Responsive Design and WCXM - What am I missing?

Like most people who fall into that information nerd bracket, I consume information via a variety of different devices. Yesterday, for example, I read the overnight news on my mobile whilst still a bit dozy from the safety of my quilt, spent the next 9 hours on my laptop occasionally following links I've seen on Twitter, and the next couple idly browsing on a tablet on the sofa due to the lack of anything of interest on the TV.

Frustrating Mobile Experience

On each device I use Google's Chrome browser, so signing in via Google Accounts allows me to simply access my bookmarks and browsing history across these devices, which stay neatly synced. 

Beyond that, though, this becomes a very frustrating experience. For example, the Chrome feature that I use the most whilst on my Android tablet is "request desktop version." The feature I wish the same browser had on my Android phone would be "request mobile version." Suffice to say, device detection for tablet and mobile OS is nowhere near as accurate as I'd like (let alone available bandwidth detection). There is however, apparently an answer to these woes.

Responsive Design and Your CMS

Back in the  alternative universe that us analysts inhabit, in pretty much every Web Content & Experience Management (WCXM) briefing over the past 6 months, the vendor has dedicated a sizable chunk of time to "Responsive Design."

This has let me to be slightly conflicted because on the face of it, I should be waving the RD flag with abandon. Yet I'm not, for 2 reasons:

  1. What if anything has Responsive Design to do with WXCM?
  2. Detecting browser dimensions is really only one part of a true multi-device strategy

Responsive Design in summary is the ability to build web pages that fluidly change format according to the screen resolution of the consuming device. It does this by using the "Media Queries" element present in the CSS3 standard, where a compliant browser is able select the correct version of a site stylesheet according to its current size (and in the case of desktop browsers by re-querying it as a window is re-sized). When it works, it's a pretty neat trick and probably explains why a demonstration of a site gracefully degrading as a window's width changes has become a standard element of all my recent WCXM briefings.

So what's my problem? Well, in this case Responsive Design has little or nothing to do with WXCM software. Unless your WCXM actually parses the CSS file -- something that I've seen only once in recent years with predictably grisly results -- there is nothing to stop good RD practice being implemented on (almost) any WCXM platform. It is not a product feature. It is a feature of the W3C CSS3 standard.

Now, I might be missing something, but my question remains: what specifically are WCXM vendors trying to prove by focusing on Responsive Design? That they won't actively prevent you from using CSS3?

Forgive me if I'm not shaking with excitement...


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Gil, Partner, Cancentric Solutions Inc.
iStudio Canada Inc.

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