1. You make it sound like fluid layouts are something new and "unconventional" which they are not.

As for your cons to fixed layouts, i'd disagree with 2 of your 3 cons:

"1. Your layout requires a minimum resolution to keep scrollbars away."

While this is true, it also applies to fluid layouts. ALL sites have a minimum resolution. If the user resizes the browser to a small width... I can guarantee you at some point he is going to have a scrollbar. So while this con is true, it also applies to fluid layouts.

" 3. Your site may tend to look like everyone elses’ site."

This one I strongly disagree with. I see more fluid layouts that look alike than non-fluid layouts.

Look at the fluid layouts for blogs. By and large the majority of them look the same. 2 or 3 column CSS fluid layouts.

Take for example sites using PHP-nuke, you can pick them out immediately. They tend to all have 3 column fluid layouts.

As for your pro's for Fluid layouts... come on.

" 2. Usually less empty space (sometimes more, though) due to percentage-based dimensions."

You just contradicted yourself. Fluid layouts don't solve the problem of white space, alot of times they create more whitespace.

" 3. You and your contributors aren’t bound by dimensions."

Your not? You act as if you can't get scrollbars with a fluid layout. You are still bound by dimensions.

Even with fluid layouts if you don't take into account designing for the traditional 800x600 screen resolution you are asking for trouble. Your fluid layout still has to look good at 800x600 (basically looking like what a fixed layout site would look like at that point) and therefore you are bound by those dimensions as your minimums.

I'm not pro fluid or fixed. They both have a use, and nobody should stick to just one or the other. It is just stupid to do so.

Posted at 4:53AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Carl

2. I was refering, primarily, to percentage based fluid layouts.

With percentage based layouts, you often either have a lot of empty space (on higher resolutions), or a lot less (due to having a 60% wide block element and a 40% right up against each other, etc.) It all depends on the type of layout. I said that you usually have a lot of empty space because fluid, percentage-based layouts USUALLY have a lot of empty space.

As far as not being bound by your dimensions... this simply means, again, that if your fluid layout is based on percentages (which most are), then you're not bound to a, say, 250px wide content space, but instead by a 50% wide content space. Meaning, of course, that depending on your layout you would have a lot of room to type your content into.

"Your layout requires a minimum resolution to keep scrollbars away"

If you have a percentage based fluid layout, then even if your site is shown on a 320x240 display, it should still fit (although your font size would become an issue). With a fixed layout, you're bound by the width you hard-code.

All in all, I definitely see your points. I'm also not pro either one, I think each has its place, and each has its own strengths and weaknesses. I think, above all else, I should have made myself more clear about referring to percentage-based fluid layouts.

Thanks for the input, Carl.

Posted at 4:53AM on Dec 19th 2005 by James Jackson

3. Why do we always ignore max-width when we talk about liquid layouts?

You can combine max-width with a 100% layout and keep it from going overboard for large screens. Doesn't that solve all the cons?

And for IE, we can use Javascript to force a max-width.

For an example, look at: http://liquid.rdpdesign.com

It's liquid, and doesn't experience any of those problems. Or does it?

Posted at 4:53AM on Dec 19th 2005 by C Montoya

4. There's an interesting tutorial about mixing some of the benefits of Fluid and Static layouts:

http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/200504/fixed_or_fluid_width_elastic/

Posted at 4:53AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Paul