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“But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

smashingmagazine.com

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Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#41

Post by learc83 »

mendable wrote: post #4

This article is great, but it works on the premise that IE6 support is a purely rational discussion by two knowledgeable parties before a contract is signed. -- In reality, you may develop a website, then the client is visiting their uncle bob one weekend who has an old computer with IE6 lying around, client + uncle bob open up the website to have a look, and it is "broken". Client then sends you a hate mail about br…

Take that to it's logical conclusion, and you should still be supporting IE5 for mac.

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#42

Post by JacobAldridge »

mattmanser wrote: post #23
simonsarris wrote: post #3

Perhaps I am naive but this conversation seems easy to resolve with just a few words. Can anyone tell me how a client would respond to this: You can have a site with newer, nicer features, or you can have a site that supports older browsers. If you want both then you are commissioning two distinct websites. If you want usage statistics for old browsers I have them, and if you want to be economical I can produce the s…

To me that's lying to them. While supporting IE6 is onerous extra work, it's still work that can be done and has little impact on the final product. Take the other position, that 'Not supporting IE6 will mean I'll charge you 70% of my original quote, only x% of people use it in your target market' or better add it as an extra in the quote in the first place as the article suggests. Then it's up to them, it's a risk a…

Minor nitpick, but the OP is a she - Lea Verou. To be fair, this feels like such a male-dominated sector that I only picked you up because I had unexpectedly noticed Lea's picture at the bottom of the article, and I suspect you didn't feel the need to check!

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#43

Post by gte910h »

[deleted] wrote: post #36

[deleted]

>A line item like "IE6 support" is how to generate negative feedback from clients.

Not at all. The few clients I've had who've said anything at all have been overwhelmingly positive about knowing exactly how much IE6 support would cost vs not.

That's one of the reasons we started implementing it as a second, simpler site, much cheaper, allows that number to go down even more.

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#44

Post by j45 »

Fight opinion with facts.

Ask your customers if they got IE6 support as advice from someone.

Show how many people use it now and what that sliver of IE6 users now see with gracefully deprecating css libraries.

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#45

Post by rmc »

mendable wrote: post #4

This article is great, but it works on the premise that IE6 support is a purely rational discussion by two knowledgeable parties before a contract is signed. -- In reality, you may develop a website, then the client is visiting their uncle bob one weekend who has an old computer with IE6 lying around, client + uncle bob open up the website to have a look, and it is "broken". Client then sends you a hate mail about br…

That sounds like an asshole client. Just make sure you have it specified in writing before you start a job the browser that are and aren't provided. Then if they want to talk to a lawyer, they can try.

Best not to take any further work from that client again.

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#46

Post by seabee »

JacobAldridge wrote: post #42
mattmanser wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me that's lying to them. While supporting IE6 is onerous extra work, it's still work that can be done and has little impact on the final product. Take the other position, that 'Not supporting IE6 will mean I'll charge you 70% of my original quote, only x% of people use it in your target market' or better add it as an extra in the quote in the first place as the article suggests. Then it's up to them, it's a risk a…

Minor nitpick, but the OP is a she - Lea Verou. To be fair, this feels like such a male-dominated sector that I only picked you up because I had unexpectedly noticed Lea's picture at the bottom of the article, and I suspect you didn't feel the need to check!

If we had genderless pronouns we wouldn't have to care about details like that which don't materially affect the article or its criticisms.

Having said that, fields with a more even gender ratio have had to deal with this for a while - what do they do?

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#47

Post by gte910h »

mattmanser wrote: post #23
simonsarris wrote: post #3

Perhaps I am naive but this conversation seems easy to resolve with just a few words. Can anyone tell me how a client would respond to this: You can have a site with newer, nicer features, or you can have a site that supports older browsers. If you want both then you are commissioning two distinct websites. If you want usage statistics for old browsers I have them, and if you want to be economical I can produce the s…

To me that's lying to them. While supporting IE6 is onerous extra work, it's still work that can be done and has little impact on the final product. Take the other position, that 'Not supporting IE6 will mean I'll charge you 70% of my original quote, only x% of people use it in your target market' or better add it as an extra in the quote in the first place as the article suggests. Then it's up to them, it's a risk a…

>and has little impact on the final product.

Depends on the tools you use, etc. It very well may double the time required (as IE 6 support requires tons of testing of all the features, and many software project have huge portions of the projects being testing, not development).

Additionally, you tend to need more experienced engineers, IE6 support is aged out of the current crop of grads.

I think the second legacy browser site is a great solution. Additionally, I think if you're saying "has little impact on the final product", you're not working with clients who open up psds and count pixels on you. Some people are.

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#48

Post by JacobAldridge »

seabee wrote: post #46
JacobAldridge wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Minor nitpick, but the OP is a she - Lea Verou. To be fair, this feels like such a male-dominated sector that I only picked you up because I had unexpectedly noticed Lea's picture at the bottom of the article, and I suspect you didn't feel the need to check!

If we had genderless pronouns we wouldn't have to care about details like that which don't materially affect the article or its criticisms. Having said that, fields with a more even gender ratio have had to deal with this for a while - what do they do?

I tend to just be lazy and put "the OP" instead of he/she/it, although you could nitpick me on that as well since the author of an article posted to HN is often not the "original poster" in question.

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#49

Post by gte910h »

seabee wrote: post #46
JacobAldridge wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Minor nitpick, but the OP is a she - Lea Verou. To be fair, this feels like such a male-dominated sector that I only picked you up because I had unexpectedly noticed Lea's picture at the bottom of the article, and I suspect you didn't feel the need to check!

If we had genderless pronouns we wouldn't have to care about details like that which don't materially affect the article or its criticisms. Having said that, fields with a more even gender ratio have had to deal with this for a while - what do they do?

English does have a genderless singular pronoun: They

Just because a book said it was preferred in 1848 to use he when sex is indeterminate (then went on to use both singular he and singular they) doesn't mean that's true today.

The language always used both. Why stop today? Might feel a bit odd at first if you're not used to it, but it's not a bit different than how singular "you" is used ("You are coming today?" uses the plural form of "be").

The book itself used both forms! Shows you that English teachers may have been overly strict with you in the past.

Some more on the topic:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they

Re: “But The Client Wants IE 6 Support”

#50

Post by mixmastamyk »

libria wrote: post #34

It's interesting that despite all the investment that Google is making in Plus and their desire for a foothold in this market, they flat out refuse IE6: http://i.imgur.com/ONRK4.png

Good for them. There is a trade off to be made, better/quicker features delivered at the expense of supporting an obsolete browser.
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