FWIW, I'm on desktop but I do have JS disabled (more precisely, I use NoScript).
This results in the top and left-side bars staying decorative and unobtrusive, but the concurrent visitor counter thingy is floating well above the bottom-right of the page. But then, as I shrink in the page width, the left-side bar and the concurrent visitor counter swap sides, and also a bunch of the content from the top is added to a new bar at the bottom. Eventually, the horizontal space between the side components becomes irrelevant such that they function as an additional bottom bar. At which point, maybe 40% of the vertical space is used for navigation and other shiny toys. This is really annoying, and the overall experience is inconsistent across widths.
(Also, at all widths, the top-bar has a transparent background, so main page text interferes with top-bar text as it scrolls.)
All of this is done in CSS, so presumably it can be fixed that way too.
If you want to eliminate any friction, I recommend enabling JavaScript.
Otherwise, you can read it in terminal mode with: curl -H "Accept: text/markdown" [URL]
The mobile interaction is similar; it's not a bug, it's by design. If you were able to read the article without any problems, I'm satisfied. Thanks for the feedback.
Or perhaps you shouldn't get defensive of critique on your "design vision" such that you just write them off entirely like it has no value? You might like driving in the opposite lane, but rules say otherwise, and best practice can be likened to it because it's been decided on or landed that way due to multiple people being involved in the process of deciding those rules. Just as with best practices. There are best practices in design too, you know.
Anyhow. Depending on the viewport your panels do get in the way, it's 1/3 of the screen on mine for example. If you're going to hide the panels, hide them properly. That you show them at the top and bottom automatically, fine, though they could be smaller on mobile. However, you could at least consider the UX of using it on smaller viewports. If I want to scroll up a little bit while reading, they pop into view, making me have to scroll down to hide them again. Meaning I have to scroll higher up than intended, so I have enough space to scroll down. Another common user pattern is to slowly continually scroll too, and a tiny jitter upwards causes them to reappear, but requires comparatively massive downwards scrolling to hide again. Your site is not the only one to do this, but it's just bad design. Vision or no, and it's no justification, just an excuse. And then, what about left handed people? It's easier to accidentally click into the message box field, which opens up the keyboard and you'll have to close it. Pair this with it taking up the majority of thumb space for scrolling, given its size, and, well. Is it unreasonable for people to tell you it's aggravating? No. And this is without considering, and doing the minimum for, people who may suffer with controlling devices for whatever reason. Not by "bending over backwards" as some would have it, but at least taking such into consideration.
It's fine to have a vision of your intended or wanted design, but it's also important to be willing to reflect on how your vision may not necessarily be good design, depending on how one judges it, rather than just deflecting critique.
First, these kinds of "issues" should be explained privately (as people normally do) and not publicly on Hacker News. For me, this already weakens your feedback considerably.
Second, the article is designed to be read from top to bottom.
Third, there are no hard and fast rules of good design. There's a spectrum of gray between black and white.
Fourth, thanks for your feedback. Even though it might not seem like it, I made a note of it a couple of days ago to reflect on it. But your persistence is discouraging me.
Yes, but when I stop scrolling and scroll up even a little bit (by accident, or because I want to scroll up and read something I missed) they appear again. I think the only good UX possible is to have a button to show/hide them instead.
I'm sorry, but I disagree. The lowest interaction cost is scrolling; it's a natural, continuous, and almost involuntary gesture. Having to click or tap a button requires the user to stop, evaluate whether the title interests them, and decide to make the effort to tap. The interactions you're describing are intentional and measured. I'm sorry but if the content is truly all you care about, I recommend the previous option or activating your browser's reading mode.
Exactly, which is why attaching large UI shifts to that involuntary gesture makes the experience feel very unpredictable
> activating your browser's reading mode
Reading mode is a hack that's only needed because sites aren't already readable. You shouldn't have to activate it to be able to read the content.
In addition, it doesn't always work well if the website didn't test it. On your website, for example, it removes all images from the text.
> Having to click or tap a button requires the user to stop, evaluate whether the title interests them
Purposefully doing things in a way that doesn't let the user decide if they want it is called a dark pattern. Its not far from those checkboxes that try to trick you into accepting marketing newsletters. "We can't give users an option to think if they want our emails! If they don't, why don't they just use their email's spam filtering?"
You may not see it like that yourself, but huge links to your CV, talks and courses are exactly that - an ad that covers half the screen.
You have multiple people telling you the experience is bad, and you asked for why, but when people give you the explanation you argue back. That's fine of course, it's your own site and you can do whatever you like with it without trying to suit anyone. But that doesn't make the reader experience less bad.
This results in the top and left-side bars staying decorative and unobtrusive, but the concurrent visitor counter thingy is floating well above the bottom-right of the page. But then, as I shrink in the page width, the left-side bar and the concurrent visitor counter swap sides, and also a bunch of the content from the top is added to a new bar at the bottom. Eventually, the horizontal space between the side components becomes irrelevant such that they function as an additional bottom bar. At which point, maybe 40% of the vertical space is used for navigation and other shiny toys. This is really annoying, and the overall experience is inconsistent across widths.
(Also, at all widths, the top-bar has a transparent background, so main page text interferes with top-bar text as it scrolls.)
All of this is done in CSS, so presumably it can be fixed that way too.