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Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

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Re: Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

#351

Post by asddubs »

tshaddox wrote: post #321
asddubs wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO the best solution is to just have natural breakpoints (i.e. when a part of the design of the given page would cease to work, add a breakpoint to change the format of that component, rather than at predefined points) and then for logged in users have an option to request the desktop design, which you can do by simply setting a viewport to 1000px width and leaving everything else unchanged what would be really nice…

That sounds similar to a CSS proposal called container queries, which has been a much-requested feature for many years. Currently the only native way to do responsive design is to make styling changes based on attributes of the viewport (like width). But like you say, it would be nice to have dynamic layouts for every individual component of a website. Container queries do that.

yeah I heard of those, I was blanking on the name, thanks for pointing that out. Another thing I really want would be position:device-fixed; but that one doesn't even seem to really be on the table for the most part.

Re: Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

#353

Post by SulfurHexaFluri »

jessriedel wrote: post #250
g3e0 wrote: post #96

I feel like I must be missing something, because I don't understand this author's point at all. "Lots of websites think “Vertical Screen == Mobile User”!" No, they don't - They think a 720px wide screen is a tablet user, which is probably a fair assumption. I could equally write "Just because I browse zoomed in 500% doesn't mean I'm on a mobile" When you zoom in, things get bigger, so fewer of them will fit on the sc…

Why don't browsers tell the server whether the user has a touch screen? This seems like a perfectly reasonable thing that the website should know before delivering the page, and users who are hyper privacy focused could toggle a setting to not send this info.

Because many laptop users have a touch screen.

Re: Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

#354

Post by SulfurHexaFluri »

ss64 wrote: post #277
awillen wrote: post #151

As a product manager, my immediate response is... not worth the time. You've chosen to have a unique setup, which is fine, but your use case represents some absolutely miniscule fraction of users. On top of that, it's not even that websites are unusable, just that they're not ideal. When you decide to do weird/special/unique stuff, don't expect the world to adapt to you. You can rotate your monitor back or live with…

People with disabilities or visual impairments often have unusual setups that enable them to read. They didn't CHOOSE to be disabled.

Accessibility features are almost always not worth it purely from a profit point of view. They get added because as a society we decided that everyone should go out of their way to accommodate these users because they have no choice and should not be locked out of life.

The author here can simply deal with it or turn their monitor the other way.

Re: Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

#355

Post by SulfurHexaFluri »

SirSavary wrote: post #290
awillen wrote: post #151

As a product manager, my immediate response is... not worth the time. You've chosen to have a unique setup, which is fine, but your use case represents some absolutely miniscule fraction of users. On top of that, it's not even that websites are unusable, just that they're not ideal. When you decide to do weird/special/unique stuff, don't expect the world to adapt to you. You can rotate your monitor back or live with…

Seems to me that proper DPI detection might lead to a better experience across all "unique" monitor setups, not just this one. Is it extra work? Sure. I thought we referred to that as polish.

Is DPI a good measure though? Some cheap phones have rubbish DPIs while expensive monitors have very high dpi.

Not sure if this exists already but the idea method would be to use the physical size in cm of the display.

Re: Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

#356

Post by t-writescode »

kaishiro wrote: post #345
t-writescode wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't even think that. I have one 1920x1080 monitor and one 1440p monitor. On both monitors, I regularly make it so that each screen is used by 2 applications. A lot of websites think 960x980 is mobile. *half* of a 1080p screen. It's bad and a huge assumption on their part that their website should only be seen in full-screen mode, or half of some 4k screen when the most popular resolution is ignored in a produc…

I'll play devil's advocate here and say it's not objectively "bad". Looking at the analytics of our most trafficked sites the "tween" widths (where 960px falls) are such a small fraction of overall traffic that convincing a client to pay for queries targeting that dead zone would essentially be a non-starter. Ideally, would every website deliver aggressively optimized experiences across all viewport widths - sure. Bu…

And, admittedly, 90% view and everything seems to be how it’s supposed to be afterward.

My bigger problem is designers probably not using the website on normal machines, but instead on their 4K or 5k perfect color machines and assuming it works everywhere.

Re: Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

#358

Post by mediumdeviation »

22c wrote: post #335
brundolf wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would add to this that the specific sites in question have fairly unreasonable media-queries: The Guardian breaks to mobile at 980px, and Just Eat at 1024px . On my MacBook Pro with default scaling, these are both more than 50% the width of the monitor; i.e. if I size the window to half-screen, I'm in mobile mode on these sites. For reference, in sites I make I usually set the mobile breakpoint closer to 768px (not…

Am I missing something or do CSS media queries not solve this problem by providing an actual physical measurement? What's wrong with using something like: @media (min-width: 8in) To determine if someone is using a larger screen (or window)? Edit: https://hacks.mozilla.org/2013/09/css-length-explained/ Seems like 8in is just short-hand for 8*96px. Thanks for nothing, web standards.

You absolutely do not want to scale the page to the same physical size on different screens because you also need to take into account distance between screen and your eyes. Text on phones can be smaller physically than text on a desktop monitor because you hold your phone closer. As an even more extreme example, think of browsing the web on a TV screen while sitting on the couch and how small the text would be if it is physically the same as it is on your phone.

Re: Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

#359

Post by funcDropShadow »

pc86 wrote: post #153
sillysaurusx wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesn't address the author's central argument, which is that websites need an effortless way of letting fonts become bigger without affecting the entire layout. I've wanted it too. I don't really care if some text gets cut off on headers and looks weird, I just want to read stuff from the comfort of my bed with my laptop a few feet away.

> I just want to read stuff from the comfort of my bed with my laptop a few feet away. That's not what laptops are for. I think that's a typical snide HN/Stack Overflow-type answer, and I don't mean it rudely, but it does have some bearing on this conversation. What's the intended form factor of a laptop? What are the top 10 intended form factors? I'm not sure "reading from 'a few' [several] feet away, while I'm layi…

> What's the intended form factor of a laptop? What are the top 10 intended form factors?

Isn't the real questions why we allow devices or their makers to decide the "intended use-cases" and accept that many other use-cases are often near impossible. The PC revolution was about a general purpose computers, and laptops should imho still be general purpose computers; not machines for which some overlord in Mountainview or Cupertino checks on every button pressed whether I am allowed to do what I intend to do.

Politics aside, I am the only one who has the impression that with every new release of macOS or Firefox features get removed, that enabled me to personalize and optimize my workflows before?

Re: Just because I have a vertical screen doesn’t mean I’m on a phone

#360

Post by Blikkentrekker »

jefftk wrote: post #48

Sites are not detecting a portrait screen and deciding that they're displaying on a phone. Someone who switches their monitor to portrait, or resizes a window to be taller than it is wide, is still going to get the desktop view. In this case the author is scaling their resolution, and so their browser is presenting itself to sites as 720px wide. Sites see that and show a layout optimized for a screen of that width. T…

The auctor is also complaining about suddenly obtaining touchscreen controls, however.
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