Pony: Easier way to access mobile site

December 22, 2009 12:44 PM

Pony: An easier way to revert to the mobile site. Current link is 1. tiny and 2. all the way at the bottom.

Also, it would be nice if I could search and post from the mobile site, in that order of importance.

Thanks for the mobile site! It rocks, and is one of the best mobile versions of a site I've seen to date.

posted by Nameless to Feature Requests at 12:44 PM (13 comments total)

Do you find yourself switching between the standard and mobile site frequently? And do you frequently need to search from your phone? The link is tiny and out of the way because we didn't see it being used enough to warrant it being loud and in your face at all times.

I know everyone is going to use the mobile site in different ways, I'm just wondering how common switching back and forth between mobile and standard is.
posted by pb (staff) at 12:50 PM on December 22, 2009

What link?
posted by motty at 12:58 PM on December 22, 2009

If you visit the site on an iPhone or Android phone there's a link at the bottom of every page to view the standard version of the site. Once you click that link, you see the standard version and there's a link to go back to the mobile version in the footer. It's in the 2nd column of the footer under "Links".
posted by pb (staff) at 1:02 PM on December 22, 2009

Do you find yourself switching between the standard and mobile site frequently?

Yes, mainly for searching and posting, but I think there are some other features that are not available in the mobile site.

And do you frequently need to search from your phone?

Yes, more often than from my desktop.

The link is tiny and out of the way because we didn't see it being used enough to warrant it being loud and in your face at all times.

The site uses client detection to automatically default to the mobile site for mobile devices. It could use the same method to choose to display a link at the top of the page. This is the way I've seen it done on several sites.

(The link at the bottom should stay even if this is implemented, to make the mobile site available to people for whom client sniffing fails or who want to see the mobile site on a computer.)

I know everyone is going to use the mobile site in different ways, I'm just wondering how common switching back and forth between mobile and standard is.

The standard site will probably continue to have some features that the mobile site doesn't, a reasonable limitation. As long as this is true, users who need one of those features often will be switching back and forth a lot.
posted by Nameless at 2:07 PM on December 22, 2009

@pb: "Current link is 1. tiny and 2. all the way at the bottom."
posted by Nameless at 2:08 PM on December 22, 2009

Just to be clear, the link to switch to the standard site is excellent and does not need any changes, IMO. It is the link to switch back to the mobile version that I have a problem with.
posted by Nameless at 2:08 PM on December 22, 2009

Oh, I just realized that the link to switch to mobile is already displayed only for mobile clients.
posted by Nameless at 2:09 PM on December 22, 2009

I also find myself searching quite a bit on the mobile site, but I tend to use a site-specific google search to do so.
posted by ocherdraco at 2:19 PM on December 22, 2009

Thanks for the extra info, Nameless. We'll give it some thought and discuss making the link more prominent.
posted by pb (staff) at 2:48 PM on December 22, 2009

If you are on an iPhone, an earlier MetaTalk thread mentioned a bookmarklet that would allow you to scroll to the bottom in a few taps. I probably couldn't live without it.
posted by meowzilla at 3:08 PM on December 22, 2009

If you're on an iPhone, tap the time to go to the top, then "Skip to menu" to go to the bottom. I'd use bookmarks in your position, for the search, mobile, & standard links.
posted by Pronoiac at 7:46 PM on December 22, 2009

Wow. And I was gonna MeMail one of the mods a few days ago "hey, how do I revert to the mobile site?" Now I feel stupid. But grateful! Small link tons better than no link!
posted by ClarissaWAM at 10:50 AM on December 23, 2009

ClarissaWAM, no it's one of those things that you have to look up where it is and then flip the switch. I'm hesitant to add a giant box to every page that says, "Looks like you're viewing the standard site on a mobile device, CLICK HERE to go back to mobile" because that feels like an annoying clippy-style thing to do.

The user took the action to go back to standard, they know they're out of mobile-land, and we're showing them the site *exactly* as everyone else sees it except for the addition of a single unobtrusive link. Some people want to skip the mobile interface altogether and leave it that way forever—a note would get annoying.

If you do need to do a lot of switching back and forth a bookmark as Pronoiac mentioned is a great idea. That would put the switch front and center for you.
posted by pb (staff) at 12:19 PM on December 23, 2009