Web Design & SEO Articles

Apart from a few minor tweaks needed here and there, the long-awaited revamp to my website is finally online. The feedback has been constructive (hint - ask your family and friends to take a look, you'll be surprised what they come back with).

So why after years of me transforming my fluid, fits-on-any-resolution website and bleating on in the forums that fluid design is best and anyone who thinks otherwise should be quickly shooed away before causing any real embarrassment to themselves? Well for a few reasons really:

• Easier to Develop: With fixed width pages, the only thing you really need to test for is that you do not get the dreaded horizontal scroll bars at the smallest possible resolution. with more fluid layouts, you also have to test that the site doesn't look ridiculous and unreadable at multiple resolutions. This saves time and money.


• Bigger screens: The most commonly used resolution has increased to 1024 x 768, and screens are still getting bigger. My main screen is 1280 x 768 and one guy at WebProWorld boasts of 1680 x 1050! But a website that expands the entire space of a larger screen will stretch to fit the page and look ridiculous.
  
  As a workaround to take up all that excessive space, a seamless background or gentle colour can make up the space and even bring the fixed page to life. Storvite Ltd's London skyline background adds to their branding and makes a nice feature regardless of resolution.



• Easier to Read: Despite all these massive screens and large resolutions, the irony is that its very difficult to read font on a screen. The eyes have to work much harder, compared to reading type on paper. Therefore it is also very easy to lose your place. Fixing the width of any textual content is the least you can do to encourage your visitors to read your content.


• Different Media Styles: The big argument has always been "If you have a fluid website, it will be compatible on a handheld device" (eg Mobile or PDA). But it is pretty easy (and quick) to set up a separate stylesheet for different medias. This ensures that your site will be accessible for the PC, Print or the steadily increasing smaller-screened audience.

I do not just think for these reasons, fixed is best and if a client wanted me to create a fluid site for them, by all means I would (I am currently developing a combination of free and fixed for a client). But I am also finding that certainly my recent clientele are favouring fixed width pages over fluid ones.

At the moment this page (and I'm going to hate myself for this next comment:) is developed for browsers on an 800 x 600 resolution. But through regular analysis of my website, this may change sooner than you think.