Review: A Book Apart, Responsive Web Design by Ethan Marcotte

A Book Apart’s fourth release in the series addresses one of the largest challenges facing web designers today: how to accommodate users on an ever increasing number of different devices and browsers. With mobile web browsing expected to outpace desktop browsing by multiples over the next few years, having a mobile-friendly site will soon be seen as absolutely critical and less as a luxury (some might argue that we’ve already reached that point).

Working in a non-profit environment, much of what I do is needs-based and up until recently designing for mobile devices has frankly, just not been much of a priority. I don’t anticipate this being the case for much longer as we continue to add new functionality to existing web sites and create new ones to meet the needs of our members.

Having a mobile-friendly version of our primary web site is probably overdue, but I had not anticipated adressing it until the next overall site redesign. If it becomes a more immediate concern, I’ll likely take advantage of the jQuery Mobile framework to serve as a stop-gap until a redesign is undertaken.

I did have the opportunity to create a web-friendly version of our annual conference’s online program in the spring of this year. Having already tinkered around with the jQuery Mobile framework while it was undergoing development, I decided it would be the easiest route. You can take a look at the end result here. I think it turned out pretty well for a first attempt and the response from attendees was overwhelmingly positive. There were some minor cross-platform inconsistencies, which was anticipated with the framework still being in its infancy. It worked great for our needs and has since expanded support for additional platforms and is close to final release status. It impressed me enough to want to continue using it for situations where I need to create a mobile-friendly version of an existing web application.

Looking ahead, as I develop new web sites for our various meetings, groups, and miscellaneous projects, I believe I can incorporate responsive design into the fold. It will take a little time to adjust to the additional step/consideration during the design process, but will become routine once I’ve done it a few times. It will certainly be a more efficient way of going about the process instead of designing one site for desktop use and another for mobile.  I digress…

In this book, Ethan takes you through the process of taking a rigid design and creating its responsive equivalent. With the use of a fluid grid, flexible images, and media queries (and in some cases a few “hacks”), one can take a responsive approach to the design process and create a more consistent (but flexible!) experience for the user.

I think this is a book that I’ll reference many times in the days ahead and is a must have for any web designer.

Check out the table of contents: