Why does Firefox on my Mac display certain websites' home page with the column headings replaced with a stack of three lines?
I have Firefox running on two desktop computers: (1) on my Mac Mini running macOS High Sierra, and (2) on my Microsoft PC running Windows 7 SP1. Both systems have the latest version of Firefox. My problem is on the Mac Mini.
When I access the website, www.medtronicdiabetes,com/home on the Windows PC, the homepage displays OK, and the third line down reads, "Products Treatments Services ", etc, as it should. But when I access the same site on the Mac Mini, these headings are absent, and a stack of 3 short lines take their place. What's up with that? And how do I correct it? There should be a setting somewhere.
If I click on the stack, the headings are revealed, but in a horizontal manner, i.e., taking one line per entry and pushing the other content further down.
Thanks in advance, Philgash
Chosen solution
Website developers can customize their websites to display differently on specific screen sizes. In this case, a wider screen will show the full menu and the smaller screen will hide them in the menu.
This is common practice because people are connecting from a variety of screens (mobile, laptops, desktops, etc). For example, things need to be condensed to fit on a smartphone screen, but not to display on a desktop computer screen.
There is no real way to fix this issue because it's not really an issue. It's simply the way that the people who made the website designed it to appear on a screen of your size.
The only real thing I can suggest for this issue is to ensure that your zoom in Firefox is set to 100% like normal. Zooming in may make the website change to the condensed mode and zooming out may make it change back to normal mode.
Hope this helps.
Read this answer in context 👍 1All Replies (3)
Chosen Solution
Website developers can customize their websites to display differently on specific screen sizes. In this case, a wider screen will show the full menu and the smaller screen will hide them in the menu.
This is common practice because people are connecting from a variety of screens (mobile, laptops, desktops, etc). For example, things need to be condensed to fit on a smartphone screen, but not to display on a desktop computer screen.
There is no real way to fix this issue because it's not really an issue. It's simply the way that the people who made the website designed it to appear on a screen of your size.
The only real thing I can suggest for this issue is to ensure that your zoom in Firefox is set to 100% like normal. Zooming in may make the website change to the condensed mode and zooming out may make it change back to normal mode.
Hope this helps.
Mr. Branton, your analysis is spot-on, and simply setting the browser to full-screen solved the problem. BTW, both desktop computers have identical 24-inch displays, but I'm in the habit of avoiding full-screen so I can easily click on peripheral icons. Silly me.
Thanks for replying, Phil G.
To add to my original response, it's not so much the physical size of the screen that impacts this. It has to do with the resolution of the screen.
For example, if I have computer monitor that is 1080p resolution (1920 pixels wide and 1080 pixels tall), it will display differently from a laptop screen that is 729p resolution (1280 pixels wide and 720 pixels tall) even if both are 24" in physical size.
This is because when a website asks Firefox for the size of the window (we'll assume we just want the width of the window), Firefox will give the size in pixels. So the Firefox on the desktop will say that it's 1920 pixels wide, but the Firefox on the laptop will say that it's 1280 pixels wide.
This is naturally an overly simplified explanation. There are other factors and some situations where a website can change its appearance based on physical size. For example, I could create a box on a website that is 2 inches wide if I wanted to. I can also change the appearance based on whether the screen is portrait (taller than it is wider) or landscape (wider than it is taller).
Just figured I'd expand on my explanation a little bit. Regardless, I'm glad I could help.