Design for (and monitor) your users

Internet Web design is tricky because you do not have control over the user's connection speed, browser, or display characteristics. (You may know these characteristics if you are developing a site on an intranet, but even then people may reconfigure their desktops, bring in laptops, etc.).

Several organizations survey the Internet, and report the characteristics of the browsers and displays they find. One is W3schools.com:

There are also services that will monitor visitors to your own site. If a Web site is of strategic importance to your organization, you will want to monitor it carefully, keeping track of the time users spend on the site, the frequency with which they view each page or section of the site, etc.

Here are several developers discussing the browswers they support as of late 2008.

The characterisitcs of visitors to my Web site at http://bpastudio.csudh.edu/fac/lpress/ during August 2008 are shown here.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed on unofficial pages of California State University, Dominguez Hills faculty, staff or students are strictly those of the page authors. The content of these pages has not been reviewed or approved by California State University, Dominguez Hills.