analysis to understand. If you want to know more about it, you are welcome to follow the industry information channel.

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