Grover
Well-known member
That's why it's quite puzzling to say the least that XenForo does not have a mobile style in this day and age. Or am I missing something?
For the rest I completely agree with everything you wrote above.
It's best to use Responsive Design, but if you can't what should you do?
- Thread starter agison
- Start date
That's why it's quite puzzling to say the least that XenForo does not have a mobile style in this day and age. Or am I missing something?
For the rest I completely agree with everything you wrote above.
EQnoble
Well-known member
You don't need a mobile style when you follow adaptive layout / responsive design techniques. That IS the whole point...your site will fit perfectly for whatever resolution you are viewing the page at be it on a large television or a mobile phone. A specific style just for mobile is no better than having to make a specific style just for ie 7 , 8 or whatever...it is a waste. In this day and age you only need one style if you know how to go about it and want to take the time that it does to account for everything at however many different levels of adaptation you want to account for and respond to.
Anthony Parsons
Well-known member
I concur. I believe that has more to do with the entire lawsuit issue, than anything else though. I read XF was working on a mobile solution for the next major release prior to development ceasing. Whether they've fallen into the older solution of trying to cater for mobile browsers versus simply outputting XF as a responsive design, I do not know. Hopefully they've shifted to responsive and making further options available to include / exclude code in templates, just like <xen:comment> achieves, completely hiding it from the browser altogether.
That would really put XF above the rest for mobile design IMHO, as even the content managers don't provide such options to my knowledge yet. Being WP and Joomla.
It would be ideal to wrap template content in style tags, set within style properties to cater screen widths, something like:
<xen:style1>This content will show above 700px screen width</xen:style1>
<xen:style2>This will only show below 700px screen width</xen:style2>
That type of thing would allow us to deliver lightning fast content to our users when on mobile devices.
cclaerhout
Well-known member
About the use of old versions of IE in some countries, someone comes here once and asked if it should upgrade to XenForo or stay with vBulletin 3.x because most of people in his country were using recycled computers and were still using IE6-IE7-IE8 (the dream team). His testimony was interesting and shows that when developing a software with only new technology and without fallbacks can be "discriminant" (may be the word is too strong but I can't find another one). In Vietnam, Dinh will correct me if i'm wrong, the situation might be not the same than the user above. I've see in Taiwan many Vietnamese bought an expensive mobile phone even though they don't earn a lot. So it seems their expends are focusing the mobile segment instead of the desktop/laptop one that might be getting older without renewal.
EQnoble
Well-known member
That is way over complicating things...and to be honest is overhead that is not needed simply because it is possible to do what you are talking about already. A lot of coding would need to be done to support what you are suggesting and then to have to set all of those options for 2 different styles is crazy...I already do what you are talking about as far as displaying content only at specific widths and the current responsive design I am working on currently supports 22 generic and vendor specific monitor resolutions. All that extra code to support that xen:styleX comment system that you were suggesting to me feels like a waste when it can be done straight up already with or without xenforo.
If you know what you are doing...you can cover ie6 7 8 and everything else and still have the page be responsive.
Xenforo does not need any more code functions to do something that can be done already within web standards.
Forsaken
Well-known member
It isn't even plausible, PHP cannot retrieve the width of the screen as it is a server side solution, not client side.
Anthony Parsons
Well-known member
I don't disagree that it can already be done... your doing it, I'm doing it, many are doing it via CSS media queries. But the ultimate in responsive design is to limit media queries and deliver the lightest page as possible to a mobile user with the least code possible. That is the ultimate in mobile design, and still one reason why many sites make a choice between two sites, i.e. m.site.com & site.com, or responsive.
Responsive is still code bloated, and that is the major setback with responsive. It's advantages outweigh the disadvantages, no argument from me with that one.
I'm purely saying the ultimate in mobile design is to have the ability at template rendering to add or remove code entirely, not hide or display relevant elements, like we do now.
Not sure what the IE is about... as I didn't mention anything about that. Obviously that was in response to someone else?
Responsive is still code bloated, and that is the major setback with responsive. It's advantages outweigh the disadvantages, no argument from me with that one.
I'm purely saying the ultimate in mobile design is to have the ability at template rendering to add or remove code entirely, not hide or display relevant elements, like we do now.
Not sure what the IE is about... as I didn't mention anything about that. Obviously that was in response to someone else?
EQnoble
Well-known member
I never said anything about php...and like I said.....I am doing it already
about ie ...yes it was in response to someone else...
What would you not want a mobile user to see when on a mobile...they should have all the same content available to them in my opinion. If all the content should be available and to me that is the case...it is simply a matter of styling.
Forsaken
Well-known member
I was commenting only about the <xen:style> syntax, which isn't possible due to PHP being server-side.
EQnoble
Well-known member
What I imply is that if he does not need unique content on his page based on browser window size all he needs to do is customize the style. I also imply that most people dont want to remove content because of the size of the browser they are using...so creating a system like that only helps a limited few people who have their own idea of how they want to do something.
I dont disagree with you but there is a way he can achieve what he wants and yes not with php .
Problem is if one doesn't know how it would be done...it would be a job to teach someone to do so and modify a system built to do what he is looking for...I played around with doing it myself...imo it's not worth it unless you are making serious money and it becomes worth your time (full time job status) to manage that many dynamic page elements that may or may not display plus their own css...
Unless managing a style like that is your full time job...I dont see it being worth it...and for people to customize the work someone else has done to make all that possible by the method I know of would make it ridiculously impossible for the person that couldn't do it in the first place to modify it for their needs.
Never mind trying to make a front end application like the style properties to allow users to interface with a system like that, there is so many variables it would almost be impossible to make one that worked well and suited a large portion of the client base and for the ones it doesn't suit (which will be at the minimum every person who doesn't get styling as it is + all of the people who wont be able to handle that level of customization even if they understand styling basics ) all you did was add bloat and make a useless update.
I dont disagree with you but there is a way he can achieve what he wants and yes not with php .
Problem is if one doesn't know how it would be done...it would be a job to teach someone to do so and modify a system built to do what he is looking for...I played around with doing it myself...imo it's not worth it unless you are making serious money and it becomes worth your time (full time job status) to manage that many dynamic page elements that may or may not display plus their own css...
Unless managing a style like that is your full time job...I dont see it being worth it...and for people to customize the work someone else has done to make all that possible by the method I know of would make it ridiculously impossible for the person that couldn't do it in the first place to modify it for their needs.
Never mind trying to make a front end application like the style properties to allow users to interface with a system like that, there is so many variables it would almost be impossible to make one that worked well and suited a large portion of the client base and for the ones it doesn't suit (which will be at the minimum every person who doesn't get styling as it is + all of the people who wont be able to handle that level of customization even if they understand styling basics ) all you did was add bloat and make a useless update.
rollthebones
Active member
Yeah, how dare people who spent $2000+ on a retina computer have an enjoyable web experience.
Grover
Well-known member
Yes, I am aware what responsive design means. With my reference to a mobile style ...
... I mean 'mobile style' in general, in other words: a responsive design. Not a handy description in this case, so I understand the confusion.
I just had a look on my vBulletin 3.8 powered forum on my new iPad 4 and it just looks absolutely good. I always thought the vB 3.x style was absolutely the best for any software packages out there and still, so many years later it even looks great on iOS on the iPad! Remarkably enough, Xenforo does not exactly. Just view a XenForo powered forum on your iPad... it's actually unreadable! (especially due to all these wrongfully laid out quotes... yuk!
). To be honest, I just don't understand this. Why does a modern state-of-the-art software package like XenForo look/work so bad on modern tablets?
Grover
Well-known member
Just view a XenForo powered forum on your iPad... it's actually unreadable! (especially due to all these wrongfully laid out quotes... yuk!
I have to re-examine my feedback apparently, because at the moment I can not seem to reproduce the issue I had with quotes when viewing Xenforo.com on my iPad
. It's all now perfectly readable... I will get back to it.
Grover
Well-known member
Yup, I am sorry to have jumped on this too quickly (I just had a quick view on the iPad at the time and after seeing what I saw, never bothered to look at it in more depth). The problem I am confronted with only occurs with nested quotes, as you can see in the attached screenshot. Obviously, nested quotes are not used often at all, so my complaint turns out to be just a tiny issue really 
.
.