VK said:
JavaScript 1.5 (1.6 on Firefox 1.5) is much closer to the core
ECMAScript specs then JScript 5.6 (IE).
Only marginally closer, if at all. Both implementations are almost
flawless implementations of ECMAScript. IE has a little thing with
array literals and perhaps a bug in regexp lookahead, but that's not
where the dragon lies buried.
The problem is, as you state later, not the core language, but the
runtime environment it runs in, including the document object model
(DOM). There, IE has signficant holes in its standard compliance, so
pages written to standards need fallbacks to work on IE.
Obviously non-IE browsers also have their proprietary extensions,
and if you use those, you need to do something to have the same
thing work in IE (or any other non-IE browser).
Usially you have more troubles to make a JScript program to work on
Firefox.
IE has many extensions and features that are harder to convert to
other browsers. If you use those, the job gets harder. If you start
out trying to use web standards, then you are less likely to hit
an IE-only feature, and conversion is easier.
But overall the core language features (object, methods,
operators, statements) are pretty much identical. The problem is in
differences in DOM interface and the ways to communicate with it.
Indeed. That's not ECMAScript, but DOM (and de-facto standardized
features, aka. DOM 0).
I presume you wrote an ajaxoid using new XMLHttpRequest()
I see no reference to this in the OP's post at all.
Anyway, the one link that will tell you what the IE DOM does do:
<URL:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/workshop/author/dhtml/reference/dhtml_reference_entry.asp>
and their JScript reference:
<URL:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/script56/html/e4fb1cc7-15e0-43e9-bf2e-469fe7b2050c.asp>
A few pages on going from IE to Mozilla (which should not be directly
reversed, as some of the IE stuff they talk about can be done better
in IE as well):
<URL:
http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/web/library/wa-ie2mozgd/>
(thought there was one by the Mozilla people too, but I can't find it)
and one about writing to standards that still work in IE:
<URL:
http://www.mozilla.org/docs/web-developer/upgrade_2.html>
That said, the usual problem people have is converting IE pages to
work in standard compliant browsers. If you have a specific problem,
try posting it, with a link, and we'll probably be able to find
a solution (or tell you that there isn't one).
/L
