Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#1

Post by Azeralthefallen » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 5:32 AM UTC

We use React + Material Design, one of our largest clients has basically told us they are going to drop us because the people who use our app are stuck on IE6, which we don't support at all.

This never came up anytime before, or during the pilot. This only came out as we started to roll out to one of their offices.

Their primary workstations are stuck on a version of Windows 2000, because their primary workflow applications do not run on anything more modern. We are on premise for them, so i can make a special build if needed. Any suggestions or ideas? I looked and dug around and can't find anything.

Electron doesn't work on Windows 2000, and no amount of tinkering with babel seems to make it work at all.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#2

Post by etaioinshrdlu » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 6:08 AM UTC

I am sorry to hear about this. Seems like modern browsers are very hard to come by on such old platforms...

Idea 1: AWS Appstream https://aws.amazon.com/appstream2/pricing/?nc=sn&loc=4

Idea 2: VNC to something else on premise

Idea 3: Run the app inside Linux inside QEMU (or another emulator)

Idea 4: Write your web app like its 1999

I think Idea 3 may be best for this case.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#3

Post by rmason » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 6:11 AM UTC

Is a Docker or a VM solution possible? I admit to not being very knowledgeable here. If you can get a virtualized solution running a different version of Windows (or Linux) on these machines just for your app.

Either that or it's rebuild the app using jQuery and an earlier version of Bootstrap. For an alterative for Electron you can look into LibUI plus LibUI-Node.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#4

Post by acemarke » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 6:20 AM UTC

etaioinshrdlu wrote: post #2

I am sorry to hear about this. Seems like modern browsers are very hard to come by on such old platforms... Idea 1: AWS Appstream https://aws.amazon.com/appstream2/pricing/?nc=sn&loc=4 Idea 2: VNC to something else on premise Idea 3: Run the app inside Linux inside QEMU (or another emulator) Idea 4: Write your web app like its 1999 I think Idea 3 may be best for this case.

Option 5: run for the hills screaming?

(Only half-joking here. I know it sounds like it's an important client, but it seems as if there was a serious breakdown in communications on the client's part, _and_ they're stuck on obsolete technology. These are not realistic requirements.)

I suppose option 6 would be to figure out how to get the client to upgrade their systems to a modern hardware and OS, and then run the old software in a VM instead.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#5

Post by zenexer » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 6:35 AM UTC

I think you're out of luck. Hindsight is 20/20, but shouldn't their hardware and software requirements have come up long before you started development? How did you get to the point at which you were actively developing without knowing your target environment, especially if you're on premise?

At first I wrote a response suggesting a few ways you might be able to get it working on older versions of Windows, but they're just not feasible for anything prior to XP. Possible? Probably, but more work than rewriting everything, most likely.

You might be able to convince them to upgrade and virtualize their Windows 2000 programs--heck, you might even be able to get away with using DOSBox. That seems a lot more realistic than virtualizing Linux or a newer version of Windows on Windows 2000. But I wouldn't get your hopes up--anyone still on Windows 2000 is going to object heavily to upgrading; that's why they're still on Windows 2000. You can eliminate all the barriers for them and they still won't want to do it.

Edit: This might sound crazy, but have you looked into whether it's possible to make some changes to Electron to get it to run on Windows 2000? It's designed to be portable, so, in theory, you should be able to get it to run on a potato--assuming said potato has enough RAM.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#6

Post by zenexer » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 6:42 AM UTC

acemarke wrote: post #4

etaioinshrdlu wrote: post #2

I am sorry to hear about this. Seems like modern browsers are very hard to come by on such old platforms... Idea 1: AWS Appstream https://aws.amazon.com/appstream2/pricing/?nc=sn&loc=4 Idea 2: VNC to something else on premise Idea 3: Run the app inside Linux inside QEMU (or another emulator) Idea 4: Write your web app like its 1999 I think Idea 3 may be best for this case.

Option 5: run for the hills screaming? (Only half-joking here. I know it sounds like it's an important client, but it seems as if there was a serious breakdown in communications on the client's part, _and_ they're stuck on obsolete technology. These are not realistic requirements.) I suppose option 6 would be to figure out how to get the client to upgrade their systems to a modern hardware and OS, and then run the ol…

Option 6 seems like the most viable to me, but it's still a long shot. If they wanted to upgrade, they would've done that a long time ago. At the end of the day, they don't want to upgrade. I'm sure they could get software that does the same thing that runs on newer platforms if they cared enough.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#7

Post by Azeralthefallen » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 6:57 AM UTC

zenexer wrote: post #5

I think you're out of luck. Hindsight is 20/20, but shouldn't their hardware and software requirements have come up long before you started development? How did you get to the point at which you were actively developing without knowing your target environment, especially if you're on premise? At first I wrote a response suggesting a few ways you might be able to get it working on older versions of Windows, but they'r…

Honestly we told them our requirements well over a year ago. Which wasn't an issue apparently, even when we did a pilot in their internal labs which they were running Ubuntu.

It only came up after we started the rollout, when someone from their side who was asked to write documentation about how our app would work into their workflow, realized our app didn't work at all on his station. Which lead to oh no their requirements are horribly wrong.

To me it was a communication breakdown on both sides, but i doubt i can get them to change.

I am going to give getting electron built in Virtual Box and see if i have any luck with it.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#8

Post by Azeralthefallen » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 7:01 AM UTC

rmason wrote: post #3

Is a Docker or a VM solution possible? I admit to not being very knowledgeable here. If you can get a virtualized solution running a different version of Windows (or Linux) on these machines just for your app. Either that or it's rebuild the app using jQuery and an earlier version of Bootstrap. For an alterative for Electron you can look into LibUI plus LibUI-Node.

That is something a coworker is looking into, the biggest problem is we are expected to have ~5,000+ users of our app internally providing them all with VM's is way beyond the scope of what we support.

Even getting our app running on premise was a nightmare, and resulted in us just buying a rack mount and having them put it inside their DC, after everything they gave us was pretty awful.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#9

Post by heyjudy » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 7:02 AM UTC

Is the app used in third-world countries? IE6 is insecure and only used on very old computers that can't install anything else.

I'd check that the requirement is valid before doing a bunch of work.

Re: Ask HN: Being told to support IE6, any advice?

#10

Post by Azeralthefallen » Mon, Dec 31, 2018, 7:04 AM UTC

etaioinshrdlu wrote: post #2

I am sorry to hear about this. Seems like modern browsers are very hard to come by on such old platforms... Idea 1: AWS Appstream https://aws.amazon.com/appstream2/pricing/?nc=sn&loc=4 Idea 2: VNC to something else on premise Idea 3: Run the app inside Linux inside QEMU (or another emulator) Idea 4: Write your web app like its 1999 I think Idea 3 may be best for this case.

Idea 1: Is out because they are not actually connected to the outside internet from their workstations.

Idea 2: Not viable due to the sheer number of users most likely.

Idea 3: We tried to get virtualbox to run on their machines, which we found most only have a ~4 GB of ram and it makes hosting an entire other OS a very painful experience.

Idea 4: Looks more and more likely. :(