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Open Addict blocks Internet Explorer users
openaddict.com — The popular open source advocacy website Open Addict, is now blocking Internet Explorer users from viewing the newly designed front page due to IE rendering bugs: "I'm tired of hacking workarounds for IE's bad implementations of standard technologies; Try to validate Internet Explorer's home page and see if you think Microsoft cares about standards
rlmorgan- 2489 diggs
- digg it
- zed260, on 10/11/2007, -107/+622that's good news in my opinion digg should also block IE users (probably gonna get dugg down big time) digg might lose some users but if it makes even a single person switch from IE it is worth it
- ghindo, on 10/11/2007, -105/+37Digg should block over 50% of the browser market? lulz
- Giga, on 10/11/2007, -7/+40Why not? I'm willing to bet that the type of people who come to digg are the type of people that don't fit in the >50% of the market that still uses IE.
- skankyBacon, on 10/11/2007, -19/+7You'd be surprised. I have co-workers who still use IE (and develop for it) all the time, and they know a great deal more than I do.
- mem2, on 10/11/2007, -4/+14"they know a great deal more than I do"
Sorry Im not surprised at all - strabes, on 10/11/2007, -0/+8You must not know very much about computers.
- mdhauke, on 10/11/2007, -6/+3You would also block score of people who are forced to use IE at the workplace. ohh wait, forgot about those huh?
- Tippis, on 10/11/2007, -4/+4@mdhauke:
First of all, why not work at your workplace instead of surfing digg?
Second of all, how are they forcing you? Unless you're working on a (very) dumb terminal, it isn't particularly hard to get another browser in there...
("Session has expired", huh? so how come I could still post this comment? Moronic comment system O_o) - mdhauke, on 10/11/2007, -4/+2How about first of all, I don't go to your job and slap the dick out of your mouth.
Second of all, you seriously got to be joking about it being hard to get another browser in there. Not everybody works at mom and pops firm where they can do anything they want to the company's computer.
- mem2, on 10/11/2007, -4/+14"they know a great deal more than I do"
- invader, on 10/11/2007, -2/+19Every time my site gets featured on Digg, I check out the browser stats. I consistently see a little over 70% FF coming from Digg. But still, blocking up to 30% of their millions of users would be costly, advertising-wise.
- grumpyrain, on 10/11/2007, -2/+16Particularly when you consider the proportion of the 70% running FF using Adblock Plus or equiv.
- grumpyrain, on 10/11/2007, -2/+16Particularly when you consider the proportion of the 70% running FF using Adblock Plus or equiv.
- bigtomrodney, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4"Digg should block over 50% of the browser market?"
Well considering two or three years back that quote would have read -
"Digg should block over 95% of the browser market?"
- skankyBacon, on 10/11/2007, -19/+7You'd be surprised. I have co-workers who still use IE (and develop for it) all the time, and they know a great deal more than I do.
- AlexFerny, on 10/11/2007, -6/+13Should just do what I do on all my sites .. if browser is detected as IE put at top of page, in large letters, that this website does not work in IE because the browser is not standards compliant and we suggest you use firefox :)
- Aupajo, on 10/11/2007, -3/+18Yes, it's bad - for the hundred reasons we all know it's bad. But at the same time, if you have to work in this area, and you've felt the frustration, you can understand that here are a group of people, willing to stand up and scream defiance in the face of that malignant, glowing blue "e" that is the subject of our loathing and the source of all the restrictions standing in our way to develop a better, more powerful, more involving web. I looked at this and I thought "Damn that must feel good. If only we had the strength to stand up."
- Giga, on 10/11/2007, -7/+40Why not? I'm willing to bet that the type of people who come to digg are the type of people that don't fit in the >50% of the market that still uses IE.
- theonlyvlad, on 10/11/2007, -77/+25Sorry's, I went to IE on Vista to try it out and because of the sandbox. I downloaded ie7Pro addon, and now I have my ad-blocker and all I need. It's not a bad browser, it's actually quite decent. I realize that you as a child were persecuted for using Netscape. Mean people from Microsoft came to your house and beat you up after they traced your IP, you alternate browser surfing rebel you, but hey, I think that to end any stupid conflict, at least one side has to behave maturely.
-p.s. i respect the functionality problem as a reason for blocking IE. My reply is mostly to zed.- kh99, on 10/11/2007, -16/+9I suspect they didn't try too hard. I understand they think they are making a point, but it's not going to do anything except inconvenience people.
- aliengoods, on 10/11/2007, -9/+66As a web developer, IE is far more troublesome to develop for than Firefox, Opera, or Safari (I try to keep compatibility with all 4). Javascript is loads of fun in IE, and by fun, I mean pain. Bottom line is Open Addict has the right idea. And for their market, how many people are using IE anyhow? I don't think they would have blocked it if they were going to lose 75% of their user base.
For the record, I use Firefox. No, I wasn't abused as a child. It just has too many great extensions with a simple, easy-to-use interface.- houndeyex, on 10/11/2007, -3/+27Not to mention all the CSS "hacks" you have to use just to get IE to work right.
- theonlyvlad, on 10/11/2007, -4/+15"Well, believe it or not, most people coming to our site are using Windows and IE"
so I guess a lot. They're still doing it anyway which is respectable. Unfortunately, due to the site's contect, they're preaching to the choir. Maybe a lot of their traffic comes from people at work with IE? Maybe it's just a few geeks (like myself) who use IE willingly. However, any techie site blocking IE will not force MS into conforming.
The only way to push IE to comply was if sites like mail.google.com, facebook.com and myspace.com blocked IE users.- Vich, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4myspace.com is aspx, iis based isn't it?
not only that, but it's some of the ugliest, hacked together code I have seen in my life
- Vich, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4myspace.com is aspx, iis based isn't it?
- flyguyjm, on 10/11/2007, -4/+15/Applaud
Even the small websites I have designed require many hours of overhead getting the code to work in IE7 and then finding another hack to get it to work in IE6 too, then once it works in IE6 it is broken in IE7 again.. - fkr3, on 10/11/2007, -17/+29For the record, if you're struggling with html/css/javascript for IE you're in the wrong industry. The issues and incompatibilities are all well known and well documented with widely discussed and demonstrated workarounds. Most of them date back the best part of a decade.
Would you accept "I don't work with Ford cars, sorry" from a mechanic? No?- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -9/+18That's a damn brilliant analogy, heaven forbid we pay people to do their jobs.
- Continuum, on 10/11/2007, -13/+22The point is, a Ford car, more or less, works like a BMW or a GM. A Muffler is a muffler.
Imagine if Ford came out with a car that insisted on calling a muffler a "shuduper" and made it work a whole different way just because they "didn't think the muffler design was quite there yet" then, YES, I would accept that a mechanic does not work on Ford cars. - eplawless, on 10/11/2007, -4/+16If the car being a Ford doubled the repair time, every time, then I would accept being charged extra to work on a Ford, or being told that people don't support it because Ford refuses to standardize their motors and they very often break for no reason at all.
- Speed, on 10/11/2007, -6/+6There are mechanics that only specialize on a certain brand of vehicles. Most dealerships have their own mechanics, but you would never think of taking your Ford Focus to a Pontiac dealership.
- sladevi, on 10/11/2007, -7/+14You've missed the point, fkr3.
1. Microsoft should conform to the standards, instead of abusing their power and making people jump through hoops to get sites to look right on their browser.
2. It's not a matter of "struggling", it is a matter of being required to spend more time getting sites to work on IE. The fact that the incompatibilities are well known and documented and widely discussed, simply means that you have to read up on the wide discussions, read up on the demonstrated workarounds. This requires more time even if you aren't struggling. And even if you already know the workarounds, you still have to go through your code and put in the workarounds everywhere they are required--just for IE.
Continuum had a good analogy. If a mechanic is paid the same price for whatever car he fixes, but it takes 5 times as long to fix a Ford because he has to jump through a bunch of hoops, even though he knows exactly what he is doing, then I wouldn't blame him for refusing to fix the car. Of course it may change things if the majority of customers have Fords, but hey, it's his decision. - strangewill, on 10/11/2007, -7/+5Frankly anyone willing to complain over the problems with IE needs to get out of the software development business entirely... it is the most minor of problems I've personally run into, and as you said, all workarounds are usually throughly documented.
- mcmlxxii, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2@ sladevi
Exactly. It is about standards compliance. To continue the car analogy, Microsoft's "car" wouldn't even be allowed on the roads. I don't think people are going to change to FF because an Open Source website blocks them, but thanks to Digg a bunch more people will now be aware that IE is a howling dog to code for, and it really didn't have to be that way. - mcmlxxii, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2@ sladevi
Exactly. It is about standards compliance. To continue the car analogy, Microsoft's "car" wouldn't even be allowed on the roads. I don't think people are going to change to FF because an Open Source website blocks them, but thanks to Digg a bunch more people will now be aware that IE is a howling dog to code for, and it really didn't have to be that way.
- HonoredMule, on 10/11/2007, -5/+13Generally, I design web pages to look good in standards compliant browsers, and to "work" in IE. I'd never block a browser from any site I do, but if it doesn't render the pretty bits properly or has to degrade to a basic style sheet with no layout control and ugliness abounding, then who cares? Arguably not the person who chooses IE, and definitely not me.
As an example, a recent site I started putting together has header and footer divs pinned to the top and bottom of the window. The bottom one doesn't contain anything important, it just adds symmetry to the design...and it doesn't show up in IE7. Big deal. I've also started using transparent pngs liberally. 2 years ago, I'd have cared that it'll look like a turd on IE6, because the many users of that browser are surely going to think I'm a lousy artist despite every other major browser properly supporting pngs for about a decade, and go elsewhere. Now, I think IE6 users can go fork themselves.
These sort of things are (happily) going to start happening more and more as good browsers gain market share, and MS will look like the gaggle of dumbasses they are. Then, their ***** software will finally stop being MY problem when I don't even use it. - scanman20, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3We just need to alter sites so that IE triggers a series of annoyances (popups, music, alerts, etc.) all of which say if you weren't using IE right now, you could be seeing what you came here for.
- lordtyros, on 10/11/2007, -6/+12I'm normally an Opera user, but Digg's commenting system has slowed Opera down to the point where it's actually less slow in IE7, so I use that for Digg.
- OmegaNine, on 10/11/2007, -3/+13Works great in FF
- xaque, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5Not for me, actually. This page, with 450 comments, took so long to load that Firefox told me the script had stopped responding and asked me if I wanted to terminate it. Although most other stories on Digg aren't so bad, there's still a noticeable pause as Firefox loads the comments.
- Tweekster, on 10/11/2007, -6/+3actually it is a bad browser still
you just made it less ugly. - OmegaNine, on 10/11/2007, -2/+5It slow and clunky...But as far as writing code goes, its bad when a company basically says "I don't care if we break the standards, we are big enough to do what we want". The computer world is made of standards. Its what makes the internet work *cough*TCP/IP*cough*, without them we are screwed.
- invader, on 10/11/2007, -3/+7As much as I dislike IE for its lack of standards compliance, I have come to sympathize with them a little bit. Keep in mind that the standards bodies aren't always as productive, progressive, and prudent as we would like them to be. I've found that the key reasons why IE doesn't always implement features based on standards is because they had to implement them before the standards were even in place. MS is not going to delay the release of their product because a committee can't make up their minds in a timely manner. Internet Explorer may be *free* but that does not mean it isn't a commercial product.
- kh99, on 10/11/2007, -5/+0What you say may be true, but things are the way they are. The question is, what is the point of blocking IE users instead of implementing something reasonable for them? I think they will hurt themselves and their users and not accomplish anything.
- Tippis, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Define "reasonable" -- when I go on one of my "I hate IE" sprees, the pages still tend to work in IE, but will look much better in a more capable browser, such as Lynx... Does that count as "reasonable?" ;)
- tdyer, on 10/11/2007, -10/+1exactly...and *cough*TCP/IP*cough* isnt the only networking protocol/suite asshole.
- TheSmiddy, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7it was an example....
and the most commonly used one....
...asshole.
- TheSmiddy, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7it was an example....
- Pinhedd, on 10/11/2007, -67/+15IE works great, I see no reason to use any other browser
- flyguyjm, on 10/11/2007, -15/+4Because web developers are getting paid to make standard code somehow work in IE browsers instead of developing new content.
(And new tabs opening next to the open tab in IE7 is ridiculously annoying)- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -2/+18(And new tabs opening next to the open tab in IE7 is ridiculously annoying)
You can change that, it's called a setting, go change your tab setting, or are you too lazy to do that? - adidax, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3The web developers aren't the ones creating content anyways. That's the journalist's job. The web developer is there to make it easy for the journalist to get their content on the web. And to make it look pretty (regardless of browser).
- Me1000, on 10/11/2007, -1/+9^ You are aware that not all websites are blogs, right?
What the hell do journalists have to do with this? - shark615, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2I like that feature. I hate having the link I just opened in a new tab go to the end of my already open tabs.
- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -2/+18(And new tabs opening next to the open tab in IE7 is ridiculously annoying)
- fkr3, on 10/11/2007, -6/+12Web developers don't "develop content". They're paid to know, understand and implement a range of technologies of which html and css are essentially the manual labour. If you can't learn two very simple languages and how to work around the handful of quirks IE6 has then your skillset has peaked at the internet's equivelent of flipping burgers.
Producing content is best left to people with literary, photographic or other 'people' skills, and particularly people directly involved with the business or the site's genre.- noahhoward, on 10/11/2007, -6/+8You should not have to. Microsoft has repeatedly refused to adhere to standards and multiple requests to fix their browser. Web Developers do also develop content, while it is best left to copywriters, they aren't as readily available as you may like to think.
Whether you can work around the quirks or not, Microsoft has had plenty of time to fix their problems, it is time to dump them. Firefox and other alternate browsers are still gaining market-share despite the way people have clung to IE.
You also seem to miss the fact that not only do we need to accomodate IE6' quirks, we have to master a separate set of flaw for IE7, will we continue to support IE8's flaws too? - brianary, on 10/11/2007, -3/+3HANDFUL OF QUIRKS?? Do you even know what you're talking about?
- fkr3, on 10/11/2007, -5/+2Yup. I do this stuff for a living for a big, big, big company. Take it however you want, but after hundreds of projects over the last 8 years I've been doing this, I've rarely encountered anything that is affected by more than a few quirks.
@ noah - the thing is, it doesn't really matter what industry you work in. You have to work with old software, new software, good software, crap software. Lots of people work with software as old or older than I am - and lots of people develop systems that need to interact with the old legacy crapplications. You might as well just accept it, you're never going to be working in an environment where everybody has great hardware and the latest version of the software you want them to have.
- fkr3, on 10/11/2007, -5/+2Yup. I do this stuff for a living for a big, big, big company. Take it however you want, but after hundreds of projects over the last 8 years I've been doing this, I've rarely encountered anything that is affected by more than a few quirks.
- noahhoward, on 10/11/2007, -6/+8You should not have to. Microsoft has repeatedly refused to adhere to standards and multiple requests to fix their browser. Web Developers do also develop content, while it is best left to copywriters, they aren't as readily available as you may like to think.
- brianary, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3Yeah. Great. Unless you've spent two or three times longer trying to design a website for the lazy ***** that see no reason to use any other browser.
"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." -- Western Union internal memo, 1876. - strabes, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Did you really just type that? You must not know very much about other browsers.
- flyguyjm, on 10/11/2007, -15/+4Because web developers are getting paid to make standard code somehow work in IE browsers instead of developing new content.
- CarolynMittens, on 10/11/2007, -7/+70i applaud this article and the idea behind it, but is blocking IE users really the way to go? i think all you need is a disclaimer on the site recommending IE users to switch to something more designer/programmer friendly, and throw up a link to firefox. that's what i did on my site. shoot, half the people who use IE don't even know there are other options!! (ie everyone here's mom). blocking IE all together just seems a little harsh to me.
- Zachariah, on 10/11/2007, -2/+33Or, better yet, just strip all of the CSS and javascript out for IE and leave just the info (plus the message saying that the site is functional in all browsers, but looks best in ones that are standards-compliant).
- 10011, on 10/11/2007, -13/+7Do you want to ban folks who use FireFox 2 (or less)? It doesn't pass the Acid2 test.
- nate488, on 10/11/2007, -17/+7www.firefoxmyths.com/
ready to switch to Opera yet?- DarkN00b, on 10/11/2007, -1/+10Tried Opera. Absolutely hated it. Went back to Firefox.
- demodawid, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5I tried opera too. It's a nice browser, but I've become a little too addicted to some extensions. Adblock plus, Greasemonkey, and lots of little ones I've become used to, and don't even think they are there until i need them. Can't live without tinymenu, paste and go, reload every, user agent switcher, nuke anything enhanced... the list goes on.
- Tippis, on 10/11/2007, -2/+1Of those you listed, Greasemonkey is the only thing that is not included in Opera. Everything else is in there already (and has been for quite some time).
- Tippis, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1...in fact, come to think of it (a bit late), Greasemonkey *is* in there.
- zeromancer, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2blocking IE completely is not harsh. it's the only way MS will start making a standards compliant browser. i know FF can't pass the acid test, but IE is very intent on setting their own standards for the web. they code IE to work with their proprietary software (activeX, anyone?) while exposing vulnerabilities and completely usurping the authority w3c has for creating standards. what good are standards if you don't follow them?
- markwilcox, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6"half the people who use IE don't even know there are other options!!"
believe me, it's a LOT more than half. - sumasshu, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0I'm pretty sure 99.9% of the people who visit OpenAddict.com know there are alternatives to Explorer. So for this site in particular, removing IE support is really a non-issue.
- Almidayas, on 10/11/2007, -13/+10If Digg blocked IE users then that would have sucked for me earlier this year when I was still in high school, and didn't have firefox portable on my flashdrive. Thanks to this site my study hall was the most educational class of the day.
- RyeBrye, on 10/11/2007, -9/+1Yeah, would have sucked for you but would have been better for the rest of us who don't want to hear your bitching. :)
- theholycow, on 10/11/2007, -10/+23Dude, chill. I hate IE and refuse to use it and I really hate sites that refuse to allow me to even TRY to use Opera or Firefox but IE isn't ruining lives, and I dare say it does at least provide me with more income opportunities as I get paid to clean up adware-infested systems.
- brianary, on 11/07/2007, -1/+7It's sure as hell ruined my professional life. It takes me far longer to work around IE's retarded layout engine, so I get less done because of it. IE is now the foot-dragging loser that Netscape 4 used to be.
- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -12/+15Hm. I just created a layout and was thinking about simply not fixing it to render properly in IE.
I may just block IE, too.- combustion8, on 10/11/2007, -19/+15smart idea, brilliant even... cut your viewers in half, very smart marketing on your part.
- kh99, on 10/11/2007, -5/+11Yeah, I'll bet that for every IE user who even understands the issue, there are 10 who would call their ISP to complain that the internet is broken.
- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -7/+5Like I care that much. Screw IE users.
I think this will help understanding for them: http://www.zendurl.com/s/slythfox/no-ie.html- tempusrob, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3FYI, It's Internet Explore*r* ...
- Lighthater, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4I like how you try to make a buck by using the firefox affiliate link while pushing your agenda on your users. Just code the site and stop pushing people to do what you want. While you are at it, try a proof reading.
- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -3/+2I did proof read it... but I guess I did so many drafts I forgot to proof read the final. I'm not sure what's with me and Internet "Explore." I did that earlier today, too, and caught myself. Guess it came back.
Actually, I originally created that "template" for myself only, then decided to put it up there. I then remembered I had a firefox affiliate link, so I added it. I had no intension of people using the "template" for other people to use (AND that affilate link is thru spreadfirefox, I didn't think you could make money, and that it was just for tracking purposes!). Besides, don't most coders look over code before using it? You did.
- Vindexus, on 10/11/2007, -3/+9Some things are more important than pageviews and click-throughs.
- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -5/+3Vindexus, I agree.
- combustion8, on 10/11/2007, -19/+15smart idea, brilliant even... cut your viewers in half, very smart marketing on your part.
- mrmacky, on 10/11/2007, -12/+4It won't make them switch, it'll make them hack their registry so that their user-agent is Mozilla/Gecko.
Of course, they'll realize that in the time they spent figuring out how to edit their registry they might as well have made the switch to FF or Opera.- Naga10, on 10/11/2007, -0/+13Because the average IE user knows how to do that.
- locojones, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8No, they just will move on to the next site that works, and they'll remember never to come back to your crappy little site again. So the only person you're hurting is yourself by blocking them.
- brianary, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2Or they'll wonder if they should stop using the ***** IE browser, since maybe they didn't know about alternatives beforehand.
- shark615, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3No they won't, your site is not worth the time.
- garblax, on 10/11/2007, -16/+12Personally when I use Vista, on this laptop. (Last time was about 3 months ago, when I booted the computer up =P) I use IE, because of the integration with the rest of the system. It doesn't seem that bad nowadays, and firefox gave me a weird bug. So, I use IE.
- TheHorror545, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5Give Opera a try. Works perfectly on Vista.
- stylerm, on 10/11/2007, -2/+10Switching the user agent to fake being firefox still won't solve the website's dynamic issues. IE handles form elements differently than every single other browser, which means that right now all javascript is written in two different ways depending on the useragent. It is a pain in the ass. But static pages should be fine.
- Fduch, on 10/11/2007, -6/+1>Switching the user agent to fake being firefox still won't solve the website's dynamic issues.
You have to be a major ass to archieve that. - Smuikas, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3Dude, you suck at javascript. You don't need to sniff a user agent to see which coding path you need to take. You can either use Yahoo UI, or do the smart thing - check and see if the IE-specific function exists; if it does, use it - else use the standard function. This gets around the need to check user agents, because no matter what the user agent is it will use the right codepath.
Duhr. It's inherent in how JavaScript works. Everything is an object, even functions.
- Fduch, on 10/11/2007, -6/+1>Switching the user agent to fake being firefox still won't solve the website's dynamic issues.
- joeshlub, on 10/11/2007, -12/+27My bet is that IE users are the less intelligent of the digg crowd. At least the less technologically adept, and this was SUPPOSED to be a tech website, so....
- adidax, on 10/11/2007, -6/+22That's awesome what you did there, ya know, prejudging users intelligence based on browser choice.
I say everyone who doesn't use lynx is less intelligent than I am, because I use lynx, and I am intelligent.- aflury, on 10/11/2007, -5/+2Only idiots use lynx. links is far superior.
- kh99, on 10/11/2007, -3/+18My bet is that the most intelligent users don't spend any time worrying about who uses which browser. Some day you will realize that being technologically adept is not an indication of intelligence.
- RyeBrye, on 10/11/2007, -4/+4Ron Paul diggers prove that Digg users aren't all smart.
- DOGPARTY, on 10/11/2007, -2/+5Digg crowd intelligent? LOL
- adidax, on 10/11/2007, -6/+22That's awesome what you did there, ya know, prejudging users intelligence based on browser choice.
- oojamaflip2006, on 10/11/2007, -4/+5The trouble is i would bet my underpants on firefox having more than 50% share of page views on digg. This story doesnt need to be told to people who use firefox, safarai or ie7, because diggers arent the sort of people who download random executable files. Simple as that really. We dont get viruses because we know what is bad, risky or stupid behaviour. You are preaching to the converted. Tell this tale to grandma, mommy and pop who use their pc like idiots clicking random buttons. Tell them.
- dananimal, on 10/11/2007, -5/+2Give your Mom 'n' Gran Ubuntu!
Configure it for them of course.
My Grandmother (72) has been very happy using GNU/Linux desktop systems for over three years now (she has only been computing for 4.5 years).
Windows was a piece of crap by comparison.
If you set a Linux desktop up for an inexperienced user, in my experience, they tend to have a better experience than if you do the same using M$ Windows.
;D
PS. Go on Kevin ban IE!!!! :p
- dananimal, on 10/11/2007, -5/+2Give your Mom 'n' Gran Ubuntu!
- over9, on 10/11/2007, -7/+7Yeah and how would that guy feel is Microsoft patched Windows so that no browser except IE could access his page? I bet he wouldn't be a happy chappy.
- Naga10, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8I'd be fine with that.
- over9, on 10/11/2007, -6/+2So basically you're fine with NOONE being able to access your page because the only browser that can view your page is IE yet you've blocked it.
- Naga10, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8I'd be fine with that.
- over9, on 10/11/2007, -0/+19Judging from their forum activity, they don't seem to be a big site.
- B1663r, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8And judging by the the self digg the guy is a prima donna as well.
- voyvf, on 10/11/2007, -3/+2i can totally understand not wanting to support a browser's broken javascript and HTML implementation.
however, perhaps blocking IE browsers might be going a bit far. just restrict them to a simple, text-only, non-javascript version of the site. kind of like how the noscript tag works with lynx.
and if they spoof the useragent, well, they obviously *wanted* to see a broken site. - rdoger6424, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5The hospital frowns on installing software on their machines, so I'm stuck at work.
- Philter, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1There are other solutions. You don't have to install anything. You could try mobile firefox or other browsers that can run directly off the media of your choice.
- Sp4nk, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4People aren't going to download and install a browser just to view your stupid site. They're simply going to go somewhere else.
- HigherLogic, on 10/11/2007, -6/+5>> I'm tired of hacking workarounds for IE's bad implementations of standard technologies
*rolleyes* Translation: I'm not nearly as competent in CSS as I thought I was. Seriously, I've never hda a problem getting a site I've designed to not only validate, but look how I wanted it to in IE6, IE7, Fx, Opera, and Safari.
>> Try to validate Internet Explorer's home page and see if you think Microsoft cares about standards
Your point? Plenty of sites do not validate, just because Microsoft's site does not validate means nothing.
Oh, guess what, Amazon.com doesn't validate, it has 1457 errors! Ah, they hate standards. Garble garble, I love Fx, garble garble.
Oh, guess what, Google doesn't validate. They hate standards. Garble garble, garble garble.
Seriously, I could go through plenty of popular sites and find out that none of them probably validate. Let's do a couple real quick:
Digg - Does NOT Validate
YouTube - Does NOT Validate
CNN - Does NOT Validate
Yahoo - Does NOT Validate
Wikipedia - Does NOT Validate
Apple - Does NOT Validate
And finally, dun dun dun, FIREFOX does NOT validate.
As a designer, it shouldn't matter what browser people use. A competetent, professional designer can make a site look and work the same in the major browsers: IE6, IE7, Opera, Safari, and Firefox. This is part of the job. Just because you dislike the browser, doesn't mean you need to block people and throw up lame ass excuses. - themoose, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2If you're at a school or workplace (or library) usually the only browser they have is IE.
- BevansDesign, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Is it just me, or does it seem kinda stupid to block 75% of your potential visitors?
- ghindo, on 10/11/2007, -105/+37Digg should block over 50% of the browser market? lulz
- CyberPhoenix, on 10/11/2007, -50/+270I hope more websites do this, IE rendering bugs are unacceptable.
- alwaysmc2, on 10/11/2007, -15/+18okay, so IE users are bad people?
What if you're at work and only have IE available?
Blocking a specific browser isn't very "open".- Continuum, on 10/11/2007, -3/+7IE users aren't bad people, just the developers...
wait, thats not fair to the developers. The Project Managers are the bad people.- climbjm, on 10/11/2007, -6/+2Does this make M$ bad because they only allow you to use IE for updates? Just a thought.
I think I am going to start doing the same for my personal site.- andrewry, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1http://ietab.mozdev.org/
I use that for developing sites, and then it also works when you need to update. IE window in a FF tab. :)
- andrewry, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1http://ietab.mozdev.org/
- climbjm, on 10/11/2007, -6/+2Does this make M$ bad because they only allow you to use IE for updates? Just a thought.
- gernblansted, on 10/11/2007, -6/+3IE is not standards compliant, has many bug, requires web developers to spend many times longer to make the site work than necessary.
Therefore, IE USERS are bad? I'm sorry, I just don't see the logic there. Can you explain? - EarlOfLade, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8No, you write to MS IE group and tell them you can not view the pages you need because IE is not standard compliant.
If more people blocked IE and MS started to get complaints, maybe they would do something about it. Today, they have no incentive to do so. - locojones, on 10/11/2007, -5/+4Oh my god, web developers earning a salary to make their websites work for the dominant share of the internet viewing public. What's the world coming to???
- gernblansted, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Yes, earning a salary. I make money pushing out HTML markup, and while I like money, it's sad how much people have to pay me because of Microsoft's unwillingness to play along. If it weren't for Microsoft, I'd really feel bad about it.
- brianary, on 10/11/2007, -0/+8Yes.
The only way to get IT depts to consider switching is if there is a large enough list of things that just plain don't work in IE.
- Continuum, on 10/11/2007, -3/+7IE users aren't bad people, just the developers...
- damentz, on 10/11/2007, -0/+23Don't block them, just let them view the page regardless of render bugs.
- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -9/+3I agree.
Here, I whipped up a simple a little anti-ie page alternative... a bit "easier" to read for IE users. Feel free to use and modify. I don't care. It's public domain. :)
http://www.zendurl.com/s/slythfox/no-ie.html- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -4/+1Oh, so this is where my comment disappeared to... lol
- Fduch, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!
You are SO VERY COOOL!!!!
Can I have your children??
P.S. You page has lots of validation errors, dumb smartass =)- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2It's for IE. Who cares.
W/e dude. It was more about the text then anything else. I was trying to make something simple that could be used as a "template" for anyone else.
- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2It's for IE. Who cares.
- neoian, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3Internet Explore? And that page isn't valid BTW.
- Fduch, on 10/11/2007, -2/+10FF bugs are inacceptable too. Expecially 6-years-old ones.
So what? I gues it's ethical to block FF users, don't you think? - markwilcox, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1HOW ABOUT, we only block IE6.
- alwaysmc2, on 10/11/2007, -15/+18okay, so IE users are bad people?
- raynevandunem, on 10/11/2007, -23/+126I find this a bit much, but the rationale behind it makes sense. Hopefully, this can become a trend.
From the forum: http://www.devin.com/ieblock_howto.shtml for a how-to on blocking IE.- whataboutdave, on 10/11/2007, -17/+59I don't think it's unreasonable. We don't allow 1910's steam-powered horseless carriages on the highway, do we?
- MioTheGreat, on 10/11/2007, -6/+48We might if 85% of the population was driving around in them....
- whataboutdave, on 10/11/2007, -1/+15Friggin' democracy.
- MioTheGreat, on 10/11/2007, -6/+48We might if 85% of the population was driving around in them....
- lNSTlGAT0R, on 10/11/2007, -14/+20This is laziness. As a programmer you have to learn to deal with compatibility issues, not throw up your hands and say "Screw 85% of the world, I'm tired of my job." It's not like their site is that impressive anyway, it can't possibly be hard to tweak those sorry menus with a few standard hacks. IMO he is being a pussy. (I'm a huge fan of FireFox and haven't used IE in many years... but come on.)
- Kavok, on 10/11/2007, -6/+7Firefox is around 25% market share in europe. I don't know what Opera, Safari, Konquerer etc.. market shares are though. So its nowhere near 85% of the world.
Developing one javascript function / site template for IE and another for EVERY OTHER BROWSER is a huge pain in the ass.- locojones, on 10/11/2007, -11/+5You firefox fanboys can continue to fluff up your market share numbers, but when it comes down to it, IE is and always has been the dominant internet browser. So get over it.
- invader, on 10/11/2007, -1/+10"IE is and always has been the dominant internet browser"
How old are you? Obviously you weren't using the internet pre-1998.... - Hayaemsay, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2And you're probably still using IE yourself.
- invader, on 10/11/2007, -1/+10"IE is and always has been the dominant internet browser"
- locojones, on 10/11/2007, -11/+5You firefox fanboys can continue to fluff up your market share numbers, but when it comes down to it, IE is and always has been the dominant internet browser. So get over it.
- tempusrob, on 10/11/2007, -1/+6But take software developers, on the other hand. They've never hesitated to say "this software requires X, Y and Z" and *mean* it.
In a way, it's probably impractical ... but maybe the web developers need to start doing the same thing. There's a well-known set of standards for web content, and if you're going to use some arbitrary software that doesn't follow those standards then sorry, you don't get to play.
I mean, imagine if an IRC client came out that didn't quite implement the protocol correctly. Would those users be right to demand that the server owners accommodate said client? No way. - Syntaxis, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1It truly is laziness at it's worst. Just because mr "webdeveloper" can't make websites (or design them, which shows, then again.. this seems to be a trend in Open Souce world.. bad looking websites.. I guess they're "functional", but I digress..) - as a pro you should be making websites for your visitors, if more than 1% of your visitors use a browser, you make your site compatible with that browser.
I for one will be supporting IE until it goes below that 1%. Until that time (somewhere around NEVER) I'll continue to do what I always did: make websites that work.
But I guess I'm an evil bastard for saying this.. that said.. I don't like IE.
- Kavok, on 10/11/2007, -6/+7Firefox is around 25% market share in europe. I don't know what Opera, Safari, Konquerer etc.. market shares are though. So its nowhere near 85% of the world.
- skankyBacon, on 10/11/2007, -4/+11I agree with instigator. It is laziness, and it is unreasonable. Beyond that, it is simply contradictory...aren't people using IE exactly the kind of people you want to reach with a site about Open Source?
- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -8/+3Anyway, I whipped up a sort of template for anyone to use. Very simple, easy to read. Feel free to use and/or modify: http://www.zendurl.com/s/slythfox/no-ie.html
- suprchunk, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2I think it is actually Internet Explorer, with an 'r' at the end. Not Explore.
- slythfox, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Yeah, I've been doing that a lot today for some reason. Thanks for being nice pointing that out though. Someone else was "yelling" at me for doing that...
- suprchunk, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2I think it is actually Internet Explorer, with an 'r' at the end. Not Explore.
- Splizxer, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2They don't provide the ASP code.
- whataboutdave, on 10/11/2007, -17/+59I don't think it's unreasonable. We don't allow 1910's steam-powered horseless carriages on the highway, do we?
- kupa, on 10/11/2007, -41/+139Ok, I hate IE rendering bugs as much as the next guy, but blocking people from viewing your site totally? Isn't that like shooting yourself in the foot? Hell, that thread had a poster "can't view it from work" -- Hello? IE maybe ***** at rendering, but I'd rather people see a ***** render then block them completely. That or, one could stop using convoluted menu systems.
What IE Users see: http://www.openaddict.com/ie_reject.html
I don't mean to sound rude or offensive or anything, but when you design sites, IE is just something you have to contend with. "oh noes it doesnt render right, so i'm just gonna be lazy and give up!!!11"- Virak, on 10/11/2007, -21/+49You've never had to make a website work with IE, have you?
- SoCalChris, on 10/11/2007, -6/+47You've never had to create a PROFESSIONAL site, where you get paid by someone who expects ALL of their visitors to be able to see the site correctly irregardless of browser, have you?
- Virak, on 10/11/2007, -11/+10Your post is utterly irrelevant as this is a *nix-oriented website and they're not likely to lose a whole lot of readers by dropping IE support. And from this act alone, it seems pretty obvious that they're not in it to squeeze every last penny out of the site.
- lordtyros, on 10/11/2007, -3/+16The post said most of their viewers are using IE. So yes, this was a bonehead move.
- B1663r, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4Not a problem, looking at the web site they dont really have any viewers to lose.
- interiot, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7The problem is that web developers pay the price for people choosing IE, but they can't do anything about the choice. Only end users can, but end users don't realize how much of an impact their decision has. Their choice literally means that all non-IE users get fewer features, and get them developed more slowly.
End users need to be made aware of the impact of their choice so they can make better choices (either demand a higher quality product, or find a new product).- Fordi, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1You need to go freelance, brah. You have no idea how many extra hours you can clock because of IE's shenanigans.
- melve, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5This may be a bit pedantic, but you could probably could have just used "regardless" instead of "irregardless", which isn't technically a word.
- chiptinder, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1i thought i was the only one that hated that.
- Cenobite, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1It's Christopher Moltisanti!
- Virak, on 10/11/2007, -11/+10Your post is utterly irrelevant as this is a *nix-oriented website and they're not likely to lose a whole lot of readers by dropping IE support. And from this act alone, it seems pretty obvious that they're not in it to squeeze every last penny out of the site.
- arcthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -7/+9I, for one, have never had a problem with it. Then again I don't use hoity toity black magic CSS tricks and I'm not typically a pompous asshole. Maybe I'm not using enough code or embedding enough plug-ins to scare IE away. I dunno.
- tomi, on 10/11/2007, -4/+12Your MySpace profile page doesn't count.
- Virak, on 10/11/2007, -4/+5zOMG SPOILERS: IE fails with much less than "hoity toity black magic CSS tricks". And it's not just CSS that's a pain; have you ever tried getting standards-compliant JavaScript working on IE? That's orders of magnitude worse. Also, your assertion that you're not a "pompous asshole" is rather ironic considering the rest of your post.
- arcthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -5/+0That wasn't pompous, is was sarcastic. I thought there was a difference :(
And for the record, my myspace page is buggy as hell in firefox, and I'm not entirely sure who to blame. I just copy and pasted some other schmoe's layout like 2 years ago. For some reason all of the html I use in my content is displayed as just that - html - in Firefox.
I, for one, blame capitalism.
The Bush Administration?
I'll figure it out someday.
- skankyBacon, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7Lots of people make websites work with both browsers every day.
- Soulhuntre, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5Yes, but they have skill and / or talent.
If you lack either then you can get on your high horse and just ban IE. - Me1000, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4of course, anyone can make a page look good in IE, all you have to do is code like it was 1997!
- Soulhuntre, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5Yes, but they have skill and / or talent.
- SoCalChris, on 10/11/2007, -6/+47You've never had to create a PROFESSIONAL site, where you get paid by someone who expects ALL of their visitors to be able to see the site correctly irregardless of browser, have you?
- daven1986, on 10/11/2007, -4/+12also why let people who use IE use your site, then think that it is YOU who has ***** up the rendering. The people who use IE won't know it is crap at rendering, that is why they still use it.
they will leave thinking "oh that guy can't make a website for *****. he is an idiot" so you should just block them completely. - houndeyex, on 10/11/2007, -2/+15Honestly, do you think all the standard IE users are going to be crying over how they can't get to their favorite open source website? They probably don't even know what the ***** open source is.
- bcwood, on 10/11/2007, -4/+14I'm not a big fan of Internet Explorer myself, and I know that attacking anything Microsoft is standard procedure around here, but completely blocking IE users from your site seems a bit extreme. If you're trying to implement an overly complicated Javascript menu system, and you can't get it to work with IE, and the best you can come up with is to block all IE users from your site, then something is definitely wrong - it's really not that difficult to make a website work with IE.
- Sh0cker, on 10/11/2007, -3/+5"it's really not that difficult to make a website work with IE."
Perhaps not, but I really don't want to be coding twice my whole life :)- JamieBarrows, on 10/11/2007, -2/+2You do if your customers use IE.
For an open source website where most of its users are probably using firefox, this kind of thing is probably ok. For a business that relies on sales or pageviews, cutting out 60-70 percent of your client pool is not an option.
- JamieBarrows, on 10/11/2007, -2/+2You do if your customers use IE.
- dogstylee, on 10/11/2007, -7/+3Not difficult to make a website work with IE? I did what that error page suggested and put IE's homepage - designed by Microsoft - into the W3 Validator.... 209 errors! What is that crap.
- chiptinder, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1and he wasn't even using javascript menus (i don't think, at least he didn't need to be) those were just css. (css which will work in ie)
really the only problem with basic markup is the css box model. you just have to position everything on the page twice, once for ie and again for everything else. if you get into javascript, it's a lot worse.
- Sh0cker, on 10/11/2007, -3/+5"it's really not that difficult to make a website work with IE."
- wal9000, on 10/11/2007, -7/+3kupa: I can definitely understand where you're coming from, but from the site's perspective it also makes a good deal of sense. For a standards compliant site that won't render right in IE you have two possible user experiences:
1. The site doesn't render right. Users see the site incorrectly, and think "This website sucks. It doesn't work. It's *****."
2. The site tells the user that IE is non-compliant with web standards, and users instead think "Stupid browser. Microsoft, you have a bajillion dollars. Why can't you make a browser that works?"
From the point of view of whoever is responsible for maintaining the site, it's definitely preferable to make people hate MS instead of your site. Granted, there will be some hard feelings because (almost) everyone else makes sites that work fine in Explorer, but that's inevitable.
If it were up to me I'd redirect them to a landing page with a message along the lines of "You are using Internet Explorer, which is not compliant with official web standards. As a result, portions of this website may display incorrectly or be rendered dysfunctional. We suggest that you download a state of the art browser such as Firefox or Opera. If you wish to attempt to view the site in IE click here to continue."- B1663r, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Well the "standard" for as long as I can remember is that web sites are supposed to "degrade gracefully". So technically this guys web site is no longer standards compliant.
- MasterThief117, on 10/11/2007, -4/+1I used User Agent Switcher for Firefox to see what IE users would see.
- Me1000, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5Who cares?
- jambarama, on 10/11/2007, -0/+11What is really funny is that the author points to the IE7 homepage not validating. No page on openaddict.com, except for the home page, validates either! See http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.openaddict.com%2Finterview_with_david_korn.html&charset=%28detect+automatically%29&doctype=Inline or try it yourself at http://validator.w3.org/ .
To add irony, Firefox's homepage doesn't validate perfectly either (1 error, v. 200+ errors on IE7 homepage). The Opera home page validates though! - dani8559, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3I completely agree. There are plenty of browsers out there in the world that need to be capable of rendering many pages. Forcing users to switch to a standards compliant browser, because your page won't render in another browser, completely negates the entire reasoning behind standards in the first place. XHTML and CSS are wonderful, because they are meant to be forwards and backwards compatible, and with more semantic code, pages are supposed to render in an accessible way with or without the stylehseet.
Honestly, the only IE hack I've ever really really HAD to use was working around the pre-ie-7 box model bug, and that was simply fixed just by giving all of the child elements of that element a margin instead, which will render perfectly in any browser. Everything else is just minor presentation, like min-height and 3-px checkbox hacks. This is not to say I am not angry with Microsoft for their neglect of web standards, and I do not wish everyone were at least running the latest version of IE or Firefox. That would make my life easy, as a web developer. But blocking people from accessing information about open source, well... that's just a score AGAINST open source.
And BTW, there are a *couple* of known bugs in Gecko-based browsers.
- Virak, on 10/11/2007, -21/+49You've never had to make a website work with IE, have you?
- Senn, on 10/11/2007, -9/+94If you don't like having to work around IE's lack of support for standards (it ***** me off considerably), perhaps a less extreme method would be to present IE users with a splash page that includes a warning that the site may not render properly with IE, and at the same time recommend alternatives.
- jasmus, on 10/11/2007, -1/+14THat's exactly what most people would do, if they had not have bothered to just fix the issues. I agree the issues shouldn't exist, but they do. Makes me wonder if a website advocating open source should be turning away people that aren't using open source products. Aren't these people their target audience?
- Philter, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Not really. The target audience of this site probably doesn't even use Windows for the most part, and if they do they probably run FF or Opera. Joe Schmo IE user would probably come across the site and be like WTF is this? Where's my pron?
- arcthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2But that would be the reasonable thing to do! You ask too much!
- jasmus, on 10/11/2007, -1/+14THat's exactly what most people would do, if they had not have bothered to just fix the issues. I agree the issues shouldn't exist, but they do. Makes me wonder if a website advocating open source should be turning away people that aren't using open source products. Aren't these people their target audience?
- KnightMareInc, on 10/11/2007, -47/+191blocking 70% of the internet makes perfect sense
- flyguyjm, on 10/11/2007, -11/+10I forgot that the internet is comprised of browsers...not content... 70% of which are IE. Maybe you mean 70% of internet users, and by 70% maybe you mean less than that. Maybe getting people to accept web standards is a bad idea...
- Subterfug, on 10/11/2007, -2/+1With any luck Microsoft will be compelled to fix rendering and CSS issues to hold onto their marketshare. If they can do that then there should be no reason to block IE.
- MioTheGreat, on 10/11/2007, -8/+8IE's browser usage share is still well over 70%. It's actually closer to 85%. I personally see no reason to have to put up with FF any more, especially on Vista, where it doesn't fit in with the UI very well, or implement a protected mode like IE7.
- mtekk, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1The last I heard Firefox doesn't need a protected mode like IE7 because it isn't integrated into the OS like IE is.
- MioTheGreat, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3Ah. You're actually wrong. But don't feel bad, If you were talking about IE6 and XP, you'd probably be right.
IE7 has been pretty detatched from the shell. IE7's protected mode is actually a rather good defense that should be implemented by any internet facing app. It's arguably the single best defense against undiscovered vulnerabilities. I suggest you read up on it. IE7 can't even access your user startup folder, your desktop, your documents folder, even the vast majority of the registry is off limits to it, thanks to UAC and protected mode IE. It's because it runs at a level _lower_ than "Limitted User". I wouldn't be surprised if we see browsers implementing it in the near future. Probably Opera before Firefox, because well, let's face it, Firefox has been slow as ***** with Vista. It took them months to even get it's "set as default browser" handler working, though it was a rather simple fix.
- mrmacky, on 10/11/2007, -8/+6No no no, just blocking 100% of people who put up with Microsoft's sh*t.
I.E 5 for Mac can't even display the MSN homepage... just goes to show you, Microsoft Standards weren't even standard.- alwaysmc2, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8IE 5 for Mac is abandonware.
- sulf, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3Don't forget that percentage of browsers is highly dependent on types of websites. Do you think that IE has the same share at kernel.org as at microsoft.com? The same is true for openaddict.com, I don't think there are too many IE-users reading that site.
- akira117, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5The 70% that you don't want to hear from anyways....
- jambarama, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Yeah, but look at the content. I guarantee IE isn't 70% of their traffic, and I'll bet the average IE users certainly aren't their target audience either.
- dhonn, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2The site is for Linux and BSD addicts. 99% of their audience use Firefox!
- flyguyjm, on 10/11/2007, -11/+10I forgot that the internet is comprised of browsers...not content... 70% of which are IE. Maybe you mean 70% of internet users, and by 70% maybe you mean less than that. Maybe getting people to accept web standards is a bad idea...
- CaseyUCF, on 10/11/2007, -26/+50Was he touched by a guy while using IE one time or something?
- Tweekster, on 10/11/2007, -6/+12nope, IE is just crap.
- koick, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4Have you ever coded a website? Didn't think so.
- CaseyUCF, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1actually... MANY! caseyjenks.com biatch.
IE does suck but I'm not going to go so ar as to ban people using it from my site.
- CaseyUCF, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1actually... MANY! caseyjenks.com biatch.
- DOGPARTY, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Well that wasn't very funny.
Lets see you make that joke if your kids are molested
- Tweekster, on 10/11/2007, -6/+12nope, IE is just crap.
- Shootfast, on 10/11/2007, -13/+3
You have been banned from this forum.
Please contact the webmaster or board administrator for more information. - Seabrook7, on 10/11/2007, -24/+37I agree. I wish more large sites would follow this example. I am a web designer by profession and I get tired of designing something by standards that looks great in Firefox then I view it in IE 7 and realize I have another couple of hours of work ahead of me. Then look at it in IE 6 and realize it is even worse. I applaud Open Addict.
- arcthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -3/+11You should try doing this for your professionally designed web pages and see how happy it makes your clients :D
- tomi, on 10/11/2007, -7/+2If only our clients were well informed. Sadly, not the case.
- markwilcox, on 10/11/2007, -1/+0I suggest banning IE6 users, and putting a notice to upgrade to Firefox or IE7.
- allholy1, on 10/11/2007, -4/+3ugh, me too. It sucks spending so much time coding and designing something that you're so proud of only to find out that it barely works in IE and you HAVE to change it because so many people use IE.
- PamalaLauren, on 10/11/2007, -6/+2Honestly I gave up in regards to my site looking good in IE. If it looks good in Firefox I'm good with it. Luckily with the Mac and using iWeb it seems to show up fine.
- locojones, on 10/11/2007, -3/+5Boo hoo, you get tired of doing work. Cry me a river.
Instead of coding for the minority, you could make your life a whole lot easier by coding for the majority. I don't know where this backwards mentality came from, but if I were running a business, I'd want my efforts directed at the majority of my potential consumers. And in the internet, that majority uses IE. So why you'd code for the 10 Firefox people out there, I have no idea.- MikeSD34, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3I think the general idea is to do it right the first time, and then do what you have to to make it work in IE. We do the best we can to adhere to the standards first, before we fix it in IE, because if we don't then the standards themselves become meaningless. If the standards become meaningless, it means that it will take longer to get new features to use like CSS3. Considering we'll have to wait several years before we can stop coding for IE6, making that any worse just doesn't seem like a good idea.
- leahzero, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1As a web designer, part of your job IS to design for the most popular platforms. You're not paid to push YOUR personal agenda on your CLIENT'S CUSTOMERS.
I am as pro-Firefox/anti-IE as they come (and a web designer as well), but this thinking is just arrogant and idiotic. You won't vanquish IE by throwing silly tantrums via code, you'll vanquish it by educating users about better alternatives (Firefox, Opera, etc.) and convincing them to switch.
This smacks of a group of little boys putting up a sign outside their treehouse saying "No Girls."- hardwired, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1yes, BUT I would still use Firefox as a starting point, because it follows standard and it make sense. Then I would go back and test/fix/workaround IE bugs. Yes your job is to MAKE Sure it works on IE, but AS WELL AS Firefox, as it is a signifiant 2nd browser. What he did I probably won't do, but I applaud his courage to stick to his principle and let the World out there knows the truth, and I hope this starts a trend, until MS smarten up. If the browser market gets shifted to 7-80% Firefox, then I would stop testing on IE.
- dontera, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Wanna know what my solution is?
Charge by the hour....
- arcthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -3/+11You should try doing this for your professionally designed web pages and see how happy it makes your clients :D
- over9, on 10/11/2007, -24/+46I am all for Firefox but this is just stupid. They will lose a bug chuck of their audience.
- mossblaser, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3Not meaning to generalize but for that particular site (seemingly fairly tecky) I'm sure most of the audience should have the simple thought to get a decent browser - I wouldn't trust Internet Explorer with my google searches let alone anything important!
- B1663r, on 10/11/2007, -3/+1Judging by the site and the forum, they dont have a really large audience to lose...
- JamieBarrows, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2Actually I think he will be able to get away with it in his case. A real business would never be able to do this, and wouldn't want to.
- jejones, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1"They will lose a bug chunk of their audience."
"A bug chunk"? Freudian slip?
- koonchu, on 10/11/2007, -22/+12About ***** time somebody stood up to Microsoft at their expense!
- mythicflux, on 10/11/2007, -3/+0I don't think people got past the word Microsoft, else I would suspect that you would be getting dugg up.
- ball3r, on 10/11/2007, -9/+34When accessed from Internet Explorer:
If you're reading this it means you're using Microsoft's Internet Explorer to attempt to view Open Addict.com. You're being blocked because Internet Explorer doesn't adhere to web standards and some of our website code, which works *perfectly* in Firefox, Opera and Konquerer, doesn't work at all in IE and I'm tired of hacking workarounds for IE's bad implementations of standard technologies. This isn't anything against you as a user, rather against Microsoft for thinking they're too good to play with the rest of the world and build their software in compliance with published and accepted standards. Try to validate Internet Explorer's home page and tell me if you think Microsoft cares about building a standard's compliant browser.
Anyway, this site works perfectly in Firefox, so I recommend you use that. If you don't have it installed, you can get it from http://www.mozilla.org/firefox/.
Sincerely,
Rich Morgan
Open Addict.com
P.S. Hopefully IE rendered *this* page correctly for you... [sigh].
P.P.S. If you have a website and would like to use the same PHP code to block IE, here it is:
- locojones, on 10/11/2007, -9/+13And in layperson speak it says this:
"Dear user, our website is hopelessly broken because we're incompetent buffoons. We're sorry you wasted your time by coming to our crappy broken website, so we'll understand once you move on to a site that just works once you realize you can't view any content here. And we know we shouldn't expect you to come back. We really don't want your business. Have a nice day."- freedomknight, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1Large companies can't afford to lose users. But He is in position where he can take his own decisions with out pressure from anyone else. In business sense its not gud for business. But in truth, Its ***** correct decision that he made. Microsoft halted development of Internet Explorer for five ***** years just after killing Netscape. And do you think its gud to support some else's product who don't give rat ass about it ?
- locojones, on 10/11/2007, -9/+13And in layperson speak it says this:
- EvilCheeseWedge, on 10/11/2007, -30/+86As a consumer, I have a right to use an “inferior” product if I want to. It’s okay with me, I just won’t visit your site. I will, however, note the inherent hypocrisy here. If Microsoft did this, but the other way around, a war would freakin’ start. But what, it’s okay if open source, or the smaller guy does it?
Forcing people to either use an alternative, or “deal with it” is not really the best way to convert people to open source, in my opinion.- Pinhedd, on 10/11/2007, -17/+6no *****, I use IE. Everything looks great and really, there's nothing that the "alternatives" offer me that I dont already have.
- championchap, on 10/11/2007, -2/+5go look at Opera and tell me it offers you no more than IE.. and dont take me as a fanboy, i use firefox.. but seriously, Opera is PACKED with features!
- 35263526, on 10/11/2007, -5/+2You wouldn't visit the site anyway; according to the information given the standards-compliant page wouldn't have worked in your browser. A [working] redirect to a page explaining the issue is better than a broken page in my opinion.
- Stonedonkey, on 10/11/2007, -4/+13"Forcing people to either use an alternative, or “deal with it” is not really the best way to convert people to open source, in my opinion."
Worked for Microsoft, though, didn't it.- EvilCheeseWedge, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1Err, that was sort of my point.
- B1663r, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3What worked for Microsoft was having a browser that was MUCH nicer than the alternatives for the last half of the 90's and the first couple of years into this decade. Then they stopped developing the browser after a lawsuit basically told them to stop innovating.
- chuckd, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3What WORKED for Microsoft was them stuffing a web browser with an Operating System which itself was stuffed into every gawd damn new PC that came out at the time. The users never HAD a choice to begin with. They were spoon fed Internet Explorer and weren't told of any alternatives.
- natenovs, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0why shouldnt they package their web browser with their operating system. it seems to me they are making it easy on end-users.
- Tippis, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Don't digg the poor guy down -- he's mostly right.
IE4 and 5 blew the competition out of the water back in the days -- that's how the browser war was won (IE being integrated into the OS happened afterwards and only cemented IEs status, it didn't actually win the war for them).
However, that done, they ceased to develop the thing which is why we are where we are today, not because of a lawsuit but because they thought there would be no more browser wars and they didn't have to stay on their toes.
- Kinjiru, on 10/11/2007, -3/+8However you missed the point.. there is no inherent hypocrisy here... it's not about "you use IE so you're bad"
It is strictly about M$ refusing to adhere to established STANDARDS. If they fix IE to obey such then it would be welcomed just the same.- gildude, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1No, the point is that the dork is stopping users from viewing his site because he doesn't like Microsoft. But to the user it means the dork doesn't like the USER. Really silly idea.
- FoxMeister, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0"This isn't anything against you as a user, rather against Microsoft for thinking they're too good to play with the rest of the world and build their software in compliance with published and accepted standards."
If the user reads that, and still takes it personally then they're a moron. Probably not somebody they want coming to their site anyway.
- FoxMeister, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0"This isn't anything against you as a user, rather against Microsoft for thinking they're too good to play with the rest of the world and build their software in compliance with published and accepted standards."
- gildude, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1No, the point is that the dork is stopping users from viewing his site because he doesn't like Microsoft. But to the user it means the dork doesn't like the USER. Really silly idea.
- Arkonnan, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7Your point about hypocrisy would be valid if the homepages of each browser were blocking IE users, but this is some random webpage no one really cares about. They have no affiliation with Firefox, Opera or any other alternative browser and do not speak for the companies who make them. Microsoft has never blocked alternative browser users from viewing their homepage, and as far as I know, the Opera and Firefox websites have never chastised anyone for using IE. I have, however, visited many websites who have blocked me for using Opera(usually sites that use a lot of Active X). They usually use a far more tactful response and offer the alternative of downloading IE. But it is no different from what is happening here. Just reversed.
As far as Open Addict goes, you're right. You have every right to use an inferior product. You also have every right to take your business elsewhere. But they also have the right to choose who they allow onto their website. For all we know, IE users may not make up a large percentage of their user base, so it might be in their best financial interests not to waste time and money coding exceptions into their website for these people. But it is still their choice nonetheless.- thedragon4453, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0I think that it is safe to say that a website call Open Addict does not find that a lot of its traffic comes from IE.
- Tippis, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1"Microsoft has never blocked alternative browser users from viewing their homepage"
Actually, they have on numerous occasions. They've actively served broken HTML and CSS to non-IE browsers on their larger portals and, at times, simply said "your browser does not work here" in spite of the fact that spoofing the UA has made the page render perfectly.
- bcwood, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4I agree - alienating a large portion of your audience by telling them that they are using a crappy product and that we don't want your business unless you change to a superior product is not the way to attract people to open source.
- gildude, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I agree; they made a dopey decision. Were probably drunk on "free as in beer". Anyway, at least they didn't try to show any ads on the page. Can you imagine how much that would have ***** IE users off? Here, you can't use our site, but we want to sell some ad views anyway...
- HonoredMule, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3It's always ok for smaller guys to use myriad similar practices, because their consumers HAVE a choice and competitors to which they may take their business. Regulations are for bullies in out-of-balance markets, and that's why it's where our scorn gets directed as well.
Would you get as upset about a 5 year old kid trying to beat you up and steal your lunch money as the butch bully in the next grade ahead of you doing the same? Open source isn't powerful enough to deserve your ire, and neither is Open Addict. - SeBBBe, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Of course you have the right to choose any product you like, but I dont think it's too much to demand from webmasters that the web browser you use can follow web standards.
- EvilCheeseWedge, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1No, and I have designed websites. And they are standard compliant. However, they do look the same in IE AND Firefox and Opera, so I really don't have much sympathy here. I certainly wish MS embraced standards more. I think they are working towards it (whether they will ever get there or not...)
- adc86, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Microsoft *does* block all but IE in multiple pages.
Check their MSDN or whatever it is. With the Safari debug menu enabled (or a plugin for FF, etc) you can change your useragent and view their examples just fine. If you're not IE, though, you're not even allowed to see said example.
- Pinhedd, on 10/11/2007, -17/+6no *****, I use IE. Everything looks great and really, there's nothing that the "alternatives" offer me that I dont already have.
- mrbro, on 10/11/2007, -12/+126What gives? I'm using firefox and the site still looks ugly.
- TedTschopp, on 10/11/2007, -3/+9He is lazy...
- tdous, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7Apparently he's tired of hacking together decent design too. It's fairly usable though I guess..
- B1663r, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3I didn't realize those were drop down menus until i accidently hovered over them so he fails.
- LethalAmbition, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5It looks like a "simple" design. IE sucks monkey balls if it can't render that properly. And notice he didn't force people to use FIrefox, he mentioned two other browsers.
- Soulhuntre, on 10/11/2007, -2/+2You can't really expect to much from someone who can't make the page work.
- nevesis, on 10/11/2007, -6/+16I agree that it's a little extreme.
But that's what it takes to motivate someone. The only reason I ever use IE is because of sites which only support IE. (Netflix on-demand, I'm looking at you.)
Maybe if those people who use IE all the time were forced to use Firefox* for a single site.. they'd load it up every time they visited and eventually realized how much better it is.
*or Opera, or Konquerer, or Safari even.- arcthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -5/+4Did it ever occur to you that maybe some people just prefer IE for aesthetic reasons and don't really care about standards? 90% of the time, standards aren't an issue. Sites with CSS so convoluted it had might as well be written in ASM notwithstanding, of course.
- tdous, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1Obviously the average user doesn't care about web standards. They shouldn't have to. But neither should the designers. Nor the browser makers. It should just be the way things are done. IE ruins the party.
- MedHead, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1One can use themes with Firefox to emulate Internet Explorer.
- arcthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -5/+4Did it ever occur to you that maybe some people just prefer IE for aesthetic reasons and don't really care about standards? 90% of the time, standards aren't an issue. Sites with CSS so convoluted it had might as well be written in ASM notwithstanding, of course.
- Ashcan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+8You just make the blocked web site think you're not using IE (even when you are), and you're right in. I guess it would block most people, but I would think the level of person using Open Addict can get around the block if needed.
- Tweekster, on 10/11/2007, -3/+3They would be smart enough to know not to use IE for anything
- Ashcan, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2Sometimes at work, ya gotta use what's installed on the computer. Not everyone is the head of the IT department of a large corporation. Some of us schlubs have to actually do (or use) what we're told to in order to keep our jobs.
- SeBBBe, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3I dont think those are the people they're targeting to convert. If you're that skilled, you probably have already considered alternative browser.
- B1663r, on 10/11/2007, -2/+1I am that skilled an my workaround is I am not going to go to his site ever again... not that I ever went before.
- SeBBBe, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4I dont think those are the people they're targeting to convert. If you're that skilled, you probably have already considered alternative browser.
- Tweekster, on 10/11/2007, -3/+3They would be smart enough to know not to use IE for anything
- Nossie, on 10/11/2007, -5/+31I'm a huge linux / os x advocate and digg users seem to love burying my comments because of that, but even I cant help but feel this is the pot calling the kettle black. If it doesnt work in IE then fair enough, but why cant he just tell users that complain to take their issue to MS or download firefox rather than to actively block their browser :(
- saftaplan, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Well there have been hundreds of sites who have been blocking any browser but IE for many years, thanks to Fx these sites nearly don't exist anymore. So this is some kind of revenge. And revenge is sweet.
- cubedcompanies, on 10/11/2007, -3/+11great way to promote a cause. i'm sure most of their audience doesn't use IE anyway given the site is dedicated to 'open standards'...
- sensibledriver, on 10/11/2007, -10/+8Bravo!
- gcnaddict, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1Dumbass!
- snoolyagain, on 10/11/2007, -8/+3about time. full support.
- roadtrippy, on 10/11/2007, -1/+31So who is Open Addicts target audience now? People who are using open source software already? I'm betting it will be kind of hard to advocate the greatness of open source to the vast majority who are still using IE.
- whataboutdave, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6If you aren't ready for Firefox, you probably aren't ready for the rest of the open source world.
Firefox is like a gateway drug.- natenovs, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0firefox, the free alternative to many other free browsers.
- roadtrippy, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Firefox is a good way to start, but I think it would help the site if the maintainers directed IE users to alternative options. Maybe they will, but it wasn't mentioned in any of the posts. Even then, how many times has anyone gone to an 'IE only' site and gone out of their way to fire up Internet Explorer just to view the page? I haven't. I just go on to something else most of the time.
- whataboutdave, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6If you aren't ready for Firefox, you probably aren't ready for the rest of the open source world.
- smallSHEEP, on 10/11/2007, -4/+11I love the idea, but I'm not yet ready to block I.E. users from my own website as it has to... you know... make money =/
- xGraphite, on 10/11/2007, -10/+4'Try to validate Internet Explorer's home page and see if you think Microsoft cares about standards'
I just about spit out my soda
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.openaddict.com%2F- allholy1, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5??? why?
- mariol90, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3Sometimes it gets validated, and other times it doesn't.
The first time I checked that site (after checking a few others), it didn't get validated. Then I checked again, and it was.
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y259/mariol90/w3.png- crzdmn, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Those are errors in a URL, which is not something they validate. Somewhere on the page it crapped out. Do the same thing to microsoft.com and it fails every time
- mariol90, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0Microsoft always fails when I try it, even from the validator's homepage.
If i keep clicking "revalidate" for open addict, it doesn't validate it sometimes.
I tried the same thing with opera.com, it always validates it every time.
- mariol90, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0Microsoft always fails when I try it, even from the validator's homepage.
- crzdmn, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Those are errors in a URL, which is not something they validate. Somewhere on the page it crapped out. Do the same thing to microsoft.com and it fails every time
- snlildude87, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1'Try to validate Internet Explorer's home page and see if you think Microsoft cares about standards'
Google's homepage also doesn't validate.
- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -9/+12So much for freedom of information. What's next, blocking people from a website because they use iPhone. Why not?
- tdous, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6Why not indeed. Damn sheep-like bandwagon jump-on-ers ;)
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=iphone - LethalAmbition, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1That's actually not a bad idea!
- rytr23, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Well for one, the iPhone renders the site correctly.. So if its a standard compliant browser then there is no issue..
- tdous, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6Why not indeed. Damn sheep-like bandwagon jump-on-ers ;)
- cephelo, on 10/11/2007, -12/+35This is retarded. There is NOTHING in that site that is not easily accomplished with IE. Not that IE users are missing much -- the design and content presentation is awful at best.
- tomi, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3If you find nothing wrong, then why don't you go contact the Open Addict admin, and offer him help?
- asaturn, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I agree. Their site has a totally boring ***** design that could EASILY be accomplished with ACTUAL standard code that IE (and other browsers) will render properly - no need to "tweak" the design for each browser.
seems like they need to ban themselves from HTML generators instead of banning IE from their site.
- cubedcompanies, on 10/11/2007, -8/+19although... no offense to OpenAddict but there really is no excuse for that site not too look fine on IE... there's nothing complicated about their site at all. While MS is fixing their browser, I think he needs to brush up on his CSS.
- lsatkins, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4I think he's just trying to get publicity to his website. This would be news if it was something like cnn or google blocking internet explorer.
- david76, on 10/11/2007, -5/+32This isn't "extreme" it's ridiculous. Half of the problems they're having with layout are because they're using bass-ackwards techniques like positioning everything using absolute instead of relying on the document's natural page flow.
It is kind of ironic that a site dedicated to open source would actively block users from getting access merely because of what browser they use. I, frankly, find it very hard to believe this site couldn't be rebuilt to look correct in IE.- tdous, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2Learn. http://www.alistapart.com/articles/conflictingabsolutepositions
- n30n, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3I agree completely. If you look at the site's basic layout there is no reason that he couldn't design something that was cross browser compatible. Standards compliance is nice, but if you are going to be blocking out a large portion of the Internet then you really need to think about the validity of what they are doing.
- mdman, on 10/11/2007, -10/+14Who cares...
Blocking IE, the most used browser is stupid for any website...
but I could care less about a site I never visit anyway.. - dcoolidge, on 10/11/2007, -3/+47This is the first time I ever heard of open adict...
- obe1kenobi, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5me too
- scisam, on 10/11/2007, -2/+1that's the idea
- acl123, on 10/11/2007, -3/+6Have to admit IE 7 is not too bad now. I spend just as long getting things to work in Opera and Safari as I do in IE 7. IE 6 is horrendous obviously - the head simply swirls when you think of all the lost productivity around the world because of that browser.
- Tweekster, on 10/11/2007, -4/+2They made it uglier (if that was possible) and it still doesn't do what it is supposed to
IE7 is a failure.- natenovs, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3browses the web, has an rss reader, favorites, tabs, extensible with add ons and tool bars, protected mode, dep in vista.
what the hell else is it supposed to do?
- natenovs, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3browses the web, has an rss reader, favorites, tabs, extensible with add ons and tool bars, protected mode, dep in vista.
- kretik, on 10/11/2007, -3/+1About as much as was lost catering to ***** Netscape 4, I'd guess.
- Tweekster, on 10/11/2007, -4/+2They made it uglier (if that was possible) and it still doesn't do what it is supposed to
- nevesis, on 10/11/2007, -5/+49I think this says a lot about programming practices at the various browser organizations:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/ie/default.mspx --- Failed validation, 208 errors
http://www.apple.com/safari/ --- Failed validation, 3 errors
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/ --- Failed validation, 1 error
http://www.konqueror.org --- Passed validation
http://www.opera.com --- Passed validation- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -3/+14google.com 50 errors
Redhat.com 6 errors
Come again?- Tabou, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3Is either Google or Redhat a "browser organization"?
- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4No, but they are strong supporters of open source, the group most avid about standards compliance.
- Tippis, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Google, at least, is a "improve your internet experience" company, and as part of that, they try to minimise the load time (and server load) by stripping the page down to the bare minimums. As it happens, this means skipping a large number of compliance requriements, but largely ones that never really mattered anyway.
Pragmatism at its finest.
- Tabou, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3Is either Google or Redhat a "browser organization"?
- earlycj5, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5Though there are differences between validation and making the site display properly when compared to other sites that adhere to standards.
I feel his frustration with trying to make sites work with IE. Yes, I know there are "work-arounds" and "hacks" posted out there, but dangit, if four out of five browsers can get rendering right, why can't IE? - FoxMeister, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Bleh, I stopped bothering to validate my sites a long time ago. I don't care about being able to display a stupid little badge to increase my e-wang. I just code it in a standards compliant way and then add hacks to make sure it works in every browser. It's usually only IE that gives me any hassle though, the other browsers all do a decent job.
- thedragon4453, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0I think that is the point though. Why should there have to be work arounds? Why cant MS just follow the standard? It seems like a waste of time to have to go back and put in the extra work because one browser wants to do things their own way.
- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -3/+14google.com 50 errors
- judicar, on 10/11/2007, -8/+15this is like AA not allowing alcoholics to attend their meetings, I'm guessing this won't last long.
- decoherence, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0Last I heard, OpenAddict wasn't an MSIE user support group.
- ibis, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8Except that, I'm getting the ie reject page even though I'm using Firefox. I'm not spoofing my user-agent or anything like that either.
- darkane, on 10/11/2007, -7/+16While a lot of people will praise them for this act, I find it rather pathetic. Open Addict is a very simple website. So instead of sounding like a rebel, they come off sounding like a crappy web developer. That's certainly nothing to be proud of.
- wildmannz, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0Not coming to the party about Web Standards is pretty crappy. That's a MS problem. It shouldn't become other peoples problem, now, should it?
- GreatGod, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0The people = the vast majority you moron. The vast majority is the users, not the web developers. Whining about MS and not being an audience for the vast majority, the PEOPLE is selfish, stupid, and in this case, bigoted, incompetent, and discriminating. As suggested previously, a splash screen would have sufficed.
- GreatGod, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0The people = the vast majority you moron. The vast majority is the users, not the web developers. Whining about MS and not being an audience for the vast majority, the PEOPLE is selfish, stupid, and in this case, bigoted, incompetent, and discriminating. As suggested previously, a splash screen would have sufficed.
- wildmannz, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0Not coming to the party about Web Standards is pretty crappy. That's a MS problem. It shouldn't become other peoples problem, now, should it?
- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -9/+29google.com 50 errors
yahoo.com 34 errors
excite.com 199 errors
digg.com 2 errors
slashdot.com 6 errors
fark.com 0 errors
boingboing.net 113 errors
IE homepage 208 errors
Redhat.com 6 errors
So tell me, why is it so important that everything be standards compliant and abide by the strictest conventions? I'm seeing a trend here, errors are everywhere, no one is following the strictest conventions, some are simply following them better than others.- Loonacy, on 10/11/2007, -3/+17Probably a lot of those errors are hacks to make it work in IE. I know when I'm working on a page it usually passes with 0 errors until I have to hack in some workarounds to make it look right with IE6/7.
- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2If we believe what you said, it only takes 2 errors to get IE to render digg.com correctly. Yet 50 on the google homepage, and 34 on the yahoo homepage, something doesn't add up?
- kinghajj, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1It depends on the size and style of the site.
- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2digg home page and yahoo homepage are larger and more complex than the google homepage, that defies logic that google would have the most errors on the simplest page.
- kinghajj, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1It depends on the size and style of the site.
- Smuikas, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2This is a fallacy. You can get everything rendering fine in IE6 with a simple conditional comment to include an overriding style sheet.
No errors ***** needed.
- maninblac1, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2If we believe what you said, it only takes 2 errors to get IE to render digg.com correctly. Yet 50 on the google homepage, and 34 on the yahoo homepage, something doesn't add up?
- crzdmn, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3The issue with IE is they do things to handle those errors. For those of us who write compliant sites it's a royal pain in the ass...
although, using * in your style sheet works great for IE fixes :) - mossblaser, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Depends - the best programmer is a lazy programmer - once you get used to using the standards it really is easier to write Some title on my page than Some title on my page - not only that but turn off styles and you still see a perfectly usable page and people who need a screen reader can browse the web in comfort. Google have it easy because their pages are simple and just work, sites like Digg need something fairly robust because of the sheer size of it. Imagine the number of font tags in a page filled with massive numbers of comments... But one thing is true, adhering completely to standards is near impossible while IE remains a credible browser.
- strangewill, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3"the best programmer is a lazy programmer"
I don't know whether to dig you up for being sarcastic, or dig you down for being an idiot. Lazy programmers is what gives PHP such a bad rap in the business world.- raynevandunem, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1That quote, or a variation of it, is most often attributed to Larry Wall, creator of Perl.
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/l/larrywall141510.html
- raynevandunem, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1That quote, or a variation of it, is most often attributed to Larry Wall, creator of Perl.
- skankyBacon, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3Though they are related, and often go hand-in-hand, there is a difference between lazy and efficient.
- strangewill, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3"the best programmer is a lazy programmer"
- giraph, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2His forum doesn't even validate without errors, lame.
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.openaddict.com%2Fforums%2Fviewtopic.php%3Fp%3D5512 - feedmecereal, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Who uses excite.com anymore?
- Loonacy, on 10/11/2007, -3/+17Probably a lot of those errors are hacks to make it work in IE. I know when I'm working on a page it usually passes with 0 errors until I have to hack in some workarounds to make it look right with IE6/7.
- combustion8, on 10/11/2007, -14/+9oh well, one less site I'll be visiting.
- whataboutdave, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4Point and laugh at the IE user.
- natenovs, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1point and laugh at the 8th grader.
- whataboutdave, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4Point and laugh at the IE user.
- Antimatt, on 10/11/2007, -11/+21This is an elitist mentality. Developers everywhere go out of their way to make complex designs work across all browsers. If openaddict can't get their blocky site looking the same in IE, they've got bigger problems than loose adherence to web standards. In their defense, this is a site that caters to a low-IE using audience.
The last thing I want to see is the web go back to browser-specific sites. This isn't 1998. Accessibility of information should be top priority.- FoxMeister, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2It's not elitist, it's just frustration. The only reason we go out of our way to make complicated designs work in IE is because we get paid to (a lot of extra unnecessary pay because it doesn't follow standards). People are willing to pay because IE has the market share. Firefox, Opera and other more compliant browsers are the ones that usually suffer because there are still a lot of websites that only cater for IE properly. I think it's overboard to block users from your site all together, although I can agree with it on some level because he is trying to send a message to Microsoft. They blatantly ignore standards for no reason other than to push their proprietary crap, and it's the end-user who suffers.
- sfacets, on 10/11/2007, -9/+9This is great! Obviously most people visiting the website have more sense than to use IE anyway... More websites should block IE users, or redirect them to download Firefox.
- mossblaser, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1If enough sites do then that's one less nightmare for web developers to have to worry about - anyone who knows how quick building a nice stds. compliant site is only to spend about 30 times as long making it work even remotely similar in IE only to find that making it work in IE has smashed much of the compliance into dust. People wouldn't go on about how harsh the W3C standards are if they didn't need to cater to IE, but again until there is an obvious incentive to IE users to switch to fire fox (or indeed a way to explain that they even have a choice), such as extra features on descent browsers or better styles etc.- blocking is going too far in my opinion, possibly showing an initial warning and a picture of what the site looks like in a proper browser and then letting the user enter "at their own peril" to find a mess of glitches would give them some functionality (enough to feel it would be worth switching to use the site properly) without making them feel it was "good enough".
