Responsive Design Part 2
Rafael Basso
UX/UI Designer at Upland Altify | UX/UI Design Mentor | Designer and Content Creator at Design Relax
Desktop First
Currently, designers and web developers are confronting an enormous issue before initiating their projects.
Desktop or mobile-first?
We already discussed the Mobile-First idea, click here to check it out.
Today we will talk about the desktop first and its pros and cons.
The desktop first was the only way to design a website before the responsive tendencies.
Why should we employ this concept?
It is easier to create first for a big screen in view of the fact that if you start from the biggest width you can just remove information when the screen gets smaller and diagram the elements again.
By doing the opposite it will be harder to insert content from a narrow width to a big one, so basically you will see all major features at once.
You can also recognize the number of possibilities you have by working first on a large screen size by including elements that will be unnecessary on a mobile device.
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It will enhance the user experience.
Desktop first is also a clever idea when we talk about click x tap, we should consider the fact that the mouse is more precise in comparison with a human finger.
It is crucial to comprehend how browsers will work, therefore, if you have all elements on screen then removing visual extra information will be easier to increase the size of the tapping area.
Another truth to point out is some users still prefer Desktop rather than mobiles for multiple reasons, so it is reasonable to create first thinking in old browsers with a lack of support for modern features and just after inserting some brand new technologies.
Sometimes your project does not need mobile support.
Let’s picture the following scenario:
You are creating a portal for a company, however, it is only just for the employees to access during working hours from the company’s devices, the access will be denied from any other network or device.
Considering that probably 99% of the people are still working on regular jobs eight hours per day in front of a desktop computer, why do we have to be worried about mobile?
It will be straightforward to wrap up the project.
With modern CSS features, we can choose if we will work with grids, flexbox, etc. Desktop first is easier to define limits, you can pick the width that fits you better, in addition, when we are talking about mobile it is impossible.