Screen real estate is precious — every pixel counts. But how many pixels do you have to play with?
There are many differing views on who you should design for: your average user, or your least well-equipped visitor? And should you worry about the slowly increasing cohort of mobile phone users?
If you are already running a website, a quick look through your log files will give you a good picture of the technology your visitors use, and from this you can infer their screen sizes. Statistics from 2007 suggested around 14% were still on 800×600 screens, with the rest at 1024×768 or above.
| Year | Higher | 1024×768 | 800×600 | Unknown |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan 2007 | 26% | 54% | 14% | 6% |
Source: W3Schools Browser Display Statistics
If these were your figures, would you want to alienate 14% of your readership with a large out-of-screen 1000-pixel-wide map?
Once you have decided on screen size, the next challenge is fitting all your information onto the map. Realistically there is always more to fit on than is achievable — separating content onto toggleable layers and having multiple zoom levels is the solution. You can see this approach in action on the Tibet Album map.