Developing Website Pages for Smartphones
Smartphone limitations The Smartphone does not have all the features of a desktop PC – however with some ingenuity it can provide important information to the user. The Smartphone has two major limitations – the width of the screen (about 320 pixels to 640 for the iPhone 5) and the lack of a keyboard. The designer needs to work around these limitations. Input Limitations As to the character input limitations – the numbers 0 through 9 and A through Z can be entered via command buttons or a dropdown. Screen Size The height of the screen is not a problem, as the user can scroll down. The screen width limitation is not as limiting as it first seems. The font size which is acceptable on a PC needs to be reduced for viewing on a Smartphone. Hence more information can fit across the screen. The user also has the option to pan and zoom – but this should be kept to a minimum. Meta tags and CSS The HTML Meta tag “viewport” (introduced by Apple, but supported by...