web browser windowHas this ever happened to you? You’re browsing the web and you see a link to an interesting website or article. Excited to see some new interesting content you click on the link and BAM… it happens… the website re-sizes your browser window without your permission. Annoying isn’t it? Why do webmasters do this?

This trend used to be more popular in the late 90?s and early 2000?s, especially with webmaster-related sites and clipart sites. Back then a lot of those sites had stupid “Click Here to Enter” landing pages with no text and would re-size your browser window.

The bad news is, some haven’t learned, and it still happens today.

I was recently browsing through the topsites on one of my other sites, 4Layouts.com, trying to weed out all the sites which no longer existed or violated my TOS. I came across 3-4 sites which against my will re-sized my browser window without my permission, leading me to have to open it back up to full screen every time. By the last time it happened I was annoyed. Why are they doing this to me? What is the point of this?

These webmasters are probably trying to get us, the visitor to view the site in the resolution they designed for. For webmasters this may be a good idea in theory but it is bad in practice. Imagine browsing a website and you see an interesting link to a website or article. You click on the link and BAM… your browser window has been re-sized without your permission. Now you have to go and re-size it the way you had it before. This is a great way to annoy the visitor. Sure it isn’t much extra work to re-size your browser back to the way it was, but it is still an annoyance, and you should never annoy your visitors who are your source of profits.

If your website cannot be viewed at all common screen resolutions, it is time to redesign your website. A well-designed website will display properly in all browser windows at all sizes.

So webmasters, for the love of God, PLEASE stop re-sizing our windows. We had them a certain way for a reason!


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