[matttherunner]

I'm really struggling with viewing web pages on the PRE and wonder if anyone has found a solution. It's great that I can zoom in and out, but there are times that I want to read a whole article and it is just too painful. If I zoom in to make the text bigger then I end up having to use horizontal scrolling - a HUGE pain!

Am I the only one with this problem? It seems my 755p with the Blazer browser did a good job of rendering a web page so the text was readable without requiring horizontal scrolling. A good example of this problem is with usa today's mobile screen. Looks great on a 755p and Centro, but too hard to read on the PRE. I know my eyesight isn't what it used to be, but it isn't THAT bad...yet.

Is there a trick/tip that I haven't found yet?

[StoneRyno]

I don't have this issue. I read web pages in landscape view almost all the time.

[jbg7474]

I agree, the fonts can be quite small sometimes--they're not really meant to be read when looking at a full page. Usually when I double-tap on a column of text the fonts are small but legible in portrait and just about right in landscape.

It would be nice if the browser had a mobile mode like Blazer or Opera mini that reflowed the text in such a way that it was all legible, but I'm feeling pretty good about just double-tapping on a column of text.

[mike5]

I have the same issue. It happens on some sites/apps & not on others. As you said, when I expand it, I have to scroll horizontally & it is very hard to get just right. I don't know how it works on the iPhone, but on my MacBook, when I expand the text, it still formats to fit the screen so I don't have to go left/right. This is a huge criticism--one of the few--IMO.

An example, the US Open is being played now. From the Open's website, there is an App for the iPhone. BUT, there is also a link for all mobile phones saying to use m.usopen.com When I plug this in the browser, the entire site comes up & it is very hard to use or even look at the leader board. Someone else please try this mobile site & let me know what you think or if there is a solution.

Cheers

[jimcrane]

I am also having trouble. Many web sites do not work for me in landscape view.

[zyxwv88]

Well, the problem is that you are being too picky. Honestly. Your blazer was basically rendering it improperly to make it more readable, but it wasn't following more strict HTML. The Pre's browser tries to render it the way it really should be rendered, but yes, that will require you to zoom in and often use landscape mode.

I prefer it that way. I want it rendered properly. Yes, they could make it more readable, but that would screw up the formatting on a lot of other websites and it would make them look off.

[mdmogren]

Well, the problem is that you are being too picky. Honestly. Your blazer was basically rendering it improperly to make it more readable, but it wasn't following more strict HTML. The Pre's browser tries to render it the way it really should be rendered, but yes, that will require you to zoom in and often use landscape mode.

I prefer it that way. I want it rendered properly. Yes, they could make it more readable, but that would screw up the formatting on a lot of other websites and it would make them look off.

There is a middle ground here, they can do like opera mobile and give you options and/or resize the column when you double tap it to make it more narrow.

[dbett]

Well, the problem is that you are being too picky. Honestly. Your blazer was basically rendering it improperly to make it more readable, but it wasn't following more strict HTML. The Pre's browser tries to render it the way it really should be rendered, but yes, that will require you to zoom in and often use landscape mode.

I prefer it that way. I want it rendered properly. Yes, they could make it more readable, but that would screw up the formatting on a lot of other websites and it would make them look off.

IMO, it "should" be displayed large enough to be legible, without horizontal scrolling. Standards may be fine for displaying pages on a computer screen when the pages were designed for such a display...kinda pointless when it make the page unusable.

[un_designer]

This issue has to do with 2 things actually:

1) what the pre's and the iphone's browser both do is to zoom intelligently to fit contents of a column. but column width is beyond the browser's control. the ideal column width is about 13-15 words per line. sites where the column width is too wide will result in tiny text when zoomed in to fit width.

2) the second issue is the actual screen size of the pre, which is about .5 inches less wide compared to the iphone's. so, the same column width fitting will result in text that's smaller on the pre because the phone's screen is physically smaller.

[rhauer]

I agree. This is a huge issue. I have decent eye sight but the text is too small. It makes reading impossible when you have to scroll horizontally. I may have to return the phone. What I dont understand is how come everybody doestn have this issue.

[StoneRyno]

Font size in browser from the perspective of my user experience between webos and blackberry is no different text size stays the same unless you pay the price of having to scroll read content to make it bigger. Think about it. If you have a tiny monitor on your home PC say 15" and you can't read the text on a webpage if you resolution is set to 1280x1024 or 1080x 768 so you set the resolution to 800x600 so the text is bigger you will probably end up with the same issue having to scroll to read.

I'm not sure the solution is cut and dry. Most if not nearly all users want pages to appear identical to how they appear on a pc. The trade off is scrolling to see the parts of the page that extend beyond the screen. But this is why 3rd party browsers come into play on most platforms. There are always different kinds of people who are looking for something particular that may not be something most want to have. For instance firefox has their zoom text only option which increases the font size without increasing the elements that contain the text. So if this were featured in a smartphone browser you could double tap to zoom to the text section and then use the zoom font feature to make the font size bigger while retaining the boundaries on the page. The big questions are --- what it would take to implement in webkit and is webkit technically a 3rd party browser or do each of the platform developers build their own version of it?

[StoneRyno]

In searching for other stuff I discovered something that may be of interest in this topic of web page font size in browser. In the /etc/palm/ directory there are two files browser.conf and browser-app.conf (configs of some sort). In them are two things of interest that may provide results for what is being requested. First there is this line:

FontScaleFactor=1

Perhaps increasing the number will do the trick. And there is also a section labeled [Fonts] which also contains things like specified font sizes like min and max size etc which is worth investigating and seeing how changing the different things effects the looks in the web pages.