
I am not a css hacker but please HN change your css. smartphone experience suck - topac
http://pastie.org/8255933
======
edandersen
The joke is that max-scale and initial-scale set to 1.0 in the viewport meta
tag would probably be all that's needed to make HN better on mobile.

~~~
6cxs2hd6
Yes, but unfortunately that would be a quick, effective solution. In no way
does it entail startups being accelerated into making mobile apps that disrupt
some trivial aspect of daily life.

As "Ricardo Montalban" used to say on SNL, it is better to look good than to
feel good. Likewise it is better to reinvent the wheel than to fix it.

------
homosaur
I'm resigned to the fact this website will never improve at all.

~~~
icefox
Not only will they not make the website better they are incentivised to not
make it better. With the current look/feel/behavior be it good or bad they
have grown because of it. Any change they make is likely to make the number of
users go down. And as much as the users care about quality the owners metric
is always number of users so why change it if it is "working". I am on the
watch for a new social tech news site that is optimized first for mobile to
replace HN which I am 100% sure will be made and I will switch to at some
point in the future.

~~~
redthrowaway
HN isn't really a commercial venture. It has some pretty significant benefits
for YC, but pg's mostly opposed to trying to grow the site. In fact, he seems
to more or less resent the growth that has happened due to the concomitant
decline in overall quality.

Even if you were consider only the benefits YC gets from HN (exposure for YC
companies, recruiting, and cachet), the benefits to the first from larger
crowds are, I'd bet, offset by the slow dispersion of high-value members that
has accompanied the drop in quality we've seen over the last couple years.

I'd be willing to bet that HN would probably serve YC's purposes better with
5,000 - 10,000 users than with 50,000 - 100,000.

~~~
homosaur
I agree with you but I think doing things like eliminating table layout and
having some sort of improved experience on mobile would not affect usership at
all. You could keep the look and feel the same. There are profound technical
issues with the site that affect everyone that could literally be addressed in
an afternoon if anyone cared.

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iaskwhy
Best mobile HN, by far: [http://hn.premii.com/](http://hn.premii.com/)

~~~
Ives
Doesn't appear to work on my lumia 800. Just says "Loading..." infinitely.

~~~
tunnuz
Same here :/ however typically stuff loads weirdly on Internet Explorer for
Windows Phone (on WP7 at least).

~~~
dubcanada
It doesn't work for IE9. The author built it with HTML5 stuff, so sadly the
IE9 WP7 won't work.

But you should be used to that for mobile websites, people kinda just build
for WebKit on mobile.

~~~
harrytuttle
Webkit is the mobile IE6 if you ask me. Very narrow minded design and testing
from the people who usually bitch about IE6.

Oh the irony.

~~~
publicfig
I don't understand the basis for that position and don't think it's true at
all. Why do you think that's comparable at all?

~~~
harrytuttle
Granted it works better but it's still developing for one platform only and
excluding others.

Remember when sites were "optimised for IE". Well we're there again but it's
not IE.

~~~
thekingshorses
Actually, this was build for HTML5 browser to see if i can build native like
experience. This works great on desktop and Mobile IE10/11\. I was also told
that this works on latest blackberry and Firefox OS.

------
digitalengineer
Use the Mobile Github page:
[http://cheeaun.github.io/hackerweb/](http://cheeaun.github.io/hackerweb/)

~~~
hnha
It's a blank white page in opera mobile whereas the normal hn style works
pretty.

~~~
cheeaun
That's weird. I'll be looking into it.

~~~
hnha
before you waste time with some "software that does exist, just like there
never was a matrix sequel", I use opera mobile classic or what's it called.

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spion
Actually, changing the CSS is not necessary. All that is needed are a couple
of meta tags (viewport) in the head and switching textareas to css-based
relative width instead of using cols...

~~~
topac
yeah

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JonnieCache
I'm pretty sure at this point that HN's markup is the way it is out of sheer
bloody-mindedness :)

~~~
hyperventilator
Or pg is trying to slow the site down to delay Eternal September. Keeping it
painful to use on mobile would seem to accomplish that.

------
rubyn00bie
I think it looks fine. Everytime someone wants to make a mobile experience
better, I want to kill a kitten.

More often than not it makes vastly worse. Why can't people just keep it to
themselves.

Steve Jobs and Co. gave me a real browser so I didn't have to use a sub-par
web. Now everyone is forcing it on me anyway. Stop. Please stop. Half of the
websites I use have been ruined by responsive, and or enhancing, the mobile
experience (GitHub and StackOverflow are worthless with their mobile defaults,
text cannot be read because it overflows and zoom is disabled, formatting
looks like shit).

Why, dear world, must people insist on fixing things that are not broken?

~~~
publicfig
Are you against bad mobile implementations or just mobile implementations
altogether? This seems like a weird position to take. It's not easy to read
through comments and stories on most mobile browsers. It requires you to
either squint to read the headlines or scroll horizontally just to read across
the lines. That is a broken user experience.

~~~
rubyn00bie
I've actually found pinching and zooming to be more than adequate... And even
a bit of squinting I find acceptable because it lets me easily skim a page for
content. When I have to scroll forever just to find the content I'm looking
for its frustrating and a waste of my time.

Or news websites that start hiding the actual content on mobile, so you're
forced to "tap" the headline to even read the summary.

Or in the case of github or stack overflow, the formatting is so illegible, I
can't believe they released 'em. They've made it harder to read.

Mobile is about fast access. Letting me get my information on the go... When
mobile is a different experience it craps on that goal because I cannot access
information as fast. I must now learn this new thing; which, is a the opposite
of why I have a smartphone (fast information).

For my use cases is vastly worse. The desktop versions of most sites have more
features and allow for faster access of information. Maybe I have to zoom in,
that's okay! It's a better experience in the end.

------
nightwolf
And cue the comments where it says HN is just fine and nothing about it never
ever needs to be changed and every change you could possibly make to it would
just make it worse and you just don't know how to use your phone and so on...

FWIW, I'm partial to HackerWeb
([http://cheeaun.github.io/hackerweb/](http://cheeaun.github.io/hackerweb/))
on the iPhone and [http://hckrnews.com/](http://hckrnews.com/) on the desktop
myself.

~~~
wvl
Note that you can use HackerWeb for the comments on hckrnews.com by going to
settings.

------
sid-
Try ihackernews.com

------
ciucanu
Have you tried any mobile app? There are a lot of great apps for HackerNews. I
use HackerNews2 for my Android device and HackerNode for my iPhone.

~~~
topac
That's the point, a whole app (maybe useless) because of the lack of 10 css
lines.

~~~
ciucanu
For me is cooler this way, because it offers visibility on app list and when I
have a few free moments, I look at my phone apps and I say "Great, let's see
what's new on HN" :D .

~~~
masklinn
Your phone is not able to put page shortcuts on the homescreen or whatever?

~~~
ciucanu
That's not the point :D. It works better than a simple bookmark, with slide to
change from page to comments, etc.

~~~
masklinn
> That's not the point

I fail to see how it could be anything else. You previously stated:

> it offers visibility on app list and when I have a few free moments, I look
> at my phone apps and I say "Great, let's see what's new on HN"

I do not know about you — hence the interrogative — but I can (and do) put
bookmarks on my home screens, right next to applications and thus with the
exact same visibility.

------
csbartus
Hacker News redesigns and mobile apps are popping up almost weekly here at HN
.... I'm trying all them out.

Yet still using the original. Being a designer I was always thinking what
makes this ugly design so time resistant.

One single answer comes to my mind: the character of its creator.

~~~
c2prods
I think this "ugly design" as you say is resistant because it is a good
design. It's functionnal and as such, I don't see any reason why it should
change. A good design is a design we can read easily and use easily. For
instance, I find Designer News far less easy to read than HN. HN's design
might be ugly but it's convenient and it's all what matters. I agree that HN
could have a better mobile experience. But the current design works
particularly well on desktop.

~~~
iSnow
>A good design is a design we can read easily and use easily

HN on mobile achives neither.

~~~
c2prods
I agree, I was talking about the desktop version. I just wanted to say that
the so-called "ugliness" of HN's design has nothing to do with the fact it's
not convenient on mobile.

------
Wilya
I much prefer the current HN smartphone experience to some stupid thing that
displays one comment at a time in a huge font and is missing half the options.

It _does_ suck on non-smartphones phones, but nobody cares about that anyway.

~~~
thedrbrian
It looks fine on the iPhone 5
[http://imgur.com/i3fEdol](http://imgur.com/i3fEdol)

No massive text size , more than 5 words per line ,etc

~~~
rwg
The default HN experience isn't so great on Android's browser...

[http://i.imgur.com/TEUoGrT.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/TEUoGrT.jpg)

~~~
hnha
double-tap to zoom and all is good.

------
Trezoid
While it doesn't really help mobile users much, I have a rather buggy
userscript that converts the horrible HN markup to something actually
workable.

If anyone where interested, I could finish it relatively quickly...

------
bliker
I suggest to do what 4chan has done some time ago. Rewrite the css & html in
modern fashion optimized for all devices but keep the style the same.

~~~
topac
I'm checking the mobile version right now. The "4chan-feeling" is conserved
and the site is simple and readable without the need to zoom or scroll r/l

------
dredmorbius
My commentary on this matter:

[http://stylebot.me/styles/2945](http://stylebot.me/styles/2945)

(Mostly only of use to desktop users, but it's quite an improvement IME).

------
orenbarzilai
You can use [http://hackernews-mobile.tomodo.me/](http://hackernews-
mobile.tomodo.me/) It's similar to the css you offered.

------
robotys
working just fine on Windows Phone 7[1] Internet Explorer. Even better i
think. It automatically make the text bigger, thus easier to read within the
small screen size.

[1] Nokia Lumia 900

------
paulsutter
I love using HN on my iPhone. It loads quickly even when the signal is weak
and scrolls super nicely because of the simplicity. On mobile, I'm much more
likely to read the comments before the articles because I know the comments
will load super fast and the article will load super slow and be difficult to
stretch into the screen.

EDIT: Go ahead and set up a site that implements your "slightly nicer CSS and
HTML" that will make such a huge improvement. Publish the traffic stats so
that we can all see when you get it right.

~~~
miloshadzic
I'm pretty sure that slightly nicer CSS and HTML would not slow down HN.

------
freshyill
The saddest part is that if you resize a desktop browser to be narrow, it's a
better experience than you actually get on a phone.

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VMG
Hacker News should be an API.

~~~
msoad
api.ihackernews.com/‎

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twistedpair
If only there was a HN app...

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cinitriqs
guess smart-phones aren't that smart after all...

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claudius
Hrm, maybe you need a better smartphone? It works really well on Opera Mobile
on my N9…

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ekianjo
No it doesnt. You cant zoom in and scroll on your phone? Do you have broken
fingers? Btw there are hn apps in different stores.

~~~
marknutter
Zooming and scrolling left-to-right to read every link is a broken experience.

