The issue of DPI

Alexey Feldgendler alexey at feldgendler.ru
Wed Oct 17 18:53:06 CEST 2007


On Tue, 16 Oct 2007 18:47:38 +0200, Thomas Wood <thomas at openedhand.com>  
wrote:

>> So unless OpenMoko wishes to go against all of desktop UNIX to
>> convince that DPI should be separate from UI size - I don't think the
>> reported DPI should be the actual physical DPI.
>>
>> That said, however, I don't feel terribly strongly about this issue -
>> I would just like it to be an *informed* decision to make the reported
>> DPI equal to the physical DPI, with an awareness of the problems it is
>> likely to cause.

> Not wanting to wade too much into this debate as I am not an expert, but
> I have heard the only reason the DPI on Nokia's internet tablets is
> incorrect is because the Opera web browser was broken in this regard.

The reason why either Opera or the X server have to fake the DPI is that  
many web pages out there are not ready for the situation where one inch is  
a lot of pixels, and look unreadable or broken. Opera has been changed to  
fake the DPI, but that might have not been true at the time Nokia devices  
were released. So because Opera didn't fake the DPI, the X server had to  
do it.

Pure DPI is meaningless altogether for UI design, be it the design of a  
toolbar or a web page. If you want to make a line of text readable, that  
might mean one meter on a billboard or one millimeter on an eye mounted  
display. Assumptions that web page authors make about viewing web pages on  
desktop monitors are not relevant to handheld devices.


-- 
Alexey Feldgendler <alexey at feldgendler.ru>
[ICQ: 115226275] http://feldgendler.livejournal.com



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