It was mildly annoying how en.wikipedia.org would redirect to en.m.wikipedia.org on mobile, but en.m.wikipedia.org wouldn't redirect to en.wikipedia.org on desktop. So when a mobile user sent me a link, I had to go and manually delete the '.m' in order to view it nicely. But I guess it makes sense since desktop developers need to be able to see the mobile site sometimes.
I have always hated "m." domains for exactly this reason. They almost exclusively go one-way, mobile users get redirected to the mobile domain but desktop users never get redirected back, and all too often not only was the mobile version of the site objectively worse from the perspective of a desktop user but even the link to go back manually was either hard to find or nonexistent.
Wikipedia was one of the worst offenders, but lots of sites screwed this up in exactly the same way, and I feel it was a predecessor to modern "mobile first" web platforms that either treat desktop as second-class users or actively don't want desktop users.
Same problem though. The domain itself isn't the issue, it's that the redirect was only one way so mobile users always shared the mobile URL and desktop users who received that shared URL got the janky half-featured mobile site instead of the proper desktop one.
There was a period I can recall, maybe 2010 to 2020 most prominently, when a subset of HN readers strongly preferred the mobile Wikipedia site, even on desktop, and would always use ".m" linking to Wikipedia articles in comments threads. This also seemed to happen in reddit threads during that decade.
I sort of remember some of the older MediaWiki desktop themes looking worse than the mobile theme, but it was never enough for me personally to try always using the mobile site at the time. I do still strongly prefer old.reddit.com... For as long as that portal continues to exist.
Your website might want to present a different interface for people using mouse and keyboard than for people using tiny touch screens? Even if the number of pixels in the browser window is otherwise the same.
I think Wikipedia redirected based on user agent, but yes, whatever, point is if you're a developer you can use the browser devtools to simulate whatever you need.
That's a welcome development albeit late, but more importantly, they should address the "can't link to a highlight" problem on mobile. When all sections are collapsed by default, browser won't scroll to the relevant section.
m.youtube.com and m.facebook.com redirect you to main "m-less" domain when on desktop. That was the greatest problem with Wikipedia. You had to experience that mobile layout on desktop unless you edited the address line and reloaded the page.
m.wikipedia.org was a feature, not a bug. The interface is good on desktop. For some time, before Wikipedia did a desktop site rework, this was my go-to frontend.
Guess this also means I’m getting old as I remember the earlier comics about his partner going through this. I think this is the first one I read after I became a “weekly reader”: https://xkcd.com/1141.
again though... late for what? it's not like someone else came along, did it better, and now wikipedia is some dwindling anachronism
they didn't jump on the shifting trends immediately, got to it eventually when it was the clear path, and implemented it in a completely reasonable way... they may have actually benefited quite a bit for directions to settle
I was hoping this was a unification of the both layouts as well, that would have been really impressive. The mobile version of the article pages is great, but getting both versions from the same frontend would be an amazing case study.
The new one (called vector-2022) is much closer to mobile stylings, but not the same. The mobile skin is called minerva. On top of that the mobile site makes some changes to the content to simplify it, and replaces some elements.
I'd be surprised if anyone but the oldest non-technical users had any idea what the "www" was or why it would or wouldn't be at the front of a URL. It takes zero technical knowledge to understand "en" indicates the language and probably rarely comes up since you can use www or omit the en and links mostly just work.
They might wonder (although I doubt it), but it’s nothing actionable.
With m., they used to see a mobile layout that’s a really poor fit for a desktop screen and that they would have manually switch out of via some relatively obscure button.
