Documentation on website should use variable width

[dpsanders]

The documentation content is great! But is would be useful if the width of the text could be variable, not fixed.

[pao]

cc @nolta

[nolta]

Any particular reason? With the current width each line has about 100 chars, which is considered the upper limit for readability.

[ViralBShah]

I know a lot of people prefer to have long widths, even though I agree that 100 chars ought to be the upper limit. People are often on small screens and such. A fluid width would be nice, and I have found myself wanting that at times too.

[dpsanders]

Yes, exactly. "Responsive web design" is the key here -- who knows on which
device of what size, at what distance from the screen
(and possibly with what visual disability) people will want to read the
docs.
I should be able to choose how I want to read it, not have somebody else
decide for me what the "standard" width "should" be!

On Thu, Aug 1, 2013 at 12:29 AM, Viral B. Shah notifications@github.comwrote:

I know a lot of people prefer to have long widths, even though I agree
that 100 chars ought to be the upper limit. People are often on small
screens and such. A fluid width would be nice, and I have found myself
wanting that at times too.

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHubhttps://github.com//issues/3832#issuecomment-21915408
.

Dr. David P. Sanders

Profesor Titular "A" / Associate Professor
Departamento de Física, Facultad de Ciencias
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)

dpsanders@gmail.com
http://sistemas.fciencias.unam.mx/~dsanders

Cubículo / office: #414, 4o. piso del Depto. de Física

Tel.: +52 55 5622 4965

[johnmyleswhite]

Maybe worth noting that GitHub imposes a minimum width for non-mobile devices. If you meet that minimum, the display will expand, but you can't go below it. Mobile devices see a totally separate design, which is appropriate for their restricted width.

[dpsanders]

OK, good point.
However, it seems to me that they (think that) they need a certain minimum
width for their complicated layout, whereas a "simple" doc page is much
less dependent on having a minimum width, or at least the minimum width can
be much less.

On Thu, Aug 1, 2013 at 11:07 AM, John Myles White
notifications@github.comwrote:

Maybe worth noting that GitHub imposes a minimum width for non-mobile
devices. If you meet that minimum, the display will expand, but you can't
go below it. Mobile devices see a totally separate design, which is
appropriate for their restricted width.

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHubhttps://github.com//issues/3832#issuecomment-21947960
.

Dr. David P. Sanders

Profesor Titular "A" / Associate Professor
Departamento de Física, Facultad de Ciencias
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)

dpsanders@gmail.com
http://sistemas.fciencias.unam.mx/~dsanders

Cubículo / office: #414, 4o. piso del Depto. de Física

Tel.: +52 55 5622 4965

[johnmyleswhite]

For me, the big issue is whether you can display a whole code block without line wrapping. We probably don't have long enough examples to need the amount of space GitHub uses, but we should be careful about this. If we can ensure that wrapping is handled correctly, adopting a more fluid width seems good to me.

[nolta]

@dpsanders I can't resist pointing out that your very own website sets width: 900px.

[dpsanders]

@nolta I am well aware that my website needs a complete overhaul -- I am planning to move to bootstrap just as soon as I can find the time.

The difference is that the other day I sat down for half an hour or an hour to read through a lot of documentation pages on the julia website, whereas nobody looks at my website for more than 5 minutes (if at all...)

[vtjnash]

a significant fraction of websites are fixed width (like ours, github, ny times) because it can enhance readability. neither style is 'more correct', so it is generally left up to the layout designer to make a decision that fits bests with the overall 'feel' of the website.

since there haven't been any new actions in a month, i'm closing this as invalid/won't fix, with a note that it would more applicable to open this on the julialang repository.