I've read articles and Web sites that dictate rules for well-designed sites. In my view, there are no rules, only options. Why? Because I'd forever be breaking the rules. When you see a clumsy-looking page, one or more rules haven't been broken; the creator has made some choices inappropriate for that given site. The person may be unaware of the options available.

There's an age-old maxim I've heard: to know a thing's name is to possess it. Knowing your design options not only means you'll be conscious of their potential, but that you'll have the power to chose whether or not to employ them in your pages.

Here's the menu of options I choose from, culled from reading, trial and experience, and of course, digital serendipity. They're not in any particular ranking; I just pick from them based on a particular project's needs.

Making the site navigable by every browser on the face of the Web. I often disregard this option and choose to build site designs best viewed under robust clients like Netscape and Internet Explorer. Aren't I eliminating all of those folks who use on-line services with proprietary browsers, you ask? Well, yes. But most of the coding I write individually or contribute to team projects is slated for distribution in an academic environment, where the aforementioned Web browsers hold the market share.

Case in point: every year during January the first-year medical students at Thomas Jefferson University take intensive, compressed courses on topics ranging from biostatistics to health policy. Two such courses, Genetics and Informatics, are delivered entirely through the university's primary web-based information system, JEFFLINE. The target audience is focused, and the most likely method of access occurs in the campus computing labs, where Netscape is the standard.

Most educational organizations don't have the staff nor the funding to code multiple versions of the same Web resources. It makes sense then, in terms of economics and efficiency, for a given institution to create Web documents to be viewed under the most popular browser at that institution.

For my personal projects, however, I can't dismiss this option so readily. I have to decideis the layout and design of my resource integral to the content I publish? By "dumbing down" the design restricting the document to flush-left text and images, a default gray background color, and virtually no control over the typography am I serving up the best possible product to the end user? It's a difficult decision. Any Web author/designer can expect to receive flak from users on both sides of the Browser War.