Where has mobile view gone?

flying_pie

As from yesterday mobile view has disappeared and the link at the bottom no longer exists. I'm on Android running Brave as browser FWIW 

Roland

Still working on iPhone 

flying_pie

Thanks @Roland ;

FWIW I've now switched to DuckDuckGo browser and it's working again. Must be something to do with Brave 

John_P

I’m using safari on an iPhone and the mobile/full  option at the bottom has gone for me as well. 

With the huge pop up ads it’s almost unusable now.  

digitalscream

John_P said:

I’m using safari on an iPhone and the mobile/full  option at the bottom has gone for me as well. 

With the huge pop up ads it’s almost unusable now.  

There are no pop-up ads on this site. Never have been.

Can you get a screenshot?

synecdoche

@digitalscream here's a screenshot showing the ad obscuring mobile view. I think the issue is that the ad goes full-width for a mobile screen rather than staying confined to the left-hand column of the forum.

The screenshot also shows there is no 'Back to mobile site' button. It seems to be impossible to get the mobile site to show now. This is on Android Chrome. Hope this helps.

digitalscream

OK, that's extremely weird - there is no way that the HTML for the desktop/mobile site switch can be omitted, so these browsers are doing something extremely odd to remove it. 

For what it's worth, I'm looking at it on Android Chrome (Pixel 7a) and it's right there.

However, you should bear in mind that desktop mode on phones is not a supported use case, and never has been - it's there for tablets, but Vanilla lacks a framework to distinguish between phones and tablets in any practical manner without a significant rewrite of the handlers, which is effort that's far better spent building something new to replace Vanilla in its entirety.

To go back to the mobile view, you can click here:

https://www.thefretboard.co.uk/profile/nomobile/1

synecdoche

Thanks for looking into this. Yes, ideally mobile view would work - as you say, desktop view on mobile is where the advert is obscuring content. I don't think the ad would be an issue in 'proper' mobile view.

Unfortunately that link doesn't send me back to mobile view. I just arrive back at desktop view on my mobile screen. I wonder if it has anything to do with light/dark mode preferences (since I don't think mobile mode has a dark theme available). I'll keep trying and report back if I find anything useful.

digitalscream

synecdoche said:

Thanks for looking into this. Yes, ideally mobile view would work - as you say, desktop view on mobile is where the advert is obscuring content. I don't think the ad would be an issue in 'proper' mobile view.

Unfortunately that link doesn't send me back to mobile view. I just arrive back at desktop view on my mobile screen. I wonder if it has anything to do with light/dark mode preferences (since I don't think mobile mode has a dark theme available). I'll keep trying and report back if I find anything useful.

No, dark mode just doesn't affect the mobile view at all (another annoyance with this damned software).

Have you got your phone's browser set to desktop mode? That might account for it.

GavRichList

I always used to use desktop mode on mobile as it's just much easier to use... but yes, the ads have now totally screwed that. Happened around the same time as Imgurgate, so its significantly changed my personal traffic to the site. It's all just becoming a massive pain in the arse, I'm sorry to say. 

synecdoche

The browser has desktop mode unticked. I've tried toggling between settings and the 'proper' mobile mode doesn't kick in. I've also tried clearing cookies and using incognito and still can't get to mobile view in Android Chrome.

Interestingly, I just tried another Android browser (the basic one built into some Synology apps I use), and everything works as designed. Mobile view launches correctly, and the 'back to mobile' button is there.

So the long and short of it is that Android Chrome doesn't seem to be rendering the forum CSS correctly. Possibly Brave, too, which is Chrome-based, based on the above comments. Sounds like iOS/Safari is fine for some but not others.

I would say 'time to use another browser', but unfortunately the big Google ads are still present despite switching between browsers and desktop/mobile view. In desktop view they are correctly placed on the left-hand side of the homepage, but blow up again once you get a few clicks into threads.

Sorry - not meaning to cause headaches: just trying to help diagnose! Desktop view on a proper desktop is all fine, with no ad-related niggles. So it just seems to be mobile that's playing up.

digitalscream

synecdoche said:

The browser has desktop mode unticked. I've tried toggling between settings and the 'proper' mobile mode doesn't kick in. I've also tried clearing cookies and using incognito and still can't get to mobile view in Android Chrome.

Interestingly, I just tried another Android browser (the basic one built into some Synology apps I use), and everything works as designed. Mobile view launches correctly, and the 'back to mobile' button is there.

So the long and short of it is that Android Chrome doesn't seem to be rendering the forum CSS correctly. Possibly Brave, too, which is Chrome-based, based on the above comments. Sounds like iOS/Safari is fine for some but not others.

I would say 'time to use another browser', but unfortunately the big Google ads are still present despite switching between browsers and desktop/mobile view. In desktop view they are correctly placed on the left-hand side of the homepage, but blow up again once you get a few clicks into threads.

Sorry - not meaning to cause headaches: just trying to help diagnose! Desktop view on a proper desktop is all fine, with no ad-related niggles. So it just seems to be mobile that's playing up.

It's not CSS, though (well, apart from the ad and the fact that the desktop layout's always been broken on phones due to the screen size). The "Back to mobile" link is server-side, so the only possibility is that the browser itself is reporting itself as a desktop browser.

It's worth noting that I've tested this on three Android phones here (all updated to current), and the only time I can reproduce it is when the browser is set to desktop mode. That makes sense; it's why you don't see the "Back to mobile" link when you're browsing on a desktop. Server-side, that's exactly what it's doing...looking for the mobile tag in the user agent and showing/hiding the link accordingly.

The question then becomes...why is your browser ignoring the desktop/mobile flag and reporting itself as a desktop browser anyway?

synecdoche

digitalscream said:

The question then becomes...why is your browser ignoring the desktop/mobile flag and reporting itself as a desktop browser anyway?

Indeed! 

I've done a bit more googling and fiddling and found something that appears to be a fix, or at least it was for me. It looks like the forum address was in the list of 'request mobile' exceptions in Android Chrome's site settings. Somewhat counter-intuitively, removing it from that list and restarting Chrome brings mobile view back. And the 'full site' and 'back to mobile' links are there on mobile and desktop views, too.

All very strange, but in case it helps anyone else (this might work for Brave, too), here are the steps I took:

Open Android Chrome > open the menu via three dots top right > Settings > Site Settings > Desktop site > remove any exceptions listed.

Thanks for your help, @digitalscream. ;

digitalscream

synecdoche said:

digitalscream said:

The question then becomes...why is your browser ignoring the desktop/mobile flag and reporting itself as a desktop browser anyway?

Indeed! 

I've done a bit more googling and fiddling and found something that appears to be a fix, or at least it was for me. It looks like the forum address was in the list of 'request mobile' exceptions in Android Chrome's site settings. Somewhat counter-intuitively, removing it from that list and restarting Chrome brings mobile view back. And the 'full site' and 'back to mobile' links are there on mobile and desktop views, too.

All very strange, but in case it helps anyone else (this might work for Brave, too), here are the steps I took:

Open Android Chrome > open the menu via three dots top right > Settings > Site Settings > Desktop site > remove any exceptions listed.

Thanks for your help, @digitalscream. ;

Nice catch! Extremely weird, it's possible that a recent browser update introduced a bug in that functionality.