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Dropped IE support for Instapaper

marco.org

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Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#31

Post by dualogy »

pj wrote: post #21

The web is a public good and as such, we should have /one/ standards compliant browser that works on any device that can access it. Fund it with taxes, just like roads, bridges, and the new electric grid Obama is going to buy us... Microsoft should just stop working on IE and concentrate on the OS. We don't need Opera, Chrome, Safari, IE, Firefox, etc... They're /all/ free. Take the best of them all and build /one/.

I don't like this, but yeah, go ahead, do it. Only, kill them by being better, not by governmental decree.

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#32

Post by dualogy »

dualogy wrote: post #31
pj wrote: post #21

The web is a public good and as such, we should have /one/ standards compliant browser that works on any device that can access it. Fund it with taxes, just like roads, bridges, and the new electric grid Obama is going to buy us... Microsoft should just stop working on IE and concentrate on the OS. We don't need Opera, Chrome, Safari, IE, Firefox, etc... They're /all/ free. Take the best of them all and build /one/.

I don't like this, but yeah, go ahead, do it. Only, kill them by being better, not by governmental decree.

But that was trolling anyway, wasn't it...

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#33

Post by SystemOut »

You guys are missing the point. This guy is doing this by himself. It's hard to be good at both server backend AND well versed at front-end work to be able to work around IE6/7 problems quickly. And he's making the right call if his browser demographics are correct (which I'm assuming they are). You have to determine what to allocate resources to on a daily basis in this business. There's always more work and not enough people to go around.

I'm pretty close to pulling the trigger on dropping IE6 support on the sites I run. I don't think it's unreasonable to ask our users to upgrade to a better browser. And believe me, my company is NOT targeting the corporate user at all. :) The amount of time I spend fixing IE6 issues is just insane. I could be doing so much more that helps other users and if I can get them to upgrade to a better browser in the first place then so much the better.

I will close with this: It wouldn't suck as much to fix issues on IE6/7 if it just had decent development tools such as Firebug, Tamper Data, and Web Developer.

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#34

Post by SystemOut »

eli wrote: post #13
amix wrote: post #5

I would not recommend this if you want your product to hit the average user - IE has the biggest market share (still :(). But of course, for Instpaper it's perfectly right to do so since the market is power-users and they mostly us FF (as the author notes).

I can tell you with some authority that if you're targeting corporate users, about 2/3 of the traffic is internet explorer. Worse is that about 40% of that IE traffic is IE6.

Did you read the post? He said less than 10% of his traffic is IE6. I'd say he is making the right call based on those demographics. When you look at resource decisions you have to look at the target market...and somehow I don't think it's corporate. If he was targeting corporate users he'd probably also build a Crackberry app.

And your 40% is just way off base unless you're writing salesforce.com apps or something like that. We see about 20% of our IE traffic at IE6 still and dropping fast. 18 months ago that was still at 50%.

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#35

Post by SystemOut »

jasonkester wrote: post #23
feverishaaron wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I estimate that supporting IE6 has added more than 30% of the interface development costs to the complex projects I have worked on that use a combination of sophisticated CSS and JS to get the job done. This is a HUGE cost for start-ups and for clients to swallow, once the true cost is explained to them. Just supporting the way various sub-versions of IE6 inconsistently handle cookies is a nightmare, and in many case…

30% cost to support 70% of your userbase seems like a win to me. This is only an issue for developers who target Firefox initially. That's the wrong way to go about web development. Run IE7 on your dev box and build everything against it. That's what your users will have, so that should be your first priority. Step two is making it work for FF. The added benefit to that approach is that you'll find less cross platfor…

But IE6 isn't 70% of your userbase. Maybe 70% of your userbase is IE but only maybe 20-25% of that is IE6 so spending 30% more time/resources on IE6 is what I would call a major fail. But hey, that's just me.

And have you ever tried to develop complex ui sites on IE? I'm sorry...it just sucks and there is no good way around that. And I'm someone who knows IE6/7 quirks pretty good. Their script debuggers are utter crap and their developer toolbar is the most ancient thing out there. At least in IE8 they are copying Firebug...at that point it might not suck as much but who knows until I use it a while.

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#36

Post by CalmQuiet »

vaksel wrote: post #16

It seems like most of IE is installed on corporate machines. Now answer me this, what kind of IT Administrator doesn't realize the advantages to installing firefox?

The common, everyday grade of IT admin. Who also is overworked. and reports too a technophobe adminstrator. ...a grade of IT admin which I encounter way too often, unfortunately.

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#37

Post by jwilliams »

jhy wrote: post #20

That all makes good sense for an app built by a single developer and a specific demographic. He's cutting 10% of his potential market and probably saving 80% of front-end dev time. Seems like a good tradeoff.

I don't know - his examples were rounded corners, a float that he fixed and an unrelated-to-IE font issue. Are they worth cutting of 10% of your users?

Quite often it's worthwhile maintaining a bare-bones version of your site. For more than just compatability - there is also accessibility, printing, slow connections, etc, etc. Surely it's a better user experience to just downgrade them to that?

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#38

Post by StrawberryFrog »

cschep wrote: post #2

I love this. If everyone did this, then Microsoft would lose the power to do whatever it wanted. Standards compliance would not be optional for them anymore. I hope this is a trend that continues.

It's not quite so black and white, but yes, if you look at IE8, IE8 is more standards compliant because Microsoft has less leverage over the browser market any more.

Nevertheless, it has been blindsided by the sudden appearance of much faster Javascript in chrome and other browsers. It's too late in the dev cycle for IE8 to get that. It will have to wait for IE9 or 8.1 or whatever.

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#39

Post by alecthomas »

thesethings wrote: post #28
kirse wrote: post #8

I despise websites that do this because I have to use IE7 at work. This is probably the second fastest way for me to banish your website from memory besides being spam. Everyone on here talks about making the sign-up process as easy as possible, and requiring someone to download and install an entirely new application is about as complex and uninviting as one can get. Us "technical" people are still people, and the m…

Can I ask you (and others in a similar boat) a question about your work environment? When you say "I have to use IE at work," do you mean at the exclusion of other browsers? I too have to have IE6 at work (many old business apps require it), but I can also run Firefox, Chrome, Flock, Safari, etc. And I don't mind having multiple browsers open, in fact, I just usually do naturally, without any impetus. Does you workpl…

At my two previous employers, that's exactly what they do. All machines are completely locked-down. I suspect this is not unusual at large, more traditional corporations.

Re: Dropped IE support for Instapaper

#40

Post by brk »

sam_in_nyc wrote: post #30

I'm under the impression that this site doesn't do all that much. Ok... you store URLs, then mark them as "read" and "unread." Not necessarily a good or bad thing.. I'm sure it's incredibly useful. That's not my point. My point is, how can a 2 page website drop support for a whole browser? Just seems like laziness to me.

I think he did a pretty good job explaining why he made the choice to drop support for IE in TFA.
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