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I don't know how to IE6

blog.colbyrabideau.com

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Re: I don't know how to IE6

#111

Post by justincormack »

notahacker wrote: post #81
derleth wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we should stop supporting X browser because some kid doesn't know how to support it too? No, we should look seriously at whether we need to keep doing things the cheap labor can't perform anymore. Supporting IE6 is a Black Art, and keeping people who can perform Black Arts reliably is expensive. I suppose the traditional comparison is to COBOL codebases and greenscreen IBM development. If thinking about that convin…

For the majority of websites it's not so much a Black Art as something anyone who designed websites more than 5 years ago should manage competently (assuming there aren't unreasonable requirements such as pixel perfection or reproducing every hover effect). The comparison is more finding someone that knows how to program Python instead of copy/pasting PHP scripts.

Html and css were not designed to be an arcane programming language, but a simple layout markup. If well designed then copy paste should work fine. Arguably we didnt quite make that simplicity, but I think your Python PHP comment is way off as far as html css is concerned...

Re: I don't know how to IE6

#112

Post by wladimir »

mestudent wrote: post #74
ansonparker wrote: post #73

I look after an Australian e-commerce site. About 6.5% of our users are on IE6 (I assume they're mainly office-workers on shitty, out-dated PCs). That is way too big a chunk of revenue to ignore in the name of ideals or standards or what-have-you. But please, feel free to redirect any IE6 visitors to your blog to whatever the latest "IE6 is shit and you're an idiot" single serving site of the moment is. I agree that…

I try to make my websites work in ie6 but with minimal work, I'll let IE6 users use it but it will be a degraded experience and most of my website for normal people actually haven't seen such high IE6 usage as 6.5%.

I think that's pretty much the best solution. For old browsers in general, have a legacy HTML-only fallback site. This makes IE6 and Lynx users happy alike :-) It doesn't need to be pretty but it needs to be functional enough to do all the stuff your customers need to do.

Re: I don't know how to IE6

#113

Post by JanezStupar »

unreal37 wrote: post #82

You're 20. Working as an intern for a social networking company. I am sure life seems ideal to you, working on only modern technologies and being able to ignore things that are not perfect. Outside of this sheltered life, you will have to be able to deal with people asking you to do things you would rather not do. Might as well accept it, instead of writing a blog post every time it happens.

Feels good advocating conformism while reaping benefits of thousands of years of nonconformist struggle?

Re: I don't know how to IE6

#114

Post by duggi »

derleth wrote: post #66
true_religion wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to make a "me too" like post, but as soon as I read his biography, I thought "... wait we should stop supporting X browser because some kid doesn't know how to support it too?". Are we now just leveling the playing field so experience is irrelevant, and kids just out of college should be able to compete with those who have been working the field for ages (ages which I might add included a time when IE6 was the…

> we should stop supporting X browser because some kid doesn't know how to support it too? No, we should look seriously at whether we need to keep doing things the cheap labor can't perform anymore. Supporting IE6 is a Black Art, and keeping people who can perform Black Arts reliably is expensive. I suppose the traditional comparison is to COBOL codebases and greenscreen IBM development. If thinking about that convin…

supporting ie6 is not a black art, its a dipshit art

Re: I don't know how to IE6

#115

Post by yaakov34 »

This is immaturely and badly argued. So it took a massive two days for an intern to add IE6 support to a web app. This is actually a good argument for keeping IE6 support for the several percent of users who still have it. I am not saying there aren't good arguments for dropping IE6, but this just isn't it.

Some of the supporting arguments are even worse - does he really expect a course called "Legacy Browser Support 301" to be taught at his college? And why would he need that course, seeing as how he managed fine all by himself? He could now teach that course better than any of the profs, who probably don't hack on IE6 conditional code.

There is also this refusal to look at things from a business perspective - he is working for a company which earns revenue from that web app that he worked on. If the revenue from IE6 users is greater than the value of 2 days of an intern's work, which seems likely, then the right decision is to throw in IE6 support. Now, if you have a massive stable of web apps (like Google) and it takes immense developer resources to support IE6 which will go away in a few years anyway, that's a different story. Change the inputs and you change the answer.

He seems like a good prog and a good guy, but he needs to mature some more.

Re: I don't know how to IE6

#116

Post by estel »

JanezStupar wrote: post #107
notJim wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it costs money to stop using IE6. It also costs money to deploy, test, train users to use, rewrite all other applications to use a new browser. When the former cost is greater than the lesser, businesses will upgrade. I fail to see how its the fault of outside vendors that their clients or customers are still using an old browser. And if it's an in-house IT shop, it's purely a cost/business decision. You make it…

Same old set of excuses, covering gross negligence and incompetence that is going on in corporate IT departments. Its hard to train users and IT is against it - are two largest straw men arguments on this topic. I was leading a development effort on this type of project and I took strong position that IE6 shall not be supported (due to some conflicting technical requirements in Request for tender). This specific IT d…

Ok, how about considering a different demographic: China.

IE6 remains by far the most popular desktop web browser in China (Statcounter [1] says 50% of the market). If my site is targetting a Chinese audience, IE6 support is a must and no amount of persuasion will move the entire Chinese market to Chrome in a hurry.

[1] http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser_version-CN-monthly-201007...

Re: I don't know how to IE6

#117

Post by oliciv »

carbonica wrote: post #27

What Computer Science program would leave you buried in CSS for 2.5 years? If he meant he spent 2.5 years working with CSS on the side, why didn't he ever think "maybe I should learn legacy support"?

Because it's harder and not as cool as working on new stuff

Re: I don't know how to IE6

#118

Post by JanezStupar »

estel wrote: post #116
JanezStupar wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same old set of excuses, covering gross negligence and incompetence that is going on in corporate IT departments. Its hard to train users and IT is against it - are two largest straw men arguments on this topic. I was leading a development effort on this type of project and I took strong position that IE6 shall not be supported (due to some conflicting technical requirements in Request for tender). This specific IT d…

Ok, how about considering a different demographic: China. IE6 remains by far the most popular desktop web browser in China (Statcounter [1] says 50% of the market). If my site is targetting a Chinese audience, IE6 support is a must and no amount of persuasion will move the entire Chinese market to Chrome in a hurry. [1] http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser_version-CN-monthly-201007...

Another strawman. People using pirated OS's and being technically unsophisticated to the degree of being satisfied with what IE6 has to offer are extremely unlikely to buy your service or to provide any significant value to your advertisers. Basically they are leeches that will use whatever is cheapest/most convenient to them. Thus not having them as your user will only spare you some resources.

But if they really want to use your service - they will upgrade in a heartbeat (upgrading or changing a browser is no significant undertaking nowadays). If they are using your service via Cybercafes - they will get the proprietors to install another browser.

Your argument merely tells me that you either haven't developed or seriously thought about developing a service for Chinese market.

Re: I don't know how to IE6

#120

Post by JulianMorrison »

DrStalker wrote: post #108
JanezStupar wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are wasting money by using IE6. Yes you can argue, that they pay for IE6 development and thus its their money and that we should not care. However it is we who sell Win7 and IE6 support at the same time. And by supporting IE6 we lock our customers into stone age even more. There are plenty of alternatives for any software that had to be done via ActiveX 7 years ago. It is completely our (industry) fault that ban…

Any company still on IE6 has enough inertia that they aren't going to change for an external vendor, no matter how much that vendor hates IE6 support.

Then they need to be frozen out of ALL vendors. Eventually, it will hurt more to find the one guy left in the world who still does IE6 and pay him the ridiculous hourly rate he asks.
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