Developing with Web Standards

Chapter Fourteen: Targeting Media with CSS

For many years, developers could safely assume that the platforms their readers were using would be similar to one another: they would have a certain screen size (640px × 480px, 800px × 600px, and so on), screen resolution, color depth, and so on. So developers built sites with a core set of platform characteristics in mind. We assumed everyone had color devices—when was the last time someone used a monochrome device to surf the web... ah yes, the Kindle—rather large minimum screen dimensions (1024px × 768px or higher), a relatively low resolution (72 or 96dpi), and so on. Essentially we assumed users would view our sites using something like a desktop computer or laptop.

But something has happened ...