I launched a new theme on the site 2 weeks ago. I Mentioned at the time a new technology. I have switched to a responsive design theme. If you are not familiar with responsive design it is: (wiki pedia)
Responsive Web Design (RWD) essentially indicates that a web site is crafted to use Cascading Style Sheets 3 media queries, an extension of the
@mediarule, with fluid proportion-based grids (which use percentages and EMs instead of pixels), to adapt the layout to the viewing environment, and probably also use flexible images. As a result, users across a broad range of devices and browsers will have access to a single source of content, laid out so as to be easy to read and navigate with a minimum of resizing, panning, and scrolling.
Essentially it is a fluid layout that works with may screen sizes (tablets, phones, browser, etc…). By using a responsive designed site you no-longer need to tailer a site to a specific device or screen size. The layout can shift to accommodate. See this example below. Prior to this theme I was using the wp-touch plugin to allow the blog to display on mobile devices. That theme handled the navigation and had a specific layout and design for phones. With the new responsive design (on right) you can see that the same look / feel and layout are re-used
The Wp-touch plugin is great. I am not saying I did not like it, it is just a different method to get to mobile. Recently, I have been doing more mobile development and also more mobile websites. I have found that you can spend twice as much time focusing on mobile and the main web design. If you use a responsive based framework or design you can tailor the experience to multiple screen sizes and platforms.
As I looked at the stats of my site, I saw that the majority of non PC devices were iPads. The previous template did not look too good on a tablet. This new theme does a much better job.
I selected a free template from Onedesigns (Onedesigns.com) called Esplanade
http://www.onedesigns.com/wordpress-themes/esplanade-free-wordpress-theme
I often use Eleganthemes as my theme vendor of choice but the Esplanade theme really looked clean and did what I wanted. Often a theme for word press is tailored to a type of site. Since jimiz.net is just a blog I only wanted limited options.
My next step is to do some more customization and modifications. I have to add my about.me page links and also adjust the url. I will be removing the sub-directory of /blog and going to just the root of jimiz.net.
If you have any feedback please let me know your thoughts. I have attached some images from a tablet and mobile view.
