[thelist] front end design: liquid design

[Felix Miata]

On 2008/10/30 10:06 (GMT-0300) Sarah Adams composed:

> Felix Miata wrote:

>>> Design wise, the line length thing really kills fluid for me. Slashdot is
>>> unreadable and I don't really want to resize my browser window for a single
>>> site.

>> Yi yi yi yi yi yi yi. LAAAAAAAZZZZZZZY!!! 

> Whether it's "lazy" or not this is pretty typical behaviour. Why should
> the user have to resize their browser to make a site readable?

Should it be your job to counteract laziness? They typically have to do other
things already, such as turning on minimum font size or zooming, just to make
text big enough to read. Why not permit them that ability? No one is
literally forcing them to resize. Short of turning off all styles, they have
no solution for too short lines.

> What if
> they have other sites open in other tabs that don't require the browser
> to be resized?

So what? Making it bigger again takes little more effort than a click on a
back button.

> Regardless of our feelings on the matter (to resize the browser or not),
> we as developers need to be realistic about what our users are actually
> doing.

I don't think what users "are doing" is relevant, as it isn't something devs
can know. What users can do, however, and the wide variability in their
environments, is very relevant, and that's what devs should be realistic about.
-- 
"Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and
slow to become angry."		James 1:19 NIV

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409

Felix Miata  ***  http://fm.no-ip.com/