Web Design: the golden ratio

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If you are a fan of Lost (the tv series) you may know everything about Fibonacci and his sequence. You may have explored everything about the golden ratio and its relation with things in nature. You may now wonder what has the golden ratio to do with and how it is related to web design. Well, I won't get into a complete mathematical explanation of the golden ratio because it is not the reason why I wrote this post. The main point here is that the golden ratio has been and still is used and applied to achieve rational proportions and create pleasing aesthetics. The golden ratio has been and is used in architecture, painting, music and industrial design, you can find it in nature, and it has been used even in finance. With that in mind, it is easy to think that we can apply it to web design, in order to achieve pleasant layouts with the help of maths (because sometimes maths is beautiful).

Web Design: fluid, fixed or mixed layout?

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When starting a new web site or application, the very first thing that I think about is if I will use a fluid, a fixed or a mixed layout. It's always been a debated issue: there are experienced web designers who think that a fixed layout is best, others who think that a fluid one has a more professional look, and the debate goes on. I don't know what you think - and I'd really like to, so please use the comment section below after reading this post - but I would like to share my thoughts about it, in any case.

The web safe area

There are different pros and cons about every single solution. And I believe there are very good articles around the web that explain them thoroughly. In my opinion, the main point is - to put it simply - understanding which is the layout that will be the best for any visitor. As you know, every single user might have a different browser and a different operating system. That means every one of them might experience a web site in a completely different way. Thus the web safe area comes into play: for each possible combination of browser and operating system, it is possible to determine which is the safe area to use in your web design. Designers Toolbox has a page which analyses every of those possible combinations, however let me summarise it for you in the following table:

Home Page design: keep it simple!

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Visitors are drawn to a specific web site at different levels. We can simplify things and say that the lowest level is the way a visitor finds the site. Ah! It is a simple thing, but - as you may already know - it is the most difficult goal to achieve. It involves site promotion and search engines ranking. However, that is not the main issue here, so - like it or not - we will skip that level and its implications.
The second level - provided your potential visitor finds your web page - is how to keep the visitor on your page. I already talked about complicated home pages and related stuff, nevertheless I would like to get a little bit deeper into the issue.