Happy New Year! Many people love to make resolutions, and the most common one is to lose weight. I came across a clever tweet about resolutions that made me smile.
New Year's Resolutions: 320×240, 640×480, 800×600, 1024×768, 1152×864, 1280×960, 1280×1024, 1440×1080, 1600×1200, 2048×1536, 2560×2048
— Dave Dittell 3014 (@davedittell) December 27, 2013
Those working in web and user experience field know that it has something to do with responsive design. When doing websites, they need to be viewable not only on a laptop, but also mobile devices such as tablets and smart phones. Luke Wroblewki advocates for mobile first approach, but it is still not enough to ensure good user experience as he explains in his tweet that I find funny, too.
Mobile First.
No, API First.
No, Offline First.
No, Content First.
No, Users First.
No, Me First.
— Luke Wroblewski (@lukew) November 6, 2013
Luke’s sentiments are also echoed in Karen McGrane’s article, Responsive Design Won’t Fix Your Content Problem, where the author says: “It may seem more complicated to edit your content and fix your processes and systems at the same time you’re designing a new site—but in fact, pretending you don’t have to solve these problems just makes the job harder.”
Responsive design is more than just stretching screen resolutions to fit a device size. Since content is king, it needs to be optimized and of good quality to be interesting and valuable to users.
Another thing to consider is offline first approach because: “Frequently not having any data connection in even the wealthiest and most developed cities of the world has led us to conclude that no, the mobile connectivity/bandwidth issue isn’t just going to solve itself on a global level anywhere in the near future.” There are many times when we experience temporary disconnections or slow services, especially on mobile devices.
Last, but not least it’s also important to consider accessibility first approach. With so much talk about responsive design and mobile first, many do not realize that people with disabilities make the largest minority with significant spending power and yet is the most ignored. Accessibility is not limited to coding only or to certain individuals with disabilities – it benefits everyone and needs to be implemented from the beginning through various phases of a project. Even if a website is designed and coded with accessibility in mind, it may become less accessible if not maintained properly as explained in one of my articles, Accessibility – Universal Design.
I look forward to collaborating with more businesses who care about user needs and to seeing more websites and applications that can be viewed on any device, provide valuable content, are easy to use and access anywhere, anytime, and by anyone.