IE7:Headache?

[lengthsman]

Normally the threat of even more hacks to render a page would leave me
in a cold sweat but regarding IE7 problems, not today. MS Vista has
been put back at least nine months, why? I suspect they have gone down
the wrong track and they are having to re-evaluated where Windows
should be. I'm old enough to remember people not taking Windows For
Workgroups seriously as networking was Novell's field.

Off topic? How about if I were to change the perspective.

OS: Google / Yahoo
Server: Apache
Application code: HTML,Java,PHP developed in Adobe,Macromedia,SUN
File store: XML

What else do we need? Terminals and a rendering engine for PDA, Mobile
Phones, PC's etc...

Terminals : Linux, Windows, Mac. And that's before you even start on
hand held devices running embedded Linux and windows or bespoke
OS's...

Rendering engines: They way I see it is that everybody is aiming for
W3C compliance with the exception of maybe MS who up until a couple of
days ago thought that they could still control the market. The days of
the browser wars with subtle differences desperately trying to keep a
percentage of the market has long gone and those not W3C compliant
today will be the once ran, tomorrow. Not convinced?

How many rendering engines are there today? Did you include the
PDA's, Phones, WebTV? Could you employ enough hacks and server side
detection to cover all of them and still meet UK (coming to EU and US
soon) accessibility? I don't think so either and the market has known
this for a while. Like the mobile phone market, products will have to
be feature rich as network compatibility is just too important to mess
with.

What brought on this rant? A meeting with a client who's retains the
old adage that 'the customer is always right', and well most of his
competitors have fallen by the wayside because in his customer's
words 'they didn't give them what they wanted'. Multiplied by
what he now wanted was an e-commerce system that would allow a customer
to browse products on their PC, if they need time to finalise the
decision, order or check status on their mobile phone or PDA.

The standards are there, as are most of the platforms, hands up who
want's to exclude themselves! MS IE7? Opera and Firefox and others
are constantly fixing their rendering engines with regular updates to
meet the emerging market trends.

 

[jb]

Normally the threat of even more hacks to render a page would leave me
in a cold sweat but regarding IE7 problems, not today. MS Vista has
been put back at least nine months, why? I suspect they have gone down
the wrong track and they are having to re-evaluated where Windows
should be. I'm old enough to remember people not taking Windows For
Workgroups seriously as networking was Novell's field.

Off topic? How about if I were to change the perspective.

OS: Google / Yahoo
Server: Apache
Application code: HTML,Java,PHP developed in Adobe,Macromedia,SUN
File store: XML

What else do we need? Terminals and a rendering engine for PDA, Mobile
Phones, PC's etc...

Terminals : Linux, Windows, Mac. And that's before you even start on
hand held devices running embedded Linux and windows or bespoke
OS's...

Rendering engines: They way I see it is that everybody is aiming for
W3C compliance with the exception of maybe MS who up until a couple of
days ago thought that they could still control the market. The days of
the browser wars with subtle differences desperately trying to keep a
percentage of the market has long gone and those not W3C compliant
today will be the once ran, tomorrow. Not convinced?

How many rendering engines are there today? Did you include the
PDA's, Phones, WebTV? Could you employ enough hacks and server side
detection to cover all of them and still meet UK (coming to EU and US
soon) accessibility? I don't think so either and the market has known
this for a while. Like the mobile phone market, products will have to
be feature rich as network compatibility is just too important to mess
with.

What brought on this rant? A meeting with a client who's retains the
old adage that 'the customer is always right', and well most of his
competitors have fallen by the wayside because in his customer's
words 'they didn't give them what they wanted'. Multiplied by
what he now wanted was an e-commerce system that would allow a customer
to browse products on their PC, if they need time to finalise the
decision, order or check status on their mobile phone or PDA.

The standards are there, as are most of the platforms, hands up who
want's to exclude themselves! MS IE7? Opera and Firefox and others
are constantly fixing their rendering engines with regular updates to
meet the emerging market trends.

IE7 is rock solid.

 

[lengthsman]

IE7 is rock solid.

http://www.quirksmode.org/bugreports/archives/explorer_7_beta_2/index.html

 

[jb]

http://www.quirksmode.org/bugreports/archives/explorer_7_beta_2/index.html

wow, not a single css reference?

 

[Jim Higson]

IE7 is rock solid.

IE7 is where Opera, Firefox etc were 4 years ago.
Here's an interesting page, with shots of Acid2 under Opera 1-9 and IE6/7:

http://www.howtocreate.co.uk/operaStuff/acid/

IE7 seems to be about the same as Opera 4.

 

[Travis Newbury]

http://www.quirksmode.org/bugreports/archives/explorer_7_beta_2/index.html

Actually 69 bugs while in beta is not that bad. Heck, mozilla has 40
current bugs, and it isn't in beta.

If IE7 gives me some tabs and a few other FF features I like, then it
is good bye FF, hello IE7

 

[Gernot Frisch]

Actually 69 bugs while in beta is not that bad. Heck, mozilla has
40
current bugs, and it isn't in beta.

If IE7 gives me some tabs and a few other FF features I like, then
it
is good bye FF, hello IE7

I think you are the only one who thinks so...

 

[Jim Higson]

http://www.quirksmode.org/bugreports/archives/explorer_7_beta_2/index.html

Actually 69 bugs while in beta is not that bad. Heck, mozilla has 40
current bugs, and it isn't in beta.

Or to look at it another way, only 40 have been found in Moz while loads of
people are using it every day. Hardly anyone uses IE7 and they've already
found more.

Most of the bugs on that page are layout related and IE is in a "layout
freeze" so these problems with the beta will probably be there in the final
realease.

If IE7 gives me some tabs and a few other FF features I like, then it
is good bye FF, hello IE7

I suppose when you're surfing as an end user it doesn't really matter since
the designer will have hacked around whatever IE bugs pop up.

 

[lengthsman]

Or to look at it another way, only 40 have been found in Moz while loads of
people are using it every day. Hardly anyone uses IE7 and they've already
found more.

Most of the bugs on that page are layout related and IE is in a "layout
freeze" so these problems with the beta will probably be there in the final
realease.


I suppose when you're surfing as an end user it doesn't really matter since
the designer will have hacked around whatever IE bugs pop up.

For a while I thought it was only me that notice the "layout freeze" so
that's about what? 9 months min for vista then what another 12 before
IE7.5 meanwhile in 24 months an expected 25% web access will be from
embedded devices who are currently trying to achieve XHTML strict CSS 2
browsers. If Opera/Mozilla continues with the momentum they will
probably be there as well and will have taken a lot more of the market.
Meanwhile back at MS HQ will have their fingers crossed hoping that an
external developer has found a hack to fix their bugs!

Quote from alistapart.com

"Catching different browser bugs to maintain my design instead of
simply display the line 'you are using substandard and defected
software; if it can't display this page properly do you really want
to try a secure credit card transaction'."

I WISH !!!

 

[Jim Higson]

For a while I thought it was only me that notice the "layout freeze" so
that's about what? 9 months min for vista then what another 12 before
IE7.5 meanwhile in 24 months an expected 25% web access will be from
embedded devices who are currently trying to achieve XHTML strict CSS 2
browsers. If Opera/Mozilla continues with the momentum they will
probably be there as well and will have taken a lot more of the market.
Meanwhile back at MS HQ will have their fingers crossed hoping that an
external developer has found a hack to fix their bugs!

The 25% you quote - that's very interesting - where is that from? What would
a phone maker do:

(a) pay MS for using their not very good renderer
(b) get a good one (Gecko, KTHML) for free, pay some for support
(c) pay Opera for the best renderer out there
(d) make and support your own (very expensive)

I can't see too many choosing (a). Personally I'd choose between Opera and
KHTML - Gecko is probably a little too heavy for small CPUs. IIRC, KHTML is
favoured by Nokia for their phones.

Quote from alistapart.com

"Catching different browser bugs to maintain my design instead of
simply display the line 'you are using substandard and defected
software; if it can't display this page properly do you really want
to try a secure credit card transaction'."

I WISH !!!

Me too. In the real world though users are more likely to think "if this
site can't display the page properly, do I really want to try a secure
credit card transaction?".

 

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Actually 69 bugs while in beta is not that bad. Heck, mozilla has 40
current bugs, and it isn't in beta.

If IE7 gives me some tabs and a few other FF features I like, then it
is good bye FF, hello IE7

Those are all display rendering bugs. What about all the security holes?
You up for that?

 

[lengthsman]

It came from an article in EETimes (I think) the main theme was about
the surprising uptake (but maybe not in hindsight) of 802.11 opening a
real opportunity for inter-device operation. USB options are bespoke
software and XP or USB mass storage and poor device control, but with a
larger market of 802.11 add web interface and mini server... This was
further supported by a study that reported that if you gave to groups
of people a task with poor instruction, one using a PC App interface
and the other a web interface, same task and options, the web interface
users where more likely to complete due to a higher confidence level.

If you already have a screen and 802.11, internet access is a zero cost
feature

Digital camera, http or ftp in to get your pictures (can you really
support all browsers?) zero cost addition, upload from the camera
straight to your web site or online or offline printer. Product and OS
compatibility? ALL. The flaw browser compatibility, hence the XHTML
strict & CSS2. All the product then has to state in the manual problem
page is: if the display is broken then is not a fault of this product.
A bit of marketing and the main line browsers will have to keep up or
fall by the wayside. The Internet is no longer just about HTTP it's
the first real generic access point, that's access to your work,
shops, local news, TV, radio, your camera, phone and home.

As normal it'll come down to market forces, just as if you remove
Home use & office (the MS product not office computer use in general)
Microsoft is losing a lot of ground to Linux especially Novell/SUSE
desktop and Redhat Enterprise and if the control panel of my printer,
camera, phone and PVR looks great in Opera but not IE which one do you
think the manufactures will recommend and friends and family tell you
to use.

 

[Travis Newbury]

I think you are the only one who thinks so...

Perhaps in this group, But if they end up coming close to the current
version of FF when they get done, you will see plenty of people go back
to IE

 

[Travis Newbury]

Those are all display rendering bugs. What about all the security holes?
You up for that?

Equally as much as with all other software.