Editor: What should Web site owners consider when designing their sites to look good on televisions?
Claerbout: The most important thing to remember is that televisions are very different display devices than computer monitors; resolution is considerably lower (making text embedded in images difficult to read), and highly saturated colors can distort on a TV screen (making those deep red backgrounds painful to look at!).
Editor: How fast does the average WebTV user connect to the Net?
Claerbout: The WebTV Classic has a 33.6 modem, the WebTV Plus has a 56.6 modem.
Editor: Which browser does WebTV use?
Claerbout: WebTV products use a proprietary browser that is compatible with content developed for Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer.
Editor: What fonts does WebTV support? What typeface does text appear in?
Claerbout: The default font of the WebTV browser is a large Helvetica; monospaced fonts are represented in Monaco. No additional fonts are supported at this time.
Editor: How does WebTV display content on a television? (i.e. resizing the screen, screen dimensions, etc..,)
Claerbout: Text is increased in size and pages are reformatted to layout in a 544 pixel-wide space; WebTV users never see those dreaded horizontal scroll bars.
Editor: Does WebTV have a size limit for Web pages overall or for text, graphics, animation, audio, or video?
Claerbout: It depends on what is on the page and how much information is already in the WebTV box's cache. In general, Web pages should be smaller than 200K. Audio and video limits vary upwards from there, going as high as around 500K on the WebTV Plus.
Editor: What are common problems sites have when viewed by WebTV viewers?
Claerbout: Overly complex layouts and text embedded in images present the biggest problems for WebTV users. Since the resolution of a TV screen is significantly less than that of most computer monitors, not as much information can be clearly presented on the screen. Also, fine detail in graphics is lost. If Web sites rely on text embedded in those graphics for navigation, WebTV users may have a problem.
Editor: What should Web site owners do to fix such problems?
Claerbout: To avoid most problems, simply follow the rules of good Web design:
* Avoid "bleeding-edge" technologies, or pages that take a long time to download.
* Don't "cram" your pages with content. Design with plenty of whitespace. This makes them more readable to computer users, and resizable for WebTV.
* Avoid garish colors and backgrounds.
Editor: What is the most important thing Web site owners should do to improve their site for WebTV?
Claerbout: Testing on the WebTV Viewer will show Web designers how their site lays out on a television screen, but the Viewer cannot emulate the color or resolution differences between the two mediums. While our developer site has articles on how to use text, and are working on tools for "TV-Friendly" color, there is no substitute for dropping by a local retail store to see how your site looks on WebTV. In general, if a site's usability on a PC is "marginal", there's a good chance it won't work well on a WebTV either. That being said, the vast majority of Web sites out there display just fine on a WebTV, and by following the rules of common sense, your site will be one of them.
About the Expert:
Jos Claerbout is the Manager of WebTV Networks developer support.
TIPS & TRICKS________________________________________________
__________________________________BACKGROUND COLORS ON WEBTV
Most sites have white backgrounds with dark colored text. While this appears just fine on a monitor, white and red backgrounds can cause severe screen distortion to WebTV viewers.
To appear optimally on WebTV consider using a dark colored background with light colored text. If you absolutely have to use that white background and you know a good portion of your visitors are using WebTV to access your site try using a 90% white such as linen or whitesmoke. Keep in mind that optimizing your site for WebTV may not translate into a good site for the rest of your viewers, so be sure you know who your site should be catering to.
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Web Site Journal, Copyright 1999 by Netscape. May be reproduced for noncommercial purposes as long as attribution is given.
There are about one million persons using TV sets instead of monitors (Spring, 2000) to surf the web. TV sets, as display devices, are quite different than monitors and present unusual challenges. Mr. Jos Claerbout, Manager of WebTV Networks Developer Support, was interviewed by Web Site Journal to see how developers can include WebTV users in their sites. Note: WebTV is now known as