Mobile browser support

[ameeck]

phpBB4 should have a full support for mobile and portable browsers.

The session handler should be able to detect a mobile session and have a method available to check this status. There should be a possibility to override this and display the full board through a link. An alternate low-res style should be packed, containing only crucial information and content. Features like moderation, user management and administration would not be available through the mobile interface. Posting interfaces would be very simple and things like BBCode menus and smilies would be omitted.

When you browse your board on a mobile phone, you usually just want to check new posts and post a quick reply. The index page of the board would show some useful links like:

• New topics
• New posts in subscribed topics

[Dog Cow]

One also doesn't want to have to scroll horizontally. That is so annoying and one of the biggest problems of web browsing on the iPod touch.

Also, an email digest would help to save time when reading for new posts.

[Gaw]

It's really hard to tell how should a mobile version look like. Mobile phones are getting better and better. I'd love to have a possibility to manage a board using my mobile phone, of course I'm talking about one with a decent screen resolution. Same for the graphics, why bother when browsers like Opera Mini can show them in low-res already? PhpBB4 is still years from now, so we can't really tell how will the future look like.

[Dog Cow]

Problem is: mobile browsers are getting bigger and better; mobile screens are not getting bigger.

[Un1matr1x]

Problem is: mobile browsers are getting bigger and better; mobile screens are not getting bigger.

are you sure?

to to

and we cann't know what the future will bring ...

and afaik you can use

Code: Select all

media="screen"
media="handheld"

for css-files for mobile use

best regards

Un1

[DavidIQ]

So you're only going to cater to the 1-5% of the world that will have a laptop-sized mobile phone in their pockets when phpBB4 rolls out? I don't think that should be the focus of the mobile browser support if it were to be added in phpBB4. It should be a simple interface without any bells and whistles that will fit on a standard-sized phone's web browser. There are a LOT of sites that do it this way: Bank of America, PayPal, Quicken.com, etc.


So I think we should follow a similar style/format as they do and keep it simple.

[ameeck]

DavidIQ: +1

Rendering, bandwidth etc. will get better and better. Physical screen sizes won't get bigger.

[ToonArmy]

DavidIQ: +1

Rendering, bandwidth etc. will get better and better. Physical screen sizes won't get bigger.

Unless pockets get bigger.

[carlino1994]

This is very good.

[EXreaction]

It could probably be done easy enough with an alternate stylesheet for the main style.