6 ms·

HN is a bad example seeing as the maintainers refuse to put in the small amount of effort it would take to make it work decently on mobile.

joshuapants 11y ago
I think the way conversations thread would be pretty hard to do comfortably on mobile
- pjc50 11y ago
  Reddit manages OK. I wonder what level of petitioning would be required to get the admins to fix HN? Or are all the cool kids using an app which avoids this problem?
  - DanBC 11y ago
    Which version of Reddit? Reddit, Reddit Mobile, or Reddit Mobile Beta?
    - pjc50 11y ago
      https://reddit.com/.compact https://reddit.com/.compact is the one I use.
- prawn 11y ago
  That's no reason not to try. There are always ways to improve.
  - dev-da0 11y ago
    I agree. I think there are two distinct usability issues to address: content size and font size. That is, how much real estate the virtual viewport occupies in proportion to the display AND the size of font relative to the reader's ability to read comfortably. The trick is sensible adjustments to style attributes to keep layout working properly on the vast majority of devices no matter the zoom level or default font size, within reason. As a user example, when I load the HN front-page on an iOS device in portrait mode, I'm lazy and switch to rotate to landscape mode to see more without trimming edges and scrolling around. On most sites, I expect to be able to double-tap on a paragraph column to toggle maximize-fit-to-display-width mode and return regular all-content-on-display-width mode. If some site prevents this, I will not buy their products or use their services, because it's a signal they don't care about usability and will inevitably waste people's time. That's a form of laziness and failure that should not be rewarded. There are usually competitors that want you to switch to their brand (except with govts). Those annoying jQuery Mobile one-sized-fits-all sites deployed by pharmacies, banks, govts and so on.
Cyph0n 11y ago
Regardless, OP should have thought about the site he's posting on.
meeper16 11y ago
At least pinch-zoom is functional.
- cpncrunch 11y ago
  Functional, but not usable (as you have to scroll a bunch of times to read each line).
  - Dylan16807 11y ago
    That depends on your browser.
    - cpncrunch 11y ago
      Yes, I see Chrome has a reasonable default width, whereas the stock android browser is pretty much unusable.
mikeash 11y ago
I think it's a pretty good example. While site designers should take care to make their stuff look good on small screens, the devices with small screens should also allow users to make adjustments for when the designer didn't do this (or they did, but the user has special requirements). Mobile Safari doesn't even have a text size adjustment, for example. This is madness!
lookbothways 11y ago
The sad thing is, they fixed this a while ago with a stylesheet that adjusted the page width and text size to fit your display, but reverted it after a bunch of people whined hard.

joshuapants 11y ago

I think the way conversations thread would be pretty hard to do comfortably on mobile

pjc50 11y ago
Reddit manages OK. I wonder what level of petitioning would be required to get the admins to fix HN? Or are all the cool kids using an app which avoids this problem?
- DanBC 11y ago
  Which version of Reddit? Reddit, Reddit Mobile, or Reddit Mobile Beta?
  - pjc50 11y ago
    https://reddit.com/.compact https://reddit.com/.compact is the one I use.
prawn 11y ago
That's no reason not to try. There are always ways to improve.
- dev-da0 11y ago
  I agree. I think there are two distinct usability issues to address: content size and font size. That is, how much real estate the virtual viewport occupies in proportion to the display AND the size of font relative to the reader's ability to read comfortably. The trick is sensible adjustments to style attributes to keep layout working properly on the vast majority of devices no matter the zoom level or default font size, within reason. As a user example, when I load the HN front-page on an iOS device in portrait mode, I'm lazy and switch to rotate to landscape mode to see more without trimming edges and scrolling around. On most sites, I expect to be able to double-tap on a paragraph column to toggle maximize-fit-to-display-width mode and return regular all-content-on-display-width mode. If some site prevents this, I will not buy their products or use their services, because it's a signal they don't care about usability and will inevitably waste people's time. That's a form of laziness and failure that should not be rewarded. There are usually competitors that want you to switch to their brand (except with govts). Those annoying jQuery Mobile one-sized-fits-all sites deployed by pharmacies, banks, govts and so on.

Cyph0n 11y ago

Regardless, OP should have thought about the site he's posting on.

meeper16 11y ago

At least pinch-zoom is functional.

cpncrunch 11y ago
Functional, but not usable (as you have to scroll a bunch of times to read each line).
- Dylan16807 11y ago
  That depends on your browser.
  - cpncrunch 11y ago
    Yes, I see Chrome has a reasonable default width, whereas the stock android browser is pretty much unusable.

mikeash 11y ago

I think it's a pretty good example. While site designers should take care to make their stuff look good on small screens, the devices with small screens should also allow users to make adjustments for when the designer didn't do this (or they did, but the user has special requirements). Mobile Safari doesn't even have a text size adjustment, for example. This is madness!

lookbothways 11y ago

The sad thing is, they fixed this a while ago with a stylesheet that adjusted the page width and text size to fit your display, but reverted it after a bunch of people whined hard.