3 simple and 1 not so simple thing Sparkle can’t do?

Question
1

Hi,

I really like the clean interface of Sparkle and would love to use it (I already bought it some time ago).

However, although I thought my web site project is quite simple, there are 4 things that I am afraid Sparkle cannot do. Am I correct in this assessment?

  1. The web site is mostly text, but this text must not have a fixed width. I.e. if the user changes the width of the browser window, the text should adapt.
  2. I need to set various OpenType features (stylistic sets etc.) of the web fonts I use. (I don’t expect Sparkle to have a GUI for the myriad possible font-feature-settings; being able to add custom CSS code would suffice.)
  3. That there’s both Command-V and Command-Shift-alt-V suggests that I could paste an RTF text (from e.g. TextEdit) and preserve bold and italic settings when using Command-V, but this does not work for me.
  4. (the not so simple one) I need a vertical menu in the style of e.g. the Help Viewer in macOS (unfortunately, I don’t know the name of this style of menu, if there is one) where I can access submenus by disclosure triangles that stay open, and where the currently active menu entry is visually accentuated, akin to a table of content. Ideally, there would also be more than 2 hierarchy levels.

The result would still be a simple website with some JavaScript for the vertical menu, but I’m afraid I cannot use Sparkle for it. Is this correct?

2

@Uli, Ok let me have a go…

  1. Sparkle outputs responsive fixed width websites, not responsive fluid width
  2. Sparkle has a good variety of fonts, but you can also import fonts if needed
  3. I don’t know about this one but you should set up your font styles instead of cut/paste text styles
  4. Sparkle allows for sub-menus - https://sparkleapp.com/docs/menus.html

I found for myself the more I played and used Sparkle the more I realised there is a lot you can do with it! :slight_smile:

3

So, no.

Which is funny, because your first Hello World! trial with HTML (just with a few more words for a sufficiently lengthy line), the rawest HTML you could possibly write, would give you what I’d need. So it would seem to be the most basic feature imaginable.

  1. you can also import fonts if needed

I know. My point is being able to access the OpenType features of the fonts.

  1. you should set up your font styles instead of cut/paste text styles

Yep. I don’t talk about “full” copying of an external style including fonts, that would run against the concept of CSS. But being able to preserve bold and italic marks when pasting long, already existing RTF texts is immensely useful. It’s about preserving semantics, not style, actually. Many other web design apps are capable of preserving these attributes. (In an ideal world, when importing RTF, you could freely associate the bold and italic marks of RTF with whatever CSS styles you’d want them replaced with.)

  1. Sparkle allows for sub-menus

Your link to Sparkle Docs is most interesting, as this section is structurally extremely similar to what I would want to achieve. My website, too, should have a horizontal basic menu at the top (or bottom) of the page which references basic, disjunct “areas” of the web site, and then a vertical menu on the left side for fine-grained access within an “area”. I assume/hope that the Sparkle web site was built with Sparkle, so two menus on one page seem possible (I wasn’t so sure about this).

But, the vertical menu as it is on the Sparkle web site already shows the issue I’ll have to deal with: Imagine many more doc pages, and the menu simply becomes too long. So, what would be required is a folding of the menu, i.e. disclosure triangles after Introduction, Using Sparkle etc. that would only reveal its submenus (What Is Sparkle, Visual Web Design, …) when you click on the disclosure triangle. And then, ideally, at least one hierarchical level more, i.e. possible submenus for What Is Sparkle, …, again with disclosure triangles. From my POV, that’s about the only way to keep a site with many pages tidy.

What’s also already painfully missing in the vertical menu on Sparkle Docs is an accentuation of the current page which would show you at a glance where exactly you currently are, instead of having to compare the page heading with the menu entries.

4

Hi @Uli, that’s correct, those can’t be done quite precisely how you want them.