I really don’t understand your explanation within the context of the newest version of the spec. Are we talking about the same thing? This post is based on the draft per 29 November 2011; I doubt that is the version you researched for your book.

I suspect that the confusion here is related to the issue Niloy refers to in his comment, which is actually a non-issue.

I hope you’re describing the older version of the spec, as your explanation does fit with that one. If you are referring to the version I’ve written about here, perhaps you could clarify what you mean for the readers of this post. Intrinsic width is not once mentioned in the new spec, so your discussion of it might be confusing to some.

I appreciate your feedback.

From the reply I got here, the new flex box works as most people expected it would (distribution of width), hopefully.

A much more helpful, realistic demo would have varying amounts of content in each box so that they each have different intrinsic widths. Readers would then see that the first and last boxes aren’t necessarily twice as wide as the middle box. This is something that’s essential for us all to understand. It even took me by surprise when I was researching it and writing about it in my book Stunning CSS3. The spec isn’t intuitive here, unfortunately.

There are lots of good reasons _for_ “one web”. Mobile devices are becoming ever more capable, mobile networks are becoming faster, and mobile browsing is becoming ever more common. From that point of view, the difference in user experience between mobile browsing and desktop browsing is diminishing. Many mobile browsers ignore media=”handheld” and use the regular CSS. With media-queries, we can make one single website that will redraw itself to fit any size display with a suitable layout. Having just one version of a website means no code forking, it means no duplicate content, it means much less work for webbies to maintain two separate sites.

But…

While that’s true for a lot of sites, it doesn’t hold for all, and particularly it doesn’t always hold for large sites. It works for a site like this one, which is lean and simple and has essentially just one function. But for larger and more complex sites, there are two factors that mitigate against.

1 – Function. A lot of people do distinguish between online things they’ll do from a mobile, and things they would prefer to do from a PC. For example, I would hate to type a long reply like this in using my mobile, because it would take about an hour. Complex spatial work is best done on a big screen with a mouse. But other tasks are particularly suited to people who are on the move with just a few minutes to dip in and out. That’s particularly true for travel industries (when people are literally on the move and need to check travel plans) and physical retail. Offering a dedicated mobile version of the site that prioritises those features can make a huge difference to people’s experience and success rates.

2 – Speed. While mobile browsing has got better, it often still lags a long way behind desktop PCs on a broadband connection. Heavy websites with complex designs and lots of scripts and images are a PITA on most mobile browsers. While media-queries can alter the display, they can’t so easily stop you from needing to download massive jQuery libraries and the like. Offering a stripped down version of the site that leaves out this incidental cruft can compensate for the much slower mobile browsing experience.

Just be careful and get legal support if you’re not willing to just cut your losses.

Should I get a lawyer? I am angry because these guys screwed me many times before with their tight budgets… And underpaid me many times. I don’t want to let this go, and want to squeeze the last penny from them.