pop art

[David Cantrell]

On Wed, Sep 02, 2015 at 05:12:58PM +0100, C E Macfarlane wrote:

> Yes, for example, for security reasons, and a number of mobile browsers do
> not support JavaScript:
> 	http://quirksmode.org/m/table.html

Name one that is commonly used by consumers in the UK.

> >     And if you have deliberately turned it off (either by configuration or
> >     by using some hopelessly crippled browser that doesn't implement it),
> >     then that's your choice.
> As above, it may actually have been the platform manufacturer's choice.

True. But then you chose a crippled platform instead of just a crippled
browser.

> > The BBC can't take account of every possible weird thing that users do.
> They can very easily ensure that their content loads on as many different
> devices as possible by ensuring that their content is as simple as possible.

Perhaps they should send you the shooting script instead of letting you
watch Dr Who on iPlayer then.

> 	:-(	Do not use JS, PHP, etc to edit content according to the platform
> making the request, rather keep the content simple enough to load properly
> on any platform.

Trouble is that means that you're dumbing your application down to the
lowest common denominator. I'm sure that the handful of people using
Acorns and Amigas and WAP browsers on their Nokia 8110s will be
grateful, but the overwhelming majority will just be pissed off that
you've delivered something that is so horribly backward compared to the
much better experience they get from everywhere else.

> > You might as well complain that you can't
> > watch the TV because you chose to glue some socks to the screen.
> It is not what the user may be doing wrong that is under discussion here,
> but what the BBC is doing wrong.  See below ...

No, it really is the user choosing to limit their experience.

> > I presume you would agree that it is a Good Thing to try to send
> > appropriate stuff to the various different platforms?
> 
> NO!!!  NO!!!  NO!!!  That is the WHOLE POINT!!!  It's a BAD, BAD, BAD thing
> to try to send appropriate content to different platforms!!!  That way lies
> an insane and bloody mess and a site maintenance nightmare!!!

Not really, not if you do it carefully.

> You need to read up about Object-Orientating-Programming (OOP) in general
> and Model-View-Controller (MVC) in particular, both of which are key
> concepts to good GUI design.

Yes dear. Do you also give your grandmother egg-sucking lessons?

> http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/a-z
> http://www.macfh.co.uk/JavaJive/AudioVisualTV/TerrestrialTV/TerrestrialCalcu
> lator.php
> 
> The BBC Programmes A-Z page previously linked comes out at 0.02, while the
> most complicated page on my own site, which calculates from user input which
> direction to point a TV aerial, and draws maps of and a vertical terrain
> profile along the resulting signal path, comes out at 0.16.  This is a
> massive difference, the more so when you consider that, unlike my own page
> which works very hard for its living, the BBC page's content is essentially
> static, it never needs to change!

One of those works well on my phone and quickly gets me the information
I want, the other is an ugly mess that requires all kinds of scrolling
up and down and left and right. So much for your GUI design skills. It's
almost as if the BBC's one was intended to work well across multiple
platforms and had some thought put into the design, and you just didn't
give a toss.

Perhaps you're the one who needs to go and read about OOP etc, although
personally speaking I don't find my in-depth knowledge to be much use
when it comes to GUIs. Far better IME to out-source the work to someone
who knows GUI design and implementation.

-- 
David Cantrell | Hero of the Information Age

Only some sort of ghastly dehumanised moron would want to get
rid of Routemasters
    -- Ken Livingstone, four years before he got rid of 'em