Is anyone else having major issues with the responsive app designer?
I’ve been using Adalo way before the responsive builder and I feel like we have gone backwards. Now I’m back to making a web app separate from the mobile app. This is the problem this was supposed to solve, so I’m back to making 2 separate apps with a shared database. It’s virtually impossible to make a layout that works for all 3 screen types especially when using custom lists. Also in the mobile-only app, all my layouts are still jacked up, nothing is aligning and I went from being highly inspired and excited to making apps to frustrated and angry. I’ve had problems I’ve never had before, I have released 3 apps into the app stores before this so I’d consider myself pretty savvy with Adalo. Now it’s almost unusable and I feel trapped and If I could I’d cancel all my subscriptions but I can’t because I have clients.
I’m mainly just venting and seeing if I’m the only one, if I am then maybe I’m just incompetent.
Hello,
What is the main issue that you are facing? The horizontal alignment?
I am wondering since I have few apps built on Adalo before the responsive, and few days ago just started another app and decided to go with the latest responsive Adalo 2.0
I still do not have enough experience with Adalo 2.0 to judge, hopefully I wont face similar issues
@demereed83@mohmdfawzi
Check out This new template . You can start a new app and choose this as the template (learn Adalo). It will walk you through the new responsive editor as well as database things.
I hear you. I have also made a few apps for clients although I am the first to admit that I’m not an expert. I was excited about the responsive update but I am finding that every little change I make in the one view changes everything in the other views and it’s chaos!
Also, I have bought many addons from the app store, and most of these don’t follow the responsive layouts.
I am back to basically designing in the phone view.
But I am hanging in there with the hope that I get better, and Adalo gets better, and then we can get back to making great apps.
Yes I think a lot of us are having the same issues, and @robertbannister you hit the nail on the head…it’s chaos. Every tweak changes the other screen sizes. I use custom lists a ton and my custom list falls apart. I’m also hanging in there, there is no other builder like Adalo and since we’re early adopters I guess I have to take the good with the bad.
My solution is I make a mobile app separately and share the database with a web app. I tweak the Desktop and Tablet view and hide everything on the Mobile view. Then have a message and button that says “For a better experience on mobile download our mobile app” or something like that. That only shows up on the Mobile view that way all I have to do is manage the Desktop and Tablet layout chaos. That seems to be working, I’m managing 2 builds but at least I’m not throwing my computer through the wall, and honestly, that’s how I did it before the Responsive builder.
You are so right. The new responsive builder is great for very simple apps with default components, so having the web, tablet and PC version doesn’t become too difficult.
Things get complicated with much more elaborate designs, with many custom lists, etc… True, it becomes a total mess there.
And I too prefer to make completely different screens depending on the device and refer users to them.
Thanks for this feedback. Curious, for your custom lists, is it mostly just the column count that you’d like to change per screen or more that you’re struggling with? Have you tried using visibility to show custom designs per screen? I’ve been working on some tutorials and templates, if there are any that you’d like to see that would help, please let me know!
One tip that I find that helps if you’re struggling is to simplify simplify simplify. Use fewer components per screen, try to keep your designs clean. And not everything needs to scale! It’s totally fine to use fixed width if you’re struggling, then use Custom Layout Settings to simply set the width on each screen size so it looks good without worrying about any auto scaling. I want to make sure people don’t feel like it’s a failure to design three separate screens. That’s totally fine! The purpose is to give you the tools to deliver the best experience as you see it.
Another tip: I almost always have two layouts, not three. I choose at the start if I want my tablet design to be the same as my mobile design or my desktop design. You often don’t need three different layouts. I find that two works great. Many of our screen templates are like this if you check them out.
Here’s an example of a very easy way to do layout where you can simply make sure it looks good on every screen size. No scaling except for the nav. All components are set to fixed width. Custom layout is on for every component on every screen size. So every change you make only applies to that screen, never messes up your other screens. Just switch to mobile, make everything look good, switch to tablet, resize, reposition, switch to desktop, repeat. And one nice thing is if you’re using groups, you only have to set the group as fixed. If you have 50 components in the group, they’ll all respect that fixed parent’s behavior even if they are set to scale since scaling is relative to the parent.
Hey all, following up here with a new tutorial that I made to walk you through the easiest way to create apps in our responsive builder. There are definitely more advanced methods and features you can use, but I find that this method is a good mix of power and freedom, while taking very little time to set up and customize per screen. Take a look and let me know if there are more specific topics you’d like me to delve into:
Something that i have noted with the responsive design is that if you drag elements over a rectangle, the rectangle turns into a group, the name however remains as rectangle, is this a bug or a new feature?
I 100% agree. I don’t like that when I create my desktop experience and then go back to work on my mobile app that everything gets messed up. I have noticed I can configure the layout options, but as I drag an Item to move it where it needs to be the app and the items touches another one. It reset the layout options back to what they were and then the desktop experience loses the original layout and setup. It’s honestly a headache and I just copy only lacey applications and delete the database and change all the info to make an legacy site. Then I make the mobile separate. This is the only way to insure my applications looks right on the each device. I think the responsive design needs a little more work before I will full on use it.
This is what we needed to have a better explanation of this 2.0 builder. This is the first time I am hearing the recommendation to build mobile first. Which honestly now hearing that make the most sense. Thank you @adalojosh for this content.
@adalojosh How did you get the lists to change column numbers as you scale the screen size. this has been bugging me for days and finally found this thread. can i have 4 columns on desktop and as I scale down to tablet it goes to 2, and finally at mobile it goes down to one column? please advise workaround if possible?
