As I work on creating a responsive website, one challenge I face is how to efficiently handle the news section for different screen sizes. Currently, my CMS (modx) always supplies 4 news items, but depending on the visitor's viewport size, only 2, 3 or 4 are displayed. This method of hiding extra news items with media queries seems inefficient as it still uses bandwidth unnecessarily for users with small screens.
This approach also complicates the navigation system, especially when dealing with "newer posts" and "older posts". Clicking on "older posts" would consistently load 4 older posts, which may overload some users who only need to see 2 or 3 at a time.
I am looking for a more reliable solution to make the serving of news items more responsive. Is there a way to prevent unnecessary content from being downloaded based on screen size? Any suggestions on handling this dilemma effectively?