Re: 7 lessons from my first responsive web site

[Nathan Andelin <nandelin@xxxxxxxxx>]

Kelly,

Yes, you have given a nice review of what's happening under the covers and
some pros and cons of a scrolling content area between fixed headers and
footers, which may be better suited for database applications than site
content.

I often use "Fiddler" to see comprehensive I/O details and data streams
occurring between the browser and the server. I/O is streamlined
considerably under the SPA approach, though SEO and other concerns may take
a back seat.

It seems to me that absolute positioning and fixed pixel sizing should be
kept to a minimum under responsive UI design.

I'm currently working on a documentation viewport, which previously relied
on inline frames, but works nicely as a SPA. It follows a book-viewer
metaphor where "pages" are placed within "chapters" within a "table of
contents" within a "book". In addition to VCR style navigation links, users
can use Home, End, ArrowDown, and ArrowUp keys to navigate from page to
page.

http://rd.radile.com/rdweb/info2/home.html

Most of the intended content is yet to be filled in. Mobile users may
toggle the visibility of the table of contents in order to free screen
space for page content.






On Tue, Jul 7, 2015 at 8:51 AM, Kelly Cookson <KCookson@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Hi Nathan,
>
> Interesting.
>
> Fixing the position of the navigation at the top of the page eliminates
> the need for navigation links at the bottom of the page. That's something
> I'll keep in mind as a design strategy.
>
> I have mixed feelings about fixing the position of the theme statement
> (i.e., the lighter blue bar with the text "Social hope is faith in the
> ability of human beings to care for each other.") Fixing the theme
> statement in place reduces the height of the main content area. To me, the
> main content area is functionally more important to the site than the theme
> statement. So, on the one hand, fixing the position of the theme statement
> helps preserve the visual consistency of layout, but, on the other hand, it
> reduces the real estate of the main content and thereby disrupts functional
> prioritization of the layout. I would probably try some options like
> loading the theme statement at the top of the main content (so it scrolls
> with the main content) or dropping the theme statement on all pages except
> the home page. However, I might not like these options once I see them.
>
> I clearly see the maintenance benefits of loading the main content into a
> page. The web site header information, theme statement, navigation links,
> and footer information--basically everything except the main content--is in
> a single HTML file. If I want to make changes to this information, I can do
> it one time in one file. Conversely, the way my web site is currently set
> up, if I want to make changes to a navigation link, I have to make the
> change in multiple HTML files, one HTML file for each page of my web site.
>
> Moreover, loading the main content into the page avoids the need for a
> page refresh when the user clicks a link. The web site header, theme
> statement, navigation and footer are loaded only one time when the user
> visits the web site. The only thing that changes is the content of the DOM
> element with the selector id #content (i.e., the main content of the page).
> This eliminates any white flicker while waiting for a page to load because
> there are no more page loads after the initial page load. It also reduces
> the amount of data that has to be downloaded while browsing the web site,
> making the site more efficient in terms of bandwidth and more
> cost-effective in terms of data charges for users.
>
> Let me see if I understand the details correctly.
>
> In the HTML file, you coded this in the anchor tag for the page on Care:
>
> href="javascript:ht_html('care.html');"
>
> The argument 'care.html' is the name of an HTML file that contains only
> the main content for the page on Care. The care.html file does not contain
> any of the header, navigation, or footer information. When the user clicks
> on this anchor tag, the JavaScript function ht_html is executed.
>
> In the JS script, you coded the ht_html function:
>
> ht_html(s) {
> $("#content" ).load(s);
> }
>
> The "s" argument in ht_html(s) and load(s) is a variable that is replaced
> by the name of the file provided in the code
> javascript:ht_html('care.html').
>
> So, when the user clicks the link for the page Care, JQuery grabs the
> care.html file and loads it into the DOM element with the id selector
> #content.
>
> Is this basically correct?