Comments on: Creating a Mobile Library Website

By: Swiss Army Librarian » NHLA11 Talk on Building a Mobile Website :: Brian Herzog

Thu, 05 May 2011 14:53:12 +0000

[...] a few talks this year about how to build a mobile website for libraries – based, mainly, on my posts about the one I made for my library. This Friday is the first of those talks, for the New [...]

By: Swiss Army Librarian » Upcoming Workshop: Mobilize Your Patrons :: Brian Herzog

Tue, 26 Apr 2011 11:51:39 +0000

[...] should be a great day. For my part, I’m basically going to go through the steps I took to make a mobile site for my library, and also mention a few other mobile options for [...]

By: Richard Uren

Richard Uren — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 02:35:53 +0000

Hi Brian,

You can detect and redirect mobile browsers using Handset Detection. Drop me an email and i’ll help you out with some extra detections. Hope that helps.

Cheers
Richard

By: Oleg K.

Oleg K. — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 02:51:16 +0000

Hi Brian, just checked your site on my iPhone 3G and it looks great.

I’ll have to keep your post (and the comments section) in mind if I’m ever fooling around with a library’s (or any other orgs) mobile site.

By: Krista

Krista — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 21:22:19 +0000

Thank you! I’m just about to start a mobile site for my library – this will be so helpful!

By: Brian Herzog

Brian Herzog — Sat, 30 Oct 2010 11:20:05 +0000

@Winnie: thanks for checking – it is sad (and ironic) that the interface libraries have the least amount of control over is the catalog.

@Brad: thank you for the links – I really like how the CPL website content and navigation scales automatically based on window size – that’s great. I also much prefer the single-site approach. I’ll check out the html5 calculator next week – thanks for working on it.

By: Brad Czerniak

Brad Czerniak — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 15:29:12 +0000

I agree with Brett. For most libraries, CSS3 Media Queries are the best bet. It can be challenging to style an existing site to look good on mobile devices, but any site redesign should start from a mobile first philosophy. My preso Practically Mobile addresses this. The Canton Public Library website (though not catalog, yet!) implements this technique. Essentially, users expect the same information on their mobiles, just optimized for the different UI. Barebones mobile sites can be frustrating in a number of ways if not carefully designed. Brian, while I have your attention: I did a jQuery & HTML5 version of the ROI Calculator that CPL might roll out soon-ish. Thoughts?

By: Winnie

Winnie — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 22:16:46 +0000

Hi Brian,
I don’t have a mobile phone either, but I have an iPod touch and this looks good. I don’t a have the width/font size problems mentioned above. It’s too bad that searching the catalogue is still such a pain.

By: Brian Herzog

Brian Herzog — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 20:51:56 +0000

@Brett & @A: browser detection is the last thing I need to work on – thanks for the input, and I’ll post here how my experience goes.

@Erin: Thanks for the link – I’m listening to it right now.

@Tori: I think I figured out what was causing that, so if it’s still happening please let me know.

By: Tori

Tori — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 18:13:54 +0000

Hi Brian, you might want to check your page width and/or font sizes because it’s displaying pretty small on my 3GS. Other than that it looks great!

I don’t know of any good way to have an automatic redirect on a static website. Javascript is a tedious option because you’ll have to customize for each mobile browser. But please do post if you find an alternative, thanks!