secrets of responsive web design by sameera thilakasiri

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Secrets of Responsive Web Design

Formula for Fluid/ Responsive Layout

by Sameera Thilakasiri | www.sameerast.com | Twitter @ sameerast

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It can be any device.


Picture from internet

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Introduction• Still developing websites for the standard screen resolution

(1024x768)? Stop that! It makes you look foolish in the changing world of the Web.

• Responsive Web Design is like a shiny new toy for designers and developers. It is difficult to overestimate the importance of sensible design, as it ensures that any website will look good on different screen resolutions. I think everyone will agree with me that the first thing every designer worth his salt should do is get familiar with web design response.


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Its called responsive design


Picture from internet

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How to create a flexible grid• Using a flexible, forget style fixed width and centered on the

content. This means that all elements of our design is resized in correlation. The basic idea of a fluid grid to use this formula for the calculation of the percentage proportions of design.

target / context = result

.sidebar {width:31.5%;

}


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Pixel to EM• The same formula works for fonts. We stop using pixel sizes

based on the time we use em or percentages.

14 pixels - the body font size;21 pixels - the H1 font size;21 ⁄ 14 = 1.5 Your CSS will look like:h1 {

font-size:1.5em;}


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Fluid images• Using images of fluids causes the block size setting father. The main

idea is to use unobvious properties {max-width: 100%}. An image with img {max-width: 100%} will never get out of your head unit. If the die block is less than the size of img then the image is reduced proportionally. This principle applies to images, objects and video.

• The usage of fluid images causes the adjustment of the size to the parent block. The main idea is in the unobvious usage of the properties of {max-width: 100%}. An image with img {max-width: 100%} will never come out from its parent unit. If the parent block is smaller than the size of img then the image is reduced proportionally. This principle applies to images,objects and video. Inaddition to that {display: block;} is used to avoid parent float issues. Keep in mind media query can be excuted only at latest browsers as it is part of CSS3.


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Flexible images• A better solution is to use context-aware image sizing. This

technique basically consists of having different sizes of an image, and displaying only the size adapted to the device. Quick example:

<img src="image.jpg" data-src-600px="image-600px.jpg" data-src-800px="image-800px.jpg" alt=""> And the related CSS:

@media (min-device-width:600px) { img[data-src-600px] { content: attr(data-src-600px, url); } }


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Should know about Media Queries• Media inquiries are necessary in order to show the optimized

layout for the very resolution, which at the time was surfed the site. It is a part of the CSS standard, which allows to apply styles based on information about the device resolution.

@media screen and (mas-width:980px){/*styles*/

}


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Widespread pixel width• The most widespread pixel widths are:

320px(iPhone portrait, default), 480px (iPhone landscape), 600px, 768px(iPad portrait), 900px, 1024px (iPad landscape).

• I strongly recommend to consider all these screen resolutions if you want to make your design a responsive one.


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How does it look in practice?• The first step we should do is to include a meta tag "viewport"

into <head> to tell the browser that this webpage is optimized for mobile.

<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">


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jQuery is your friend• jQuery is definitely a super useful tool when it comes to web

development. Lots of jQuery plugins can help you to create better responsive websites.A quick round up of my personal favorites:

• FitText: A plugin that makes font-sizes flexible.• Elastislide: A responsive jQuery carousel plugin.• Supersized: A full screen background slideshow plugin.• FitVids: A lightweight, easy-to-use jQuery plugin for fluid

width video embeds.


http://fittextjs.com/

http://tympanus.net/codrops/2011/09/12/elastislide-responsive-carousel/

http://buildinternet.com/project/supersized/

http://fitvidsjs.com/

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Thank you


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AuthorSameera Thilakasiri is a website designer based in Colombo. Specialist in UI, UX, SEO, IA, IxD, RWD. He is blogging technical areas while is leisure. He can be reached by http://www.sameerast.com


https://plus.google.com/111681059766080908127?rel=author