Chrizum said:
ioi said:
Chrizum said:
I understand the idea behind the forum's design and the forum buddy. The only thing that I think should be done is make the site's width dependant on the user's resolution, like 90% of the websites out there do. With a fixed width like this, many users fall out of the ideal layout. With a variable, resolution dependant width, all users will see the full 100% of the website's layout.
What I don't know is if that can be easily tweaked or if that requires an entire redesign again (but I'm guessing it's the former).
|
I'm not sure that most sites have variable width? Some do but not many.
The sites design template is built around the header / footer / ad structure - if the site were to shrink below 1000px wide then what would happen to the top menu, what would happen to the background ads etc?
The site is designed and optimised for 1000px width as 99% of sites are today. For those running at 1400px and above (most people) then you have the space to see the forum buddy, for those running below that resolution then obviously it'll be cropped or cut off. We could have an auto-check that disables the forum buddy below a certain resolution if that would help?
|
That would not help, as being able to see your recent threads and if there are new posts/replies is an essential feature of the website.
As for sites with variable width, about 90% of the sites I have visited in my life have them or at least are fully functional even with a 1024x768 resolution. Competing sites like IGN, Gamespot and GameTrailers work 100% fine on any resolution.
|
I thought you were being a little over the top for a minute as I don't see many website with fluid layouts (but by fully functional I guess you include static sites as long as they work at the standard 1024 width), most are static... the only ones I frequently use that have fluid widths are google, my hotmail (but not msn.com when you log out of hotmail) and wikipedia. Oh and the school I worked at used moodle for it's VLE (virtual learning environment) which was also fluid... but it was horrid on lower resolutions so IMO shouldn't count.
I agree though that features like that should not be "locked out" from users with lower than what looks to be about 1350px wide screens (mine is 1366 luckily). Adverts and background images or patterns are nice to fill the spaces so that wider screens don't have to be filled with block colour, but website features should be accessible to 99% of users at least.
