Mobile Website companies

Feathers

smash wrote: »

Feathers wrote:

If you find that you've a lot of 'bulk' on your desktop site that can be quite easily stripped out of a mobile site without too much concern, I'd say that you've done something wrong with this site to begin with.

Well that's just a rubbish response to be honest. Clients will fill their sites with pages of content that's good for seo and is relevant to their business but is not suitable for their mobile website.

Firstly, bad copy is bad whether it's done by a copy writer in your agency or a secretary in the clients office, it should be judged on its own merits. Just because it's the client that's doing it doesn't justify whether content should be in the site or not.

Secondly, if its relevant to their business how is it not suitable for mobile? Can you give an example?

smash wrote: »

Feathers wrote: »

If it's relevant information for desktop users, how do you know if won't be relevant to mobile users? Keep in mind that mobile could be on an iPad on a 4 hour train journey — not everything is 5s on the site to get a specific piece of information.

Mobile should not be on an iPad unless you have coded a responsive design, otherwise you display the full website.

OK, a HTC One - the point is the same: second guessing that your user doesn't want rich content because they're on a portable device is wrong. By all means, change the navigation & use features like location awareness, but stripping out chunks of your site because you presume all users on a small screen are in a hurry or on the move isn't an accurate reflection of mobile use.

Also, if your not doing responsive design considering the array of screen sizes & pixel density you've to deal with, you're not building a modern website.

jmcc

smash wrote: »

Which again is back to a point I made earlier: "It is easy to identify what the client wants out of their mobile website and make it work in a user friendly manner."

The point is that the site has to give the user what they want. Sometimes what the client thinks the user wants is not what the user wants. This is why some webdevs tend to get things backwards and end up designing brochureware sites that please the client but then don't get used.

Regards...jmcc

smash

Feathers wrote: »

Firstly, bad copy is bad whether it's done by a copy writer in your agency or a secretary in the clients office, it should be judged on its own merits. Just because it's the client that's doing it doesn't justify whether content should be in the site or not.

Secondly, if its relevant to their business how is it not suitable for mobile? Can you give an example?

Company history or staff bios.

Feathers wrote: »

OK, a HTC One - the point is the same: second guessing that your user doesn't want rich content because they're on a portable device is wrong.

I didn't say that.

Feathers wrote: »

By all means, change the navigation & use features like location awareness, but stripping out chunks of your site because you presume all users on a small screen are in a hurry or on the move isn't an accurate reflection of mobile use.

It's not like that. It's more about providing the user with what they want and need based on the results of the analytics from their desktop site.

Feathers wrote: »

Also, if your not doing responsive design considering the array of screen sizes & pixel density you've to deal with, you're not building a modern website.

Responsive design for mobile is different than responsive design where the whole site changes when you resize a screen.

smash

jmcc wrote: »

The point is that the site has to give the user what they want. Sometimes what the client thinks the user wants is not what the user wants. This is why some webdevs tend to get things backwards and end up designing brochureware sites that please the client but then don't get used.

Regards...jmcc

I agree, see my comment about the analytics above.

Giblet

smash wrote: »

Responsive design for mobile is different than responsive design where the whole site changes when you resize a screen.

Huh? Responsive design is responsive design, the whole idea is that you design one website that works with all viewports, abbreviated or not.

I wouldn't cut anything out of the site. You have a bunch of SEO done for your main site, you search Google, you get links for that site. Should some of them redirect to the mobile version and some for the desktop version because it's not available? That's a pretty bad user experience. I'd recommend blocking Google from even crawling the mobile version (if it's separate, not really a concern for a responsive design). The SEO generated for the main site should be valid for the mobile. So you need all content to be reflected in both. Some search robots get confused and get caught by common redirect strategies too, so if you didn't do this, you might miss a ton of content being crawled.

smash

What you're saying is true for a small business, but look at any of the top Irish websites and see what they've done with mobile! Their sites are too large to transition to mobile so they present the user with the features or pages most used on their desktop site.

Giblet

That's not true, I work on a few websites for large companies, and they want it all. These are full eCommerce + Corporate websites too, so a lot of functionality.
I don't care what anyone else has done either, especially if they haven't done it correctly (I wonder how many are eager to expand their mobile offering)

smash

Giblet wrote: »

smash wrote: »

Responsive design for mobile is different than responsive design where the whole site changes when you resize a screen.

Huh? Responsive design is responsive design, the whole idea is that you design one website that works with all viewports, abbreviated or not.

and just to go back to this, what I meant to say was a fluid mobile site to cover various screen sizes and resolutions.

Giblet

smash

Still, I'd like to see an example of a mobile version of a large website that has all the info from the Desktop website.

The Corinthian

Feathers wrote: »

I guess it boils down to the question — would you say building a desktop site is 'fairly easy'?

This was never really my point; I challenged the notion that transitioning from traditional to mobile Web development is 'fairly easy'. I did so as it is a simplistic viewpoint based upon two separate media that are superficially similar because they share similar technologies.

You got the same thing fifteen years ago from DTP houses who discovered WYSIWYG's like Adobe PageMill. I remember many were convinced that going from print design to Web design was also 'fairly easy'.

smash wrote: »

I don't recall that, the only thing mentioned so far is gps actually.

Actually prioritization was also something that was pointed out; functionality that would be important on a traditional Web site may well be of little importance to a user, while other functionality becomes prioritized.

The example I gave was of a chain of shops; at home the user is more likely to wish to browse special offers, for example. However as mobile will more likely be used while away from home, functionality such as finding the nearest affiliate would become a likely reason for the user's visit.

This is not to suggest that you should not allow a user to also browse special offers on a mobile site (as you erroniously responded to Sparks earlier when he raised the topic of prioritization), only that priorities change on a mobile site in keeping with user behaviour.

As for the use of mobile specific functionality with GPS, when mentioned, you completely ignored it. In fact you've not touched on this at all and have instead doggedly stuck to your simplistic 'cut down' approach.

I never said a mobile optimized cut down version. And to be honest I think you know what I meant when I said "It's a stripped down website which should be created to deliver a product/experience to a user without the addition bulk." but you[re just looking for a silly argument.

I've no intention of second guessing what you 'meant' in retrospect - I'll stick to what you've actually said, much of which was pretty generic and meaningless and to date the only strategy to mobile Web development you've actually suggested is a 'stripped down' Web site.

Certainly 'stripping down' a Web site (at least of bandwidth hungry media) is part of the process, however prioritization and mobile specific functionality, designed for the medium are also equally important. You've not mentioned and even, when cited, ignored these.

So you didn't read my point in one of my first replies to you? "It is easy to identify what the client wants out of their mobile website and make it work in a user friendly manner."

This would be one of those pretty generic and meaningless comments I spoke of earlier - making it work in a user friendly manner is just a black box response; you can say that about anything without knowing how to. How do you make it work in a user friendly manner? Does it differ from a traditional Web site? If so how?

This is actually what we're arguing about, not that a site should "work in a user friendly manner" - of course it should. Yet you don't answer this and simply expect us to accept a generic and meaningless cliche.

And I would also question that it is easy to identify what the client wants; it often can be but as often as not the client may lack knowledge of what is possible or advisable, or may simply not have what they want fully defined in their own head.

Freddio wrote: »

The Gardai cared quite a bit that Joe O'Reilly's phone was checking in with a mobile mast near his home at the time of his wife's murder when he said he was in town and Google's new terms say they will hand over any data they have to the police if the requests are valid. That would include Gmail, Analytics, GPS, Web searches etc

Fair point. However, to begin with the Joe O'Reilly example has nothing to do with even the Internet. As for Google's new terms, I accept your point, but this has as much to do with a site being able to identify you as an individual; most sites cannot and are not overly interested in knowing your identity.

Nonetheless, you make a valid point.

smash

The Corinthian wrote: »

This was never really my point;

Well you did, because I originally said he should ask the company who created his desktop site because it should be fairly easy for them.

The Corinthian wrote: »

I challenged the notion that transitioning from traditional to mobile Web development is 'fairly easy'. I did so as it is a simplistic viewpoint based upon two separate media that are superficially similar because they share similar technologies.

The fact that the technology is almost the same is pretty important.

The Corinthian wrote: »

You got the same thing fifteen years ago from DTP houses who discovered WYSIWYG's like Adobe PageMill. I remember many were convinced that going from print design to Web design was also 'fairly easy'.

Print design and web design are totally separate in all regards.

The Corinthian wrote: »

Actually prioritization was also something that was pointed out; functionality that would be important on a traditional Web site may well be of little importance to a user, while other functionality becomes prioritized.

Thanks captain obvious.

The Corinthian wrote: »

The example I gave was of a chain of shops; at home the user is more likely to wish to browse special offers, for example. However as mobile will more likely be used while away from home, functionality such as finding the nearest affiliate would become a likely reason for the user's visit.

Back to GPS again.

The Corinthian wrote: »

This is not to suggest that you should not allow a user to also browse special offers on a mobile site (as you erroniously responded to Sparks earlier when he raised the topic of prioritization), only that priorities change on a mobile site in keeping with user behaviour.

I already agreed that priorities change.

The Corinthian wrote: »

As for the use of mobile specific functionality with GPS, when mentioned, you completely ignored it. In fact you've not touched on this at all and have instead doggedly stuck to your simplistic 'cut down' approach.

Read my posts before you reply will you "That is so narrow minded. You could also be looking for data on bus times for a totally different route that you will be getting later. If it was to present you with data based on your location then you're confusing the user. It should be an option, but it should in no way be the default."

The Corinthian wrote: »

I've no intention of second guessing what you 'meant' in retrospect - I'll stick to what you've actually said, much of which was pretty generic and meaningless and to date the only strategy to mobile Web development you've actually suggested is a 'stripped down' Web site.

Because it is stripped down. It's stripped down so that the important information is clearly presented to the user and the menu structures are not as complex.

The Corinthian wrote: »

ICertainly 'stripping down' a Web site (at least of bandwidth hungry media) is part of the process, however prioritization and mobile specific functionality, designed for the medium are also equally important. You've not mentioned and even, when cited, ignored these.

That's not true, it was the first point I made "It is easy to identify what the client wants out of their mobile website and make it work in a user friendly manner." this is prioritization.

The Corinthian wrote: »

This would be one of those pretty generic and meaningless comments I spoke of earlier - making it work in a user friendly manner is just a black box response; you can say that about anything without knowing how to. How do you make it work in a user friendly manner? Does it differ from a traditional Web site? If so how?

This is actually what we're arguing about, not that a site should "work in a user friendly manner" - of course it should. Yet you don't answer this and simply expect us to accept a generic and meaningless cliche.

Well I wouldn't expect to have to talk to a programmer/designer in a way where I have to spell out every I say. User friendly means exactly that. Make it user friendly for the medium you are delivering the product on. If you need it spelled out then change industry. And I've yet to see what I don't answer...

The Corinthian wrote: »

And I would also question that it is easy to identify what the client wants; it often can be but as often as not the client may lack knowledge of what is possible or advisable, or may simply not have what they want fully defined in their own head.

And this is why you spec out a project and 90% of the time lead the client in the right direction.

The Corinthian wrote: »

Fair point. However, to begin with the Joe O'Reilly example has nothing to do with even the Internet. As for Google's new terms, I accept your point, but this has as much to do with a site being able to identify you as an individual; most sites cannot and are not overly interested in knowing your identity.

Nonetheless, you make a valid point.

Just another note on this by the way. Every time you log into an open wifi zone, the provider by law has to keep a record of your mac address and a few other details for a length of time.

The Corinthian

smash wrote: »

Well you did, because I originally said he should ask the company who created his desktop site because it should be fairly easy for them.

I don't think you understand what I've said at all and I really don't know how to more simply explain it to you at this stage without the use of finger puppets.

One cannot presume that it is 'fairly easy' for them. They're a traditional Webdev firm, as far as we know, and to presume the transition from traditional to mobile Web development is 'fairly easy' ignores much of what has been pointed out to you.

The fact that the technology is almost the same is pretty important.

In so far as it gives a false sense of competence, just as being able to go from QuarkXPress to PageMill did, fifteen years ago.

Print design and web design are totally separate in all regards.

Really? Both can be done using superficially similar technologies (WYSIWYG's) and the transition from one to the other can be carried out 'fairly easily', using much of the same content and skillsets.

The only reason that you're now suggesting that they are 'totally separate' is because you're aware that the transition is a paradigm shift in terms of what users want and how they behave.

Yet, you've presumed no such shift between traditional Web and mobile, beyond bandwidth concerns.

I already agreed that priorities change.

Where? I missed this refinement to your original argument.

Read my posts before you reply will you "That is so narrow minded. You could also be looking for data on bus times for a totally different route that you will be getting later. If it was to present you with data based on your location then you're confusing the user. It should be an option, but it should in no way be the default."

Actually it probably should, especially if user behaviour shows that 95% use the mobile site principally for that functionality. Mobile users hate having to go through additional click-throughs far more than on a desktop and if they do will often bookmark not your homepage but the page they always go to.

Well I wouldn't expect to have to talk to a programmer/designer in a way where I have to spell out every I say.

Actually, you do have to spell it out, because much of what you're saying sounds like generic BS from someone who doesn't know what they're talking about, but is too proud to admit it. Thus you through a whole load of meaningless generic arguments that could apply to anything in the hope that it deflects the discussion.

Given the number of responses from people here disagreeing with you, many of whom have been in the business a long time, I'm surprised you're still posting.

And this is why you spec out a project and 90% of the time lead the client in the right direction.

And this is always 'easy'?

smash

The Corinthian wrote: »

I don't think you understand what I've said at all and I really don't know how to more simply explain it to you at this stage without the use of finger puppets.

You have pointed out nothing bar the fact that it's a different platform that broadly uses the same technologies. Which nobody argued about.

The Corinthian wrote: »

One cannot presume that it is 'fairly easy' for them. They're a traditional Webdev firm, as far as we know, and to presume the transition from traditional to mobile Web development is 'fairly easy' ignores much of what has been pointed out to you.

Only based on your opinion.

The Corinthian wrote: »

Really? Both can be done using superficially similar technologies (WYSIWYG's) and the transition from one to the other can be carried out 'fairly easily', using much of the same content and skillsets.

No it really can't. Print designers generally don't have a clue about code, nor do they want to.

The Corinthian wrote: »

The only reason that you're now suggesting that they are 'totally separate' is because you're aware that the transition is a paradigm shift in terms of what users want and how they behave.

Sorry what? They're a completely different industry, always have been.

The Corinthian wrote: »

Yet, you've presumed no such shift between traditional Web and mobile, beyond bandwidth concerns.

You can not compare web and mobile to web and print. You just can't. It's a pathetic argument. Web and mobile are pretty much developed the same way when it boils down to it. Print and web are nothing alike.

The Corinthian wrote: »

Where? I missed this refinement to your original argument.

Close to the start. It was a point I made, not one I refined "It's common sense that the sites are used differently and are stripped to to suit how people use mobiles. I've said that already."

The Corinthian wrote: »

Actually it probably should, especially if user behaviour shows that 95% use the mobile site principally for that functionality.

So now you're twisting to say "if 95%" bla bla.... I made that point a long time ago about using analytics to define what the users need.

The Corinthian wrote: »

Actually, you do have to spell it out, because much of what you're saying sounds like generic BS from someone who doesn't know what they're talking about, but is too proud to admit it.

And this is where my conversation with you will end. Because while you're spouting rubbish about print vs web when comparing it to web vs mobile it is clearly you who doesn't have a clue. If you think it's generic bs, then you just don't understand it or don't have enough cop on and you need it spelled out. Mobile web apps take up a lot of my project time in work, I could easily bet I've worked on a lot more projects in the field than you have.

The Corinthian wrote: »

Thus you through a whole load of meaningless generic arguments that could apply to anything in the hope that it deflects the discussion.

You could think that, or you know... you could grow up and read the points I've made.

The Corinthian wrote: »

Given the number of responses from people here disagreeing with you, many of whom have been in the business a long time, I'm surprised you're still posting.

I've been in the business for 12 years. It's basically been you has has been arguing btw.

Feathers

The Corinthian wrote: »

This was never really my point; I challenged the notion that transitioning from traditional to mobile Web development is 'fairly easy'. I did so as it is a simplistic viewpoint based upon two separate media that are superficially similar because they share similar technologies.

You got the same thing fifteen years ago from DTP houses who discovered WYSIWYG's like Adobe PageMill. I remember many were convinced that going from print design to Web design was also 'fairly easy'.

Yeah, I know — was more of a flippant, rhetorical question getting at this idea I'd say good design is always a lot of work (what are you being paid for otherwise?), but the simplicity of execution on the final product can make it seem easy to others: whether that's print, web, conceptual, whatever.

smash wrote: »

Company history or staff bios.

smash wrote: »

It's not like that. It's more about providing the user with what they want and need based on the results of the analytics from their desktop site.

So you're deciding for me that I don't want to view the company history because I'm on a mobile device? The most frustrating thing for me when I'm on a mobile website is when I find the designer has blocked me from content that I want to use & I then have to reload the full website.

It doesn't matter whether your site loads in less than a second & has halved the bandwidth if I have to go & reload the main site, you've cost me time and bandwidth.

& how can you make a decision about what I do and don't want to see on mobile based on desktop analytics?

smash wrote: »

Responsive design for mobile is different than responsive design where the whole site changes when you resize a screen.

OK. I'm talking about responsive design as a broad term, not fluid CSS.

smash wrote: »

Because while you're spouting rubbish about print vs web when comparing it to web vs mobile it is clearly you who doesn't have a clue.

…

I've been in the business for 12 years.

You're saying that you've been designing website since they looked like this, but don't remember a time that that a lot of people in print design were offering website builds? You don't remember sites written in Microsoft FrontPage/Dreamweaver design view/InDesign?

I'd say the comparison is spot on — there's a lot of people who knew about design previously who didn't know the web that were claiming they could look after your website for you. Now there are a lot of people who know 'traditional' web-design but don't really know mobile saying they'll advise you on your mobile site/app.

If you're saying that a lot of your time in work is dealing with mobile sites & you've been working in the industry for 12 years you've surely come across people like this?

jmcc

smash wrote: »

I've been in the business for 12 years. It's basically been you has has been arguing btw.

I have domain names older than that. And a few of us on this thread, The Corinthian included, have been around since the early days of the web (ie before the technology journalists discovered the internet). Seriously though, the one thing that I have not seen anyone mention in the thread is Information Architecture. For those who run large websites (>=100 million pages) it is very important but strangely it is also very important with mobile web sites because they are relatively sparse in information terms. The screen space is limited and this means that deciding whether to include an "aren't we great?" page high up on the navigation stack is important. And Print and Web design are not totally separate.

Some of the early computerised print design was done with mark-up language and this made things very easy for print designers to adapt to the early web and effectively start producing websites. They were familiar with the basic concepts for layout and choice of fonts.The advent of WYSIWYG software packages really only started with Frontpage, NetObjects Fusion and similar. A lot of clueless people then decided that they too were "web designers" about this time. It was not uncommon to see courses advertised by colleges and universities taught by people who while being familiar with the technology hadn't a clue about aesthetics or design.

One of the most important things in print design is page layout and you are working with a fixed size layout. This meant that a lot of designers with print experience started designing fixed size websites even though the users were using many monitor sizes. Thus you had people who were designing on large monitors (20" or so) with high resolutions designing sites for themselves that looked great on their monitors but lousy on the 15" 800x600 monitor that the average user had at the time. (This was one of the results of the false confidence pointed out by The Corinthian above.)

Tables were used to create these fixed size layouts and many sites still use them for positioning even though they were only intended to display tabular data. The biggest paradigm shift for print designers (a wonderful DotBomb phrase) was designing for a page that could be resized. When you fold a newspaper, the print stays in the same position as you are looking at just a part of the page. When you resize a webpage with a fluid layout, everything moves. This mucked up some designs and it had a lot of designers using a fixed layout.

Now if you look at a magazine page or a newspaper page, they are both filled with cues for the reader and often they are so subtle that the reader doesn't even have to think about them to use them. The page numbers, the section headers, the headlines, the sub-heads, the pull-quotes all have their equivalent in web designs.

The biggest shift with mobile web is that the model changes from a largely Push/Broadcast/Fixed model to a Pull/Narrowcast/Dynamic one. With a desktop design, a lot of information can be stuffed into one webpage without overloading it. With the mobile webpage, space is at a premium and conscious choices have to be made about what to include and what to exclude. That's where Information Architecture becomes important. Forcing web designers to think in terms of IA is perhaps the biggest shift caused by the mobile web.

Regards...jmcc

smash

Feathers wrote: »

So you're deciding for me that I don't want to view the company history because I'm on a mobile device? The most frustrating thing for me when I'm on a mobile website is when I find the designer has blocked me from content that I want to use & I then have to reload the full website.

No the client decides that.

Feathers wrote: »

how can you make a decision about what I do and don't want to see on mobile based on desktop analytics?

you have a hotel? you want to sell rooms.
you have a car dealership? you want to sell cars.
This is also what you want to do on your mobile website so that's the4 main focus. you can use your analytics to see what else people want from your company and add it in. I'm not saying you're limited in what you should do no mobile, just saying you should get your USP on your homepage which is obvious.

Feathers wrote: »

You're saying that you've been designing website since they looked like this, but don't remember a time that that a lot of people in print design were offering website builds? You don't remember sites written in Microsoft FrontPage/Dreamweaver design view/InDesign?

I finished college in 2000 and started my first job that summer. At that time maybefriends.ie was live, carzone.ie was live, entertainment.ie was live... and none of them looked bad for their time, and none of them were built in FrontPage etc. I've also never worked in a Print company, and never want to. I was always of the opinion that print designers can't design for web because thy don't understand it enough.

Feathers wrote: »

I'd say the comparison is spot on — there's a lot of people who knew about design previously who didn't know the web that were claiming they could look after your website for you.

But they didn't know the web, that's the key point. Web designers these days who are designing for mobile is just a step up in design for different resolution browsers. The technology used to display both is almost identical, with print, it was a different world.

Feathers wrote: »

Now there are a lot of people who know 'traditional' web-design but don't really know mobile saying they'll advise you on your mobile site/app.

Advising is different than building.

Feathers wrote: »

If you're saying that a lot of your time in work is dealing with mobile sites & you've been working in the industry for 12 years you've surely come across people like this?

I've come across a lot of people like this, but they're generally the same people who wont produce a good desktop site either. They're bad designers, not good designers who are struggling to come to terms with a new platform.

Feathers

smash wrote: »

No the client decides that.

You're meant to be the professional here — I hope for your sake, you never have to deal with an architect who has the same attitude that you do.

smash wrote: »

I'm not saying you're limited in what you should do no mobile, just saying you should get your USP on your homepage which is obvious.

Up until now, you have been talking about 'stripping the bulk' out of the site; now you're saying that you're simply moving this information off the homepage. They are completely different things, opposites in fact.

smash wrote: »

But they didn't know the web, that's the key point. Web designers these days who are designing for mobile is just a step up in design for different resolution browsers. The technology used to display both is almost identical, with print, it was a different world.

Fine — would I hire the same developer to do both? Yes. Would I hire the same UX or designer for both, if they'd no experience of mobile? Definitely no.

smash wrote: »

Advising is different than building.

Yes, it's the most important phase of any development project, where you help the client to plan their goals. If a developer can give me good advice around designing for mobile, I'll presume he can also write the underlying code — the opposite isn't the case though.

smash

Feathers wrote: »

Up until now, you have been talking about 'stripping the bulk' out of the site; now you're saying that you're simply moving this information off the homepage. They are completely different things, opposites in fact.

Have a look at mini.ie's mobile site or entertainment.ie's mobile site to see how the bulk is stripped out but the sites still deliver the product to the user.

jmcc

smash wrote: »

No the client decides that.

You've really got to see things through the eyes of your clients and their target market.

you have a hotel? you want to sell rooms.

No. Look at all the advertising for hotels and you'll see they are selling the experience.

you have a car dealership? you want to sell cars.

Again, no. They are selling dreams of how the buyer sees themselves.

I finished college in 2000 and started my first job that summer. At that time maybefriends.ie was live, carzone.ie was live, entertainment.ie was live...

As were some other sites but the Irish web was far smaller then than it is now.

and none of them looked bad for their time, and none of them were built in FrontPage etc.

You seem to have only seen the web designs but not the websites (all those choices were database backed sites).

I've also never worked in a Print company, and never want to. I was always of the opinion that print designers can't design for web because thy don't understand it enough.

So based on your lack of knowledge of print design, you can extrapolate that to include all print designers?

Regards...jmcc

Feathers

smash wrote: »

Have a look at mini.ie's mobile site or entertainment.ie's mobile site to see how the bulk is stripped out but the sites still deliver the product to the user.

I know what mobile design looks like, thanks.

My point was: I think that the same information should be available to you whether you choose to use a phone, tablet, TV or computer to access a website. Now if the information is suddenly not useful when I'm on a phone, you've to seriously reconsider if it is useful to begin with at all, as you've no idea why a user is on a phone rather than a laptop, for instance.

As a straight question — do you believe that some content should only be made accessible on a desktop version of a site?

It's not a trick question, as there are different views put across on it in industry, I'm not sure why you're changing your stance the whole time.

smash

jmcc wrote: »

You've really got to see things through the eyes of your clients and their target market.

Which I do.

jmcc wrote: »

No. Look at all the advertising for hotels and you'll see they are selling the experience.

Which involves selling a room.

jmcc wrote: »

Again, no. They are selling dreams of how the buyer sees themselves.

You're mixing up a new car distributor, with a motor dealer.

jmcc wrote: »

As were some other sites but the Irish web was far smaller then than it is now.

That means nothing in the context of why I gave examples of the sites that were around.

jmcc wrote: »

You seem to have only seen the web designs but not the websites (all those choices were database backed sites).

I know they were database backed sites. These companies also did sites for hundreds of clients and still do and for the time, none of their sites looked bad or were designed using frontpage etc. That was my point.

jmcc wrote: »

So based on your lack of knowledge of print design, you can extrapolate that to include all print designers?

I can only say it based on my personal experience with print designers. And I know I'm not alone in thinking that way from discussing it with others.

smash

Feathers wrote: »

I know what mobile design looks like, thanks.

But you're now ignoring 2 examples I've given of sites that have stripped out content for mobile, but the sites still deliver the product to the user.

Feathers wrote: »

My point was: I think that the same information should be available to you whether you choose to use a phone, tablet, TV or computer to access a website. Now if the information is suddenly not useful when I'm on a phone, you've to seriously reconsider if it is useful to begin with at all, as you've no idea why a user is on a phone rather than a laptop, for instance.

A lot of the time it's not really useful, as I stated earlier clients add a lot of stuff for seo.

Feathers wrote: »

As a straight question — do you believe that some content should only be made accessible on a desktop version of a site?

It's not a trick question, as there are different views put across on it in industry, I'm not sure why you're changing your stance the whole time.

No I don't think that. But I think that content should be rewritten for mobile for sure.

Giblet

Mini did a decent job, but they serve most content just with certain parts emphasised, with a lot of the content within easy reach (and without extra page loads). Entertainment.ie did a horrific job in some areas, content hidden by a sea of slow navigation. I couldn't find a mobile version of the desktop frontpage news story i was interested in.
For another irish example, something like elverys.ie pretty much serves up everything, just with the emphasis shifted to easy navigation.

Giblet

smash wrote: »

A lot of the time it's not really useful, as I stated earlier clients add a lot of stuff for seo.

And SEO isn't valid for the mobile site?

Feathers

smash wrote: »

But you're now ignoring 2 examples I've given of sites that have stripped out content for mobile, but the sites still deliver the product to the user..

Yes, I am ignoring them, because I never disputed that you can make a website that gives a good experience or still sells your product, my point was simply that if there's good content available on your main site it should be on the mobile site too, as you don't know why your users are on a mobile.

If the content is rubbish on your main site, you probably have bigger problems that your mobile site. & it doesn't matter who is adding it — a user doesn't care if an agency is responsible for a failing or the client, it's all seen as the same site to them.

jmcc

smash wrote: »

Which I do.

No. I think that you still don't get it.

Which involves selling a room.

It involves renting a room but it sells the experience and all the extras that go with that.

You're mixing up a new car distributor, with a motor dealer.

Again it is about what the customer wants and how the customer sees themselves in the car.

From the examples above it would seem that you are basically taking your opinions and extrapolating them to what the client and user wants.

I know they were database backed sites. These companies also did sites for hundreds of clients and still do and for the time, none of their sites looked bad or were designed using frontpage etc. That was my point.

But you don't know how they were designed. For all you know, the initial web design could have been done on Frontpage or Fusion or its equivalent and then optimised and connected to the database. But then I may not have your knowledge of database backed web design.

I can only say it based on my personal experience with print designers. And I know I'm not alone in thinking that way from discussing it with others.

Purely anecdotal evidence then?

Regards...jmcc

jmcc

Giblet wrote: »

And SEO isn't valid for the mobile site?

Getting mobile search right is one of the hardest problems in Search. Not even Google has managed to do it properly so any bit of SEO in a mobile site tends to be useful to the search engines.

Regards...jmcc

The Corinthian

smash wrote: »

I've been in the business for 12 years.

I've been in the business for just under 15 years, and developing for mobile for over 12.

In the early days of the Irish Webdev industry, before your time, many print design companies jumped onto the bandwagon because the WYSIWYG tools made it relatively easy for them. This resulted in quite a few hamfisted sites out there that were built with a DTP-print mindset in the first few years.

By the time you got into the business, the emphasis was already turning to dynamically generated sites, with the classic n-tier architecture and so most of these print design companies bowed out or upgraded their in-house skills to include programmers and other IT resources. It's hardly surprising that some of the founders of some of the big Webdev firms at that time, such as Labyrinth and Web Factory, came from print.

Even today, many print design companies offer Web development as one of their services, although thankfully have largely learned that print is not the same as Web.

Mobile Web began principally with WAP. Again when the money was rolling in many Webdev firms rolled onto the bandwagon and this resulted in a lot of bad sites. Of course this was not why WAP failed, but it certainly didn't help. By about 2006, phones supporting HTML began to appear, but it was not until the iPhone appeared that real interest took place in this area and Webdev firms quickly jumped onto the bandwagon, producing rubbish with a Web-mindset, just as the print designers had done a decade earlier.

Mobile sites are not the same as Web sites. I've been saying (and even written articles on) this for almost ten years. You may ultimately be drawing from the same content, but even beyond the bandwidth and capabilities issues people interact with mobile sites and apps in a completely different manner to traditional Web sites. In effect it should be treated as a completely new application.

And this is why I originally challenged you on this, because you suggested that it's no big deal; it's "fairly easy" to go from one to the other, and this is exactly what those print designers thought fifteen years ago about the Web. I'm not saying it's very hard, but neither is it "fairly easy" and most of the transition is about mindset, not technology.

To date, you've not really said much about how they differ other than the need to strip down the original and a vague mention of differing prioritization (only when it was raised by others) and repeating some sort of 'the customer is always right' mantra. You've pretty much ignored mention of phone specific functionality also.

At this stage, there's a few people now on this thread pointing out that much of what you're saying is overly simplistic or makes no sense, but TBH I get the impression you're going to argue out of pride till Doomsday anyway.

So on that basis, I'll take my leave and wish you the best.

BarackPyjama

A lot of cock measurement going on here. How about answering the OP's question? :eek: