Foamcow,
I like you. You are very polite and I enjoyed debating with you in a friendly way and we have been respectful of one another. The thread started out well until it got hi-jacked. I guess what I should learn is to not bother to respond to people who are unfriendly or antagonistic but sometimes it appears that one is conceding a point.
Anyway I will do my best to answer YOUR post.
1. Lynx-type browsers:
I am not sure how many people use lynx browsers but the blackberry is a lynx-type browser and it works exactly as a lynx browser with one important difference - it has a small screen. Maybe the Blackberry is not used much in the UK but in the US it is called a "Crackberry". There was a supreme court decision yesterday affecting the Blackberry. If the lower court judge tries to take away the Blackberry, as seems likely, I predict that there will be riots on the streets. The Blackberry is also used extensively in the third world where cell towers are more ubiquitous than phone or cable lines.
If you read almost any article on programming for the blackberry, inevitably the advice is to not use framesets. When I lived in the UK I remember that there was some debate about car bumper legislation and bumper heights. Over and over people said "well what happens if you try to line up a Rolls Royce bumper with a mini-minor". After this had gone on for some time one TV personality actually decided to try just that. Guess what! the mini and rolls bumpers were exactly the same height.
In the same way since I have a Blackberry, rather than join the no-frameset chorus, I decided to try it. Low and behold framed sites work better. The reason that your site would not work well on a Blackberry is because of the small screen. The first thing anyone would see is a menu. Clicking an item on the menu would simply show the same menu again. It would not help to put your menu at the end of the page because they would then have to page down to get to it. A page could be larger than a transmittable unit.
With a frameset the menu takes you directly to the page desired and because of the nature of the interface, users know to use the back button.
I live next to a cell tower and I can assure you that the last thing that you want to do is to re-transmit redundant data.
2. PDF files
PDF is a printing technology. I think you conceded that it was hard to use on the web. That means that it is hard to use off the web (for anything other than printing). PDFs require additional software to create and to use. PDF files are huge. When I spoke of offline content I guess I really should have said off web content. It seems to me that HTML is a better way to deliver such content. Frameset are a good way to deliver content that requires a table of contents.
3. Questions
How or why does using a frameset prevent users from logging in or are you speaking from a usability/design perspective?
In a site where you have to log in to access the "meat", why would preventing deep linking be an issue? It wouldn't be possible to use the link without the login anyway.I can kind of see the rationale, but I'm interested in your opinion.
Maybe I did not word this well. Framesets can be used for a login page. The point that I was really making was that sites like Fidelity are not framesets until you login. Certainly you would not want the pages inside to be deep-linked and I would imagine that that is taken care of with security and session technology. I was also responding to Chris who couldn't imagine a site that should not be able to be deep-linked.
Bearing in mind what you have already said I do actually think some of your arguments are good. So I'm going to open my mind and I'd like you to tell me why your sample Symposium site is presented in a frameset. What are the advantages of doing it that way over creating it as a non framed site?
Well since I use framesets extensively for offline work I tend to see applications for them where they are not strictly necessary. In the case of people who never use framesets they seem never to consider them even when they are necessary (or useful).
I would also note that I get a lot of static here just for using the word Frameset. I have been an applications programmer for thirty six years. At college in 1969 I worked on the IBM prototype for the Personal PC. I used similar to web technology (CICS-mainframe) before most people on this site were born. I worked for a software vendor who used web technology in its early days to access legacy applications and for re-hosting mainframe to PC applications.
None of this means that I know everything but it certainly does not mean that I know nothing. I do not take kindly to people barely out of their teens who tell me that I am uninformed. I come to this site to become informed on new technologies and I have found many tips helpful and have tried to give back. I take exception to people who, knowingly or unknowingly, provide bad advice.
Clive
