GEORGETOWN EAGLES

This section gives an overview of the page layout.

Because the layout depends somewhat on how well a browser honours the browser standards, better browsers render pages more faithfully. The following information is therefore prescriptive, not descriptive.

The page width depends on the width of the browser window: the preferred width is 55 em units; but if this would be wider than the browser window, the width is reduced to fit within the window. The user should never have to scroll horizontally unless they browse with a device having a tiny screen, such as a web-enabled cellphone.

Because an em unit is the height of a character in the user’s preferred font size, the preferred page width is wider if the user’s preferred font size is larger, and narrower if their font size is smaller. The result is that about the same number of characters appear on each line, no matter what the font size is, so long as the browser window is wide enough for the preferred page width.

The colour theme is ruby, ebony, and gray. Buttons and menus are ebony and gray.

The font size is larger if the user prefers larger fonts, and smaller if the user prefers smaller fonts. The size of most body text is one step smaller than the user’s preferred size, in keeping with tradition: in special cases, such as footnotes, the size is two steps smaller, for example, this text. Headers are sized proportionately.

The font used depends on which fonts are installed. The site names a list of fonts, and the browser uses the first font in the list which is installed. The list of fonts is:

• For normal text : Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, Univers, Nimbus Sans L, Tahoma, and the generic sans-serif font.
• For quotes : Trebuchet MS, Comic Sans MS, Bradley Hand ITC, Monotype Corsiva, Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, Univers, Nimbus Sans L, Tahoma, and the generic sans-serif font.

The size of the page depends on how the user has configured the File Print function. Browsers typically let the user specify portrait or landscape mode, the paper size, and margin sizes.

The font size for most body text is 11 points, with any smaller text being 9 points. Headers are sized proportionately.

Things devoid of content are not printed: e.g., the masthead, menus, and decorative graphics. Moreover, content is printed in black and white (or shades of gray) whenever possible. This reduces print costs.

Documents — e.g. PDF and Word documents — are printed normally.

About 95% of people have browsers with the JavaScript programming language enabled.

Internet Explorer 5 and 6 must have JavaScript enabled for the drop-down menus to work, because the menus require a standard feature which these browsers don’t support, and JavaScript code is needed to overcome this deficiency. If JavaScript is not enabled, however, users can still navigate from page to page, since clicking any visible menu item goes to a page which lists the same choices as would appear in the drop-down menu: the result is that going from page to page would simply not be quite as smooth, and an extra mouse click would be needed.

All browsers must also have JavaScript enabled for pages which have information extracted from schedules, which includes such pages as a team’s News, Games, Calendar, and Tournament pages.

All browsers must likewise have JavaScript enabled for a team’s photo gallery.

If JavaScript is not enabled, messages will appear advising the user to enable it. Information is available on how to enable JavaScript.

This section discusses browser compatibility issues.

Different browsers will inevitably display pages somewhat differently, with newer browsers displaying pages better than older, more primitive browsers. For example, today’s versions of advanced browsers — like Firefox, Konqueror, Opera, and Safari — will display dropdown menus which are partly transparent: poorer browsers will not.

This site does not support extinct browsers: they lack critical features and have such serious security defects that people should not be using them; for more about this, read Why Update? This site does work with older browsers which are still commonly used, but such browsers often have security defects and other bugs: users should use the newest stable version of their browsers, even if this site works perfectly well with an older browser.

Following is an overview of known issues: