In certain cases, ignorance is not bliss, especially, if it concerns the running of your online business. Nevertheless, even if the whole of 2013 has not been able to convince you of the significance of having a website for conducting your day-to-day transactions; today, in the fast flowing months of 2014, you need not only a regular website but rather a responsive website for mere survival.Now, don’t get finicky about the word Responsive Website or Responsive Web Design for that matter because the concept is nothing new or novel in 2014.

What Exactly Is a Responsive Design

Ever since IBM introduced smartphones in 1992, people became crazy about mobile versions of their websites. This was followed by real waves – one design for Blackberry, another for iPhone, iPad, netbook, to name a few. And the avalanche is continuing unabated till the designers themselves are likely to be replaced by people belonging to some other trade or calling. But, you see, whenever there is a crisis in the field of technology, a solution surfaces itself automatically. In fact, studies revealed that if the design and development are made to respond to the user’s behavior and setting, based on screen size, platform, orientation, etc; it can give birth to Responsive Web Design. The implementation, to be precise, consists of an amalgamation of flexible grids and layouts, images as well as appropriate use of CSS media queries. As a result, whenever the user switches from his/her laptop to iPhone, the website would inexorably shift to accommodate for image size, resolution and scripting. To be more specific, the website would acquire the technology to instantaneously respond to the user’s hand held device. This, as you can see, eliminates the need for a wide array of design and working phases for each new and novel device that are likely to be presented in the market.

How the Concept Originated

Surprisingly enough, the concept of Responsive Web Design reportedly originated from the idea of Responsive Architectural Design, whereby a room or a given space technically adjusts to the crowd of people entering into it. Part of the relevant document is reproduced here for the benefit of readers (and website owners, too).“Recently, an emergent discipline called “responsive architecture” has begun asking how physical spaces can respond to the presence of people passing through them. Through a combination of embedded robotics and tensile materials, architects are experimenting with art installations and wall structures that bend, flex, and expand as crowds approach them. Motion sensors can be paired with climate control systems to adjust a room’s temperature and ambient lighting as it fills with people. Companies have already produced “smart glass technology” that can automatically become opaque when a room’s occupants reach a certain density threshold, giving them an additional layer of privacy.”

Now, if you transplant this discipline onto the field of Web Design, we would have similar benefits. The basic question, meanwhile raises its head, as to why should we create custom web design for each and every group of users? Do the architects ever practice such methods? No; they never do that. While agreeing that the architectural designing of a building that houses a school would differ from one that serves as a housing block, no further deviations are made thereafter. Similarly, Responsive Web Design would automatically adjust to the user’s device, if it is so designed. For instance, there are certain types of Responsive Web Designs that are formed  of netlike substances that easily fills the screens of most tablets and iPhones easily and effectively. What is more, the prime display mostly occurs above the fold!