[toni-a]

I have been regular to  photozone from my mobile since 2006 the days of the excellent good old forum layout, and had resquested a mobile form of the site.

Now as smartphones became extremely popular don't you think a mobile friendly form of the site would be interesting ?

A mobile application could be a good idea however I'd prefer a mobile version of the site: m.photozone.de like we have for instance m.youtube.com I am quite sure somany people will love it.

Of course seeing large images and checking image quality won't be feasible but all the rest can be done.

[Brightcolours]

Klaus slowly but steadily has been working on making PZ more smartphone/tablet friendly, if I am not mistaken. That will take a while obviously, as it is done next to lens testing, real life and work.

[Rover]

I never had any trouble viewing PZ (even before the latest alterations) on my smartphone (which has a pretty small screen to boot). Why would one need an application that would just clog up the smartphone memory while probably being just another browser-like tool to access the same pages you can view from the proper browser? It's not like Photozone updates often enough to make use of the system notifications anyway...

[Klaus]

Hey, don't kill me 

 

Actually I have been quite busy optimizing the mobile aspect during the last few weeks.

On smartphones you should notice that the left sidebar has been omitted for instance thus providing more real estate for the articles.

The font should be readable by now as well. There's nothing that I can do about image size though.

Technically PZ is now (well since yesterday) "mobile friendly" according to Google (I wouldn't sign that but anyway). 

I have a Xperia Z2 and I think the content is rendered Ok now. This will be different across the device landscape though (I only checked Android/Chrome and iPhone). The current portal is from the stone age so I can only align it within limits.

 

On tablets you will continue to see the standard site - I don't think that the mobile version makes sense here. At least I wouldn't complain on my iPad. This might be different on low-resolution tablets though.

 

Please note that smartphones are aggressively caching the site styles so it may take quite a while till you see the latest optimizations (unless you flush the cache).

 

A new portal is also in the making but this is a massive effort. Please don't hold your breath yet (Q1 2016 I reckon). This new portal will be fully responsive rather than just switching between two versions.

[Rover]

I still think some people are making too big a deal out of it... Getting Klaus occupied with this stuff means we'll be getting fewer reviews - and it's the reviews we are after, innit?

[Klaus]

I still think some people are making too big a deal out of it... Getting Klaus occupied with this stuff means we'll be getting fewer reviews - and it's the reviews we are after, innit?

 

Well, just to defend Toni's position here from our perspective - there has been a rather dramatic drop in the industry since the peak in 2013. When the industry falls, we are falling with it, of course. Thus we just can't ignore social networks and mobile devices anymore. The good ol' times when growth was the norm are over and they'll not come back. Now the industry (us included) can be happy if it can keep the current levels.

We are still in a fortunate position in that PZ is just a side business. To a certain degree we can say "so what ?" - although it has to make sense at least. I am expecting that some of the sites running in full commercial mode will collapse soon.

[toni-a]

Just rechecked the site using windows phone :

everything seems great except one bug:

on the homepage I can see only the tab selected in blue I can't see the other page titles :lens reviews, forum, articles technique, the zone However this issue should be quit easy to correct.

As for  the visitors this is the current trend everywhere: the big ones take everything leaving very little for small business, this the general trend: multinational companies with huge invetstments. Being able to stay profitable is already an accomplishment.

Photozone found its niche in lens reviews. Although what I liked most is the feeling to be in a small friendly community, of course a small friendly community is not profitable (except maybe for giving fedback and detection of bugs and typos) 

[Klaus]

Windows phone has a marketshare of less than 3%.

I will have a very brief look but I will not spend too much time creating workarounds when Microsoft is, once again, not capable of rendering websites like all the others ...

[Klaus]

Windows phone has a marketshare of less than 3%.

I will have a very brief look but I will not spend too much time creating workarounds when Microsoft is, once again, not capable of rendering websites like all the others ...

 

As it turns out, the official Windows Phone browser emulators require a Windows 8 Pro OS ... which I don't have here.

The other emulators that I found were rather crappy (most can't even properly show Android or iOS results).

Thus I am afraid ...

[toni-a]

The site is working perfectly except the header on the homepage the rest seems just fine including the forum.

I don't think it is worth the efforts for the time being to update since a windows 10 a major update is expected, since it is a unified platform for desktops and mobiles I think this problem should be history. BTW I am very satisfied with my Windows phone I don't understand why 97% of people choose other platforms.