Website Design & Mobile-Friendly Design

[wetnoodle]

My site is definetly not optimal on mobile but I got it to be usable by forcing the viewport to device width

Code

<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">

and then scale all width values by percentage. Not the best but it seems to function the same on most devices.

[garystu]

Mobile design is easy. Change a sidebar to a header, remove some negative space, up the font size.

Its ok to have a "best viewed on" disclaimer but you only need a touch of CSS to make a site useable on mobile. Its not hard to do, and its not profound to not do. I think its good to buy a PC. You should buy a PC. but let's face it nobodys going out and buying a PC because some random personal website looks like ass lol. On the other hand it's all low stakes.

BECIDES 16:9 widescreen kind of looks Bad for websites anyway. its an aspect ratio for TV and gaming not web surfing...

.


posted from my cool and epic phone

[Semper]

I personally really love having a mobile responsive site. I think it's entirely possible to be creative while building a site within the confines of responsiveness. It was the limitations of a responsive design that gave me the inspiration to make my site the way it is, so my viewpoint is that creativity is possible whether on rails or in a sandbox.

I fully agree with people stating that a personal website should be what the webmaster wants it to be, including it being unresponsive. But, From my personal experience, I've found responsive sites to be a lot more fun to hang out on than unresponsive ones.

Some of my reasons for making my site responsive are:

• I have a blog, and a newsletter, and if I want people to read those then I need to make it easy, while still maintaining my artistic vision.
• Making my site responsive has made me pay attention to where I put my code, so I have a much easier time going back and editing things, updating my site's look, and even creating templates for new pages.
• I actually really enjoy looking at my website on my phone while not at my computer, because I am Narcissus at the pond, lol. I love my website and I want to always have it available to put my eyeballs on.
• What more, when I'm out and about and chatting with someone about my coding adventures, it's easier for me to pull up my website on my phone browser and show it off to people.

I also find the argument that "people need to detach from their phones" to be a fairly facile one that doesn't fully take into consideration why people are always on that damn phone.

Phones are a lot more versatile, portable, and cheaper than a computer, and the people who usually own only a phone are those with very little money. Homeless people use smartphones as do a lot of young people. If I am for a free and open internet, then I figure that I should make my arguably free to browse website easy to access for people who have little to no money.

For some young queer people their smartphone is one of the few places where they can afford privacy to look up info and art that matches their personal experiences, especially if they are living with homophobic/transphobic/queerphobic parents (whether this be on the scale of mild to outright dangerous). Taking into consideration my website in particular, I do not see it as an information hub for queer topics, nor do I intend for it to be, but but I understand that young queer people who only have a phone to explore their communities with do want to see queer art and queer stories, which can help some through difficult times.

I also believe homeless and low income people have a right to look at art freely, or read articles, or blogs, or newsletters, or whatever else someone could put on their website.

I have seen past threads on this forum where some members have talked about their site loading speeds, and how it's important that we build websites that can load on slow internet connections and old machines, and I think this drive for accessibility can also be applied to mobile users.