FTiM is now mobile friendly (Updated)
01. Nov, 2009 
9 Comments
I just finished installing WPtouch, an impressive WordPress plugin that serves an optimized version of a site to mobile devices. I enabled most features of the site, including Disqus-powered comments and the submission form. The unique author is displayed on every post, and you have access to all tags, categories, and pages from the top menu. If you’re on a mobile phone and you don’t want the optimized version of the site, you can always flip the switch at the bottom of the page to view the full version.
[Update: Some readers were seeing the mobile-optimized version of FTiM in their desktop browsers. Sorry about that. Turns out it was due to some conflicts with other plugins I have installed. I just added all the known fixes and did a round of testing with friends across multiple browsers and platforms, and the proper sites should now be getting served to the desktop and mobile devices. Let me know if you see any other problems like this.]
There are some kinks to work out yet between this plugin and the site organization that I am experimenting with. For example: right now I have multiple “Finder” and “UI” sub-categories that live under the top-level Leopard and Snow Leopard categories. This way, users can read posts just about Leopard UI tips and bugs, or just Snow Leopard UI tips and bugs. But WPtouch uses the iPhone OS’ rolodex list tool to display all categories in a flat, alphabetized list, instead of organizing sub-categories under their proper parent categories. Like I said, I’m still experimenting, so I’m working on this.
WPtouch allows for a fair amount of design customization, which I will add once I get a real theme in place for the full version of the site. The layout won’t change much, but I eventually aim to match the overall color scheme between the full and mobile-optimized versions of this site.
Other than that, let me know what you think or if you find bugs on devices that I can’t test on like Android, BlackBerry, generic mobile phones.
Post Author
If your target market is exclusively iPhone users, I suppose it's fine. But if you expect people to read it on a desktop Mac, it's pretty bad. Too much wasted space, bad formatting (the text starts at the bottom right of the image and is a fluid-width layout, making it difficult to read. Isn't this the second or third design change in just a short period of time?
Hi Jim, sorry for any confusion, but my target market isn't just iPhone users, even though this is a heavily Apple-centric site (and so is http://finerthingsiniphone.com, where many of these changes will appear soon). In fact, as I state in this post, I chose the WPtouch plugin specifically because it optimizes a site for more than just the iPhone OS – it optimizes for Android, BlackBerry, and generic phones as well.
As far as this being a major design change to the site for desktop users, I don't think it is. This is really just an addition to make the site much more friendly to mobile devices. You shouldn't notice a thing if you only visit FTiM in a desktop browser.
I hope this helps to clear up any confusion.
David Chartier
Finer Things site owner
I'm getting the iPhone version in Safari and Firefox on the Mac. (Safari 4.0.3, Firefox 3.5.4, OS X 10.6.1.)
Is this intentional? The old format was far nicer to read.
Hmmm…and I just found the switch in the footer, but it doesn't work. Clicking it takes me to http://finerthingsinmac.com/finerthingsinmac.com/ and clicking Home from there takes me back to the mobile view.
The mobile version displays in normal desktop mac browsers as well. The footer switch doesn't work. And iPhone centric versions of sites are always an insane and useless pain as the traditional website is best. Finally, Disqus comments are horrible for users.
WTF is going on with this blog lately?
Sorry for the trouble everyone. Apparently there are a few conflicts between the WPtouch plugin I'm using to serve an optimized site for mobile devices and the cache plugin I also have installed. I just fixed all the known conflicts and settings, and had a few folks test the site in various desktop browsers to make sure it's serving the proper desktop version. Everything seems fine again, but please let me know if you're still seeing an iPhone/mobile version of this site in your browser, and which browser you're using. Thanks.
David Chartier
Finer Things site owner
Sorry, no this wasn't intentional. It was a bug because of the mobile-optimizing plugin I just installed. I think I just fixed everything so desktop users see the proper site, and only mobile users see the stripped-down version. Please let me know if you don't see the proper version again though.
Hey Jim, I finally understand what you were talking about. Turns out there were some feature conflicts when I installed this plugin, and I didn't realize that it was serving the mobile-optimized version to some users even if they were on desktop browsers.
That was not the intention, and after a round of fixing the conflicts and lots of testing, I think I nipped this in the bud. You should now see the full desktop version in a desktop browser, and the mobile-optimized version only if you're on a relevant device.
Sorry again about this.
David Chartier
Finer Things site owner
Yeah, that's what I meant. It looked fine on a mobile, but I saw the same thing in a browser on the MacPro and thought “eeewww.”
Glad to hear you've found the issue.