What is up with the new layout?

[Caldor]

I hope this is a work in progress because the new Steam forums SUCK. I just replied to a new post and the window with the text cannot be resized, cannot be scrolled through with the mouse and is only about 3 lines high. What is up with that?

And what is the benefit of taking the top bar and moving it to the left, and making it a button? Now its 3 clicks for me to check replies rather than 2 and much less of an overview. You cannot even let it stay open. The Steam logo at the top does not work as a link, which is a pretty basic design pattern to use. There just seems to be no benefits from the new layout and it breaks things that were working without seemingly fixing anything.

When browing forums the pages are now on a drop down. I have to wonder what happens when its those threads with more than 500 replies? They seem to be adding a new layout just for the sake of it... but if it only makes things worse, then why? Why?!

I hope they have a long term plan for this, because this design really gets under my skin.

[Crazy Tiger]

What are you talking about? What new forums?

[aiusepsi]

Sounds like the mobile-style layout you get when the window you're viewing the Steam website in gets narrow. It's not a new feature, it's been like this for years.

There's a "View Desktop Website" link in the menu which turns off the responsive layout so it doesn't change with narrow windows.

[Caldor]

Originally posted by aiusepsi:

Sounds like the mobile-style layout you get when the window you're viewing the Steam website in gets narrow. It's not a new feature, it's been like this for years.

There's a "View Desktop Website" link in the menu which turns off the responsive layout so it doesn't change with narrow windows.

But it is the desktop website. Would explain why its so strange though. The layout does not make much sense. I will try to see if I can find the link you mention. It does not seem to be happening in the the Steam client.

I guess I will have to try and see if it only happens in the Opera browser.

[aiusepsi]

It's a responsive design, it uses CSS media queries to have a different layout when the window is different widths. You can't make the Steam client narrow enough for the mobile-style layout stuff to kick in. I would guess the rationale for the responsive design being the default rather than mobile-only is that if the window is so narrow that the content would be cut off and require horizontal scrolling to see, then switching to a layout optimised for narrow viewports is a win, even if it does bring along some mobile-isms.

Unless you're purposefully looking at Steam web pages in really narrow windows, the only thing I can think of is maybe something to with scaling or zooming that's interacting in a funny way with how the browser deals with media queries?

The "View Desktop Website" link is right below "Change User" in the left side menu.

[Caldor]

Yes, the link is there... it did decide to show the mobile website. Very strange... I have 3 monitors... only two active now. One is 1440p, another is 1080p. The desktop link does fix the issue.

Strange that it suddenly happens now, first time I have ever seen it happen on this computer. It was full screen, zoom level 100%. No idea why it decided to do this. It also just seems to switch back and forth now and then. Like if I go to the store, its the regular site, but the community sites show it as mobile.

I will see if I can make it happen again and then try another browser.

[Caldor]

Does not seem to happen again. I have been making support tickets to Steam for the first time in years. I had to Google some of the support parts of Steam, maybe one of the links was a mobile link and it stuck in the browsers temporary files as the settings for parts of the Steam site.

Either way, now I know how to fix it next time. Thanks :)