Can I trick Google into looking more favourably upon me?

[pauland]

I'm waiting for someone to suggest I just zoom the page, but that should not be required to read text easily.

Unfortunately the big disadvantage that Xara has is that it does not use a templating system like Wordpress or a CMS based system, where essentially you'd just be designing four or five pages that would control the layout and formatting of your 300.

My opinion is that Xara is not well suited to sites with a large number of pages because there is no concept of templates or master pages.

[Initiostar]

Ian,

The main song menu might be better in a grid format for your mobile variant. I would be conscious too that the mobile font size IMO should be at least 20px. Text styles across variants is really useful here (e.g. Normal text desktop might be say 16px whereas you can set Normal text in the mobile variant to be say 20px).

The attached screenshot is from an AV demo (still WIP); it was derived through a piece of work earlier this year on audio plugins.

https://initiostar.co.uk/demo/JukeBoxv5/

In the demo only letters A & B are active, A has the option of immediately highlighting additional info about the song, where as B provides an info popup as an option.

Maybe some ideas to think about - 300 hundred pages in a shed-load of work; I would get the basic mobile framework sorted and tested on real devices, Android and iOS, before you plough on - best done entirely on a test site.

Gary

[pauland]

Ian,

The main song menu might be better in a grid format for your mobile variant. I would be conscious too that the mobile font size IMO should be at least 20px. Text styles across variants is really useful here (e.g. Normal text desktop might be say 16px whereas you can set Normal text in the mobile variant to be say 20px).

The attached screenshot is from an AV demo (still WIP); it was derived through a piece of work earlier this year on audio plugins.

https://initiostar.co.uk/demo/JukeBoxv5/

In the demo only letters A & B are active, A has the option of immediately highlighting additional info about the song, where as B provides an info popup as an option.

Maybe some ideas to think about - 300 hundred pages in a shed-load of work; I would get the basic mobile framework sorted and tested on real devices, Android and iOS, before you plough on - best done entirely on a test site.

Gary

Excellent points.

[IanB]

Thanks for all the help which I will take on board.

I think I'm a bit too fond of my menu buttons but may have to jettison them. Also the side menu may have to be changed to the top or drop down. Also the videos will need to be resized. Also, also, also ...

There will need to be so many changes that making them on a parallel test site seems to be the way to go. I may be away for some time.

Ian

[IanB]

Though I have modified some of the introductory pages, producing a mobile friendly version and increasing the text size, I have come to a decision, for the moment, that creating a mobile friendly version of the whole site just to appease Google is not worth the effort.

There are many websites which were designed to be viewed on computer screens - this one - talkgraphics - being an example.

If users of my site are interested enough they may be prepared to turn their mobiles through 90 degrees and even zoom in - or get out a decent sized tablet - or blow the cobwebs off their laptop.

I've had enough of technological changes dictating what I should do. Now, where's that papyrus and quill?

Ian

[pauland]

Though I have modified some of the introductory pages, producing a mobile friendly version and increasing the text size, I have come to a decision, for the moment, that creating a mobile friendly version of the whole site just to appease Google is not worth the effort.

There are many websites which were designed to be viewed on computer screens - this one - talkgraphics - being an example.

If users of my site are interested enough they may be prepared to turn their mobiles through 90 degrees and even zoom in - or get out a decent sized tablet - or blow the cobwebs off their laptop.

I've had enough of technological changes dictating what I should do. Now, where's that papyrus and quill?

Ian

Ian I respect your decision and I understand it would be a huge amount of work to do otherwise.

It may be convenient to blame technology, but really this is about meeting the needs of your potential audience not bowing to machines.

Google recognises the importance of the mobile platforms in todays world, not because there are a lot of mobile phones but because for most people the mobile phone is their first call when it comes to looking for something and often people will just use a mobile phone rather than anything bigger. This is the world today. The man in the pub beside the canal is going to be told about some website that has lots of info about canal songs - he won't be pulling out a laptop, he'll be reaching for his phone and saying "I can't read that" and forgetting about the whole thing.

As a family if we have visitors around, if there is some subject we are discussing then phones are pulled out.

Your aim was to boost your rankings with Google to get more visitors. I stand by my original suggestions.

Technology is not dictating, it's simply how people live today.

Again, I respect and understand your decision, and I think that your situation highlights for others the importance of the mobile platforms in web design and accommodating mobile at the very start of a project is crucial. This is why there is a dominant mobile-first movement in web design for several years now.

Good luck with the project and mobile or not I'm glad to see your dedication and this information being available. In this niche subject I do think people will try a little harder to get past the frustrations of no mobile support.

[IanB]

Ian I respect your decision and I understand it would be a huge amount of work to do otherwise.

It may be convenient to blame technology, but really this is about meeting the needs of your potential audience not bowing to machines.

Google recognises the importance of the mobile platforms in todays world, not because there are a lot of mobile phones but because for most people the mobile phone is their first call when it comes to looking for something and often people will just use a mobile phone rather than anything bigger. This is the world today. The man in the pub beside the canal is going to be told about some website that has lots of info about canal songs - he won't be pulling out a laptop, he'll be reaching for his phone and saying "I can't read that" and forgetting about the whole thing.

As a family if we have visitors around, if there is some subject we are discussing then phones are pulled out.

Your aim was to boost your rankings with Google to get more visitors. I stand by my original suggestions.

Technology is not dictating, it's simply how people live today.

Again, I respect and understand your decision, and I think that your situation highlights for others the importance of the mobile platforms in web design and accommodating mobile at the very start of a project is crucial. This is why there is a dominant mobile-first movement in web design for several years now.

Good luck with the project and mobile or not I'm glad to see your dedication and this information being available. In this niche subject I do think people will try a little harder to get past the frustrations of no mobile support.

I don't disagree with any of that. As a long retired teacher, latterly of Information Technology where the KISS principle was my mantra, I have to say that the relief when I no longer had to keep up with technology was palpable.

Twenty years or more ago I created a modest website in basic HTML which I hoped would stand the test of time because of its simplicity. Technological changes related to videos necessitated the recent complete overhaul of what is now a much larger site and as I modify it I worry that the site, which I hope to pass on to someone to maintain when I can do it no more, has too many quirks involved in its production and is now completely dependent on Xara software. I've nothing against Xara software and was a fan and user of the original Computer Concepts Artworks many moons ago, but I wonder where they are going and hope sincerely they survive in this increasingly chaotic world. The ability to print out the majority of the website pages directly or with minimal editing is certainly a useful aspect of XDPro which I may have to utilise in future if I am to preserve the site's content. It was one of the factors which made me decide to use Xara rather than update my HTML knowledge (probably an impossible and definitely painful task).

I agree that if I was starting to design the website from scratch I might look at designing a mobile version first. But not necessarily so. I spent a lot of lock-down creating a private family history website and spent some time thinking about page size. I can't remember what size I chose but the pages were designed (minus navigation buttons on a separate layer) so they could be printed on A3 paper (landscape format). This was so a paper copy could be handed to my family as the website will inevitably be transient in nature. The large size was necessary so family tree diagrams (albeit small portions thereof) could be accommodated. The site is perfectly legible on an 8" tablet held sideways but there is no way it could be viewed on a mobile phone.

I think making the introductory pages of the waterway songs website mobile phone friendly is a sensible thing to do at the moment so I'll concentrate on that.

Thanks again for taking the time to make your constructive comments.
Ian