November 6th, 2007
Web Reset
All web browsers display websites differently. Different browsers have different default settings for things like margins, paddings, h1, h2, p, etc. This causes websites to look differently on different browsers. As a web designer and mac user, I tend to rely on Firefox or Safari to test out and display the websites I'm creating. The fact that I usually forget is that most of the world is using Internet Explorer.
To combat this issue, many coders use a reset. A reset is coding that will set all the factory defaults to 0. It tells the browser to use the settings you have set in your style sheet to display the page. This coding goes at the beginning of your CSS style sheet. One of the better resets was created by Eric Meyer. Try this to make your site work consistently!
Image Replacement
This is very cool and yet simple concept. Image replacement is one of those techniques that can turn a very simple page into a graphically appealing page. In simple form, image replacement is the technique of taking a boring item like an h1 and replacing it with a beautiful text image that you may have created in photoshop. In the past many people have tended to stay away from this because of accessibility. If a web user has disabled images in their browser, then the beautiful heading you've created won't be displayed. The same thing would happen with small-screen devices. Newer image replacement methods have been created to solve these problems.
There are many image replacement methods. The most popular is the Fahrner Image Replacement (FIR) technique. This article gives a great explanation of this and other techniques along with the advantages and disadvantages of image replacement.
As with anything good, you must take the bad. There are disadvantages to image replacement. In this case, accessibility again! The FIR technique has been tested and has failed in several popular screen readers. Joe Clark has posted a well written article about this on A List Apart.
When developing a website, its important to make it accessible to everyone. Using image replacement may spice things up but its always good to use it with discretion. It may be in your best interest to research and learn about newer image replacement techniques that are more user-accessible.