My Size or Yours: The Toggle

[Blinky the Shark]

This site a little button (toward the right end of its main toolbar)
with a double-headed arrow, that essentially offers the user "my size or
your size?" It appears to toggle between a fixed-width page and a
liquid page. Is this common, and proof that I've been sleeping? Given
that it's been coded for fluidity anyway, what would be the perceived
value in offering a rigid rendering, even if the user *did* happen to be
using a viewport size that the author had coded for)?

http://arstechnica.com/index.ars

 

[Toby Inkster]

It appears to toggle between a fixed-width page and a liquid page.
http://arstechnica.com/index.ars

Doesn't seem to here. Seems to toggle between two different fixed width
layouts, with slightly different widths.

Given that it's been coded for fluidity anyway, what would be the perceived
value in offering a rigid rendering

I think it's a bit of a "because I can" feature.

 

[Blinky the Shark]

Blinky the Shark wrote:

Doesn't seem to here. Seems to toggle between two different fixed
width layouts, with slightly different widths.

Holy cow -- you're right. The columns simply narrowing to another fixed
width tricked me; I didn't catch that they were still fixed. Looks like
I happened* to have my width just right that the narrow style fit it
closely enough to fool me.

*I don't generally pay attention to its size, and tend to move it around
and resize it now and then.

I think it's a bit of a "because I can" feature.

How about the font-size buttons? Useful, I guess for someone who
doesn't have a browser that will resize the page (either the whole
page, like opera, or the text, like Moz/FF) that would be useful --
although I wouldn't say the range goes high enough for any serious
vision disabilities. I don't know where the line would be drawn
(probably at a different place for each user), but this seems to be
more of a comfort setting than an accessability setting (except for
a very small subset of impairment levels). So I suppose that's also
a "because I can" feature.

 

[rf]

Doesn't seem to here. Seems to toggle between two different fixed width
layouts, with slightly different widths.

Resize your browser in the two different modes. One is fixed. The other is
liquid. Right out to 4000 pixels.

I think it's a bit of a "because I can" feature.

Yes.

Why offer a nice liquid design and then offer another fixed variation unless
it's to keep the "fixed width is good" crowd" happy?