As you can imagine, the method one uses to set up a site’s layout can have a profound impact on a users experience of that site. Just how rigid or flexible your site is can impact how comfortable your user feels viewing that site and (depending on the viewer’s answer to that all important question) can increase or decrease how frequently that user visits your site.
If the number of users begins to decline, one will find it necessary to go back to the beginning and see how you can make the site more user friendly. There are two main layouts and we will be taking a good look at them in this article.
The rigid design has been used since the beginning, and while it does have some strengths, it also has many weaknesses. In the rapidly-changing environment of web design, both of these layouts must be looked into very carefully.
Many web design artists in east London love working with a rigid layout system because it gives them such control over the final ‘look’ of the website, and that over a wide range of platforms, monitors and viewing systems. Another strength of the rigid system is that since it is based upon precise measurements, it usually creates web pages that can print particularly well.
Sometimes, however, that which is seen as a strength is really a weakness. For instance, if the user’s monitor resolution is larger than your site, your site will end up occupying only a small part on the monitor. This is wasteful, and does not give the user the right idea of your site. The rigid design is also useless if the user’s monitor is smaller than your site, thus forcing the user to scroll in both directions to get even part of your message. This is not an enjoyable viewing experience.
Perhaps worst of all (for a rigid layout website design) is its inability to adapt to mobile devices that perhaps can change the orientation of a page based upon the way in which the user holds the device. This is where a newer layout system comes in. This is the fluid layout in which measurements in the site are not based upon rigid measurements at all but rather upon a system of percentages.
A column posted on your site, rather than measuring a precise area of length and breadth, will measure a percentage of the available screen area. This makes your website more adaptable and includes almost all monitor resolutions, as well as mobile devices.
The fluid layout’s most important application is based around mobile devices. The screens allow a site to be oriented upon how a user holds the device. If a user holds it so that the screen is tall rather than broad, the site will go into portrait mode, adapting itself to this orientation. If the user changes the way the device is held, the site also changes to adapt to the new condition. It is advisable for web designers in east London to go toward the fluid layout, or even a combination of the rigid and fluid.