On 1/30/13 1:41 AM, Steve Bennett wrote:
A couple of screenshots to save people the effort: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/767553/eiger-normal.png https://dl.dropbox.com/u/767553/eiger-three-columns.png https://dl.dropbox.com/u/767553/eiger-three-columns-more.png
Looking at these, it's remarkable that we've put up with such a bad layout for wide screens for so long. I mean, seriously - that eiger-normal.png looks *awful*. The text is far too wide to read comfortably, and then there's this huge white space next to the contents box.
And all with a tiny amount of CSS. Great job, Magnus!
I like it as well. Actually, I recall a previous version from Magnus that was sort of like this which I also liked; am I imagining that?
The main issue with the present layout, imo, is that wrapping text around images produces clutter for no real gain when pages are so wide. I do like wrapping text around images on narrower pages, such as a typical book, or narrower portrait-format screens. In those cases, the alternatives feel inferior to me. Narrow columns really don't work for me: I use the IEEE and ACM 2-column article formats regularly in my day job and do not find them either aesthetically pleasing or particularly readable. And using a wider column without wrapping results in the image taking up the whole page for a certain amount of the vertical space, which is only sensible if it's a major object of discussion which should narratively fit into the text, rather than a side illustration.
But at larger widths, you can put the side illustrations out in the margin, because there is tons of space.
-Mark