kode54 wrote:

Most properly coded “responsive” mobile/desktop design rely on the viewport width, and not on serving separate sites for mobile […]
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Most properly coded “responsive” mobile/desktop design rely on the viewport width, and not on serving separate sites for mobile devices. And the page layout intelligently changes depending on whether you are on a really slim portrait mode device, a low resolution tablet, or a medium to large window on a desktop.

For a reference, see a forum I help run, Hydrogen Audio.

Also for reference, I mostly browse this forum in the down time at night, when I’m on my iPad. For that, in landscape mode, a desktop site such as this is mostly fine.

Fake edit: Jesus christ, nested quote limitations? If you’re going to do that kind of bullshit, could you please at least trim the nested quotes off before handing the post to me when I hit the quote button? That’s one feature you’ll never find turned on with any forum I run, because I just love seeing how pissed off some people get when the quoting gets nested ten or twelve levels deep. But at the same time, we also chew out people for quoting the post immediately above theirs, even if the forum gives that person a whole two hours to go and edit their post out from under the person who just replied to them.

I like to quote the post I respond to even if it's the one right above just so if that post gets edited my post still makes some sort of sense.

I also like that we can edit old posts so we can correct erroneous information and edit / add to lists and the like.

I often delete nested quotes but I don't think there is a reason for them to be removed by "magic".

kode54 wrote:

For a reference, see a forum I help run, Hydrogen Audio.

Bit awkward to read on the desktop when relevant text starts at the far left of the screen.

SW-SSG wrote:

vvbee wrote:

collector wrote:

you can take a look at my forums. http://sierrahelp.com/forums/

Pages scroll a bit sluggish on my desktop. I hope that's not a feature?

Scrolls fine here.

The only real problem for phones and 800x600px displays that I can see are those massive avatars......

The avatars scale. On my droid they are about 1 - 1.5 cm.

vvbee wrote:

collector wrote:

you can take a look at my forums. http://sierrahelp.com/forums/

Pages scroll a bit sluggish on my desktop. I hope that's not a feature?

Scrolls perfectly fine for me and you are the only one to ever report such an issue. Perhaps something with your browser?

Check it out, chrome on linux: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJEH9_O7c_E. A subset of your userbase likely experiences the issue.

An improvement for mobile and touch devices would be to make some bigger page buttons, or atleast a big NEXT button?

I'm also having a hard time browsing/navigating around on the forum on mobile (using Firefox Mobile here).

Made some screenshots how it looks / feels: https://imgur.com/a/0inoKgR

Board and forum list view are the hardest part unless you constantly zoom in/out.

Within a thread, it's "mostly okayish" but there are many odd things. For example, sometimes the font sizes of the individual messages itself are very different without apparent indicator why.

And I haven't yet talked about hitting the navigation elements (links, buttons), it's gamble. Overall not a very pleasant experience.

Has it to do with the forum software, maybe old? It says 2002-2013? Maybe a more recent version has better stylesheets for mobile?

It's hard to use, yes. But not very hard.

There is a theme I see from another phpBB forum I visit - About a soccer club, not relevant to mention btw - and I asked them which theme they use.
There is: https://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/style/we_universal/

Seems to be responsive and work for mobile devices. Works for me when I use on my phone. The buttons can be still small, though.

Might be worth a try. There are other themes (light or dark themes) on this site as well.

Luckily, I don't always bother using certain websites on a mobile device, although most websites, including VOGONS, do work okay on tablets. On a side note, I do kind of agree with Qbix updating the forum, because according to the footer, this site hasn't been updated since 2013, which is not a bad thing at all, but still, you should always stay up to date with a lot of things. As long as you're not planning on changing the template, because I do like the current purple forum layout and username colors (brownish red for registered users, red for admins, and dark blue for mods).

I don't have issues with VOGONS on mobile. It works just as well as any other website on a little screen that you have to touch in order to do anything.

Some sites are desktop-oriented by design, and that's a GOOD THING.

Allegedly the rumor is that VOGONS founder "Snover" is working on a new (optional?) skin that will also be mobile-friendly for release at some point, so don't lose hope that we can keep everyone happy.

Qbix is anti-Tapatalk so that won't be happening at least.

I don’t like Tapatalk either. I see no point in downloading an app to access a Forum... when I can do that with a browser!

Tapatalk is so 2011

the sweet spot would be a responsive design for newer devices (tablets, smartphones) and the actual design for "real and serious computers" (which is compatible with most os'es)

I actually like vogons when browsing on my phone, fast and efficient.
I don't use tapatalk or other weird apps, just an internet browser.

I have never used Tapatalk so I don't know how well it works.

But I really like small, lightweight clients for specific applications, which can be made very efficient and fine-tuned to do one thing and do it well. A web browser is a general-purpose application, and will necessarily be slower than a well-written client app.

There is work being done on a forum upgrade which will include a different look, it should work better on phones, but might not be as great on very old machines. Those haven't been tested yet.
The dominant color will continue to be purple, except the font is currently white for better contrast. But of course things might change as it is still work in progress.

Qbix wrote:

The dominant color will continue to be purple, except the font is currently white for better contrast. But of course things might change as it is still work in progress.

I think that on the current purple, white would look worse than the current brown. Of course if the purple is darker, things may be different.

It's not the same purple.

I take it that it is still based on Prosilver, which now scales nicely for mobile devices.