[RFC] Include mobile style

[callumacrae]

Oh, IPB seem to have a new one.

vBulletin (and the old IPB skin) use jQuery Mobile. I want to use jQuery Mobile, so if you class vB as being able to navigate fine then that's what the phpBB one will be like.

[Erik Frèrejean]

Sure it is navigable, however it is really unacceptable how it looks for something that is officially shipped.

Javascript should only be used to enhance the user experience, I'm -1 on something that doesn't work (properly) without javascript.

If this is done, then please do it properly.

[callumacrae]

Of the top 5 sites on the Alexa 500, 3 of them - the top three, in fact - rely on JavaScript. I can provide more statistics showing that your views are unusual, if you want. Can you provide any to prove me wrong, that it is wrong to rely on JavaScript?

How about a mobile style that says "You do not have JS enabled, please enable it or click here to go to the full style"?

[Danielx64]

Of the top 5 sites on the Alexa 500, 3 of them - the top three, in fact - rely on JavaScript. I can provide more statistics showing that your views are unusual, if you want. Can you provide any to prove me wrong, that it is wrong to rely on JavaScript?

How about a mobile style that says "You do not have JS enabled, please enable it or click here to go to the full style"?

No for heven shake, listen to Arty!

JavaScript should be used only to enhance user experience. CSS should be used for styling. Period. I don't understand why you are even debating this.

[callumacrae]

That's an opinion, and an opinion that I believe stopped being widely regarded as true about five years ago.

Again, can you provide any statistics showing that you're right?

[callumacrae]

IE 6 and 7 have between them an approximately 10% market share. phpBB does not support those two browsers.

According to statistics that I have been collecting on a few websites I manage over the past few days (using a script tag and an image tag), a little over 2% of mobile traffic doesn't support JavaScript.


I really don't understand your case here, short of repeating the old view of "But JavaScript is just a toy!!1"


EDIT: I finally found some decent statistics... http://stats.wikimedia.org/wikimedia/sq ... lients.htm

"Browsers, other mobile"

I don't know half the browsers, but I know that the first five support JavaScript. That's 97.92% of their mobile traffic.

[Arty]

IE 6 and 7 have between them an approximately 10% market share. phpBB does not support those two browsers.

Really? That's news to me. phpBB 3.0, which is a release branch, fully supports IE6 and 7. phpBB 3.1, which is a development branch, supports IE7, with exception of rounded corners.

edit: it is 6% on wikimedia stats that you linked to, not 10.

Again, can you provide any statistics showing that you're right?

Can you provide any statistics to the contrary? I've yet to see anything that proves that it is acceptable for software company to cut corners and instead of developing style correct way, go with third party library that requires users to have JS that has nothing to do with styling.

So far you've linked browser stats that do not show how many of those browsers have JavaScript support enabled (just because browser can support it, doesn't mean it is enabled), some websites from Alexa that have nothing to do with forums, forum software (vBulletin) that people are abandoning in masses because new developers decided to cut corners on everything for sake of making quick buck and latest version is a total mess.

[Senky]

I don't know half the browsers, but I know that the first five support JavaScript. That's 97.92% of their mobile traffic.

It is not about they support JS, it is about wether they USE javascript. A lot mobile phones have it disabled because of big batery consumption.

[callumacrae]

Okay, I'm going to stop arguing with you, because you're clearly not reading my posts >_<

Are you volunteering to develop a style that doesn't require JS and improves on Prosilver on mobiles?


Also, why not just only enable the mobile style on browsers that have JavaScript enabled?

[Erik Frèrejean]

Of the top 5 sites on the Alexa 500, 3 of them - the top three, in fact - rely on JavaScript.

Half of the top 10 sites work without javascript so I don't think that this is a conclusive argument. Besides that I don't think that the "top" sites on Alexa are a fair comparison, non of them have actually anything to do with forum software. What works for a "google" doesn't have to work for a bulletin board.
[offtopic]Also if we are going to use Alexa to define what to do we just as well can drop "fancy urls" as well as most of those sites don't use them [/offtopic]

We're in the business here to create the best forum software we can, do you really believe that implementing a half hearted solution like the vB is the result of trying to produce the best forum software?

Sure it is navigable, however it is really unacceptable how it looks for something that is officially shipped.

Really, for me something like that is unacceptable for the core product.