There is a scourge on the Web. It is called Internet Explorer 6. Even though the more recent version of Microsoft’s browser, IE7, has been around for more than two years, IE6 still represents 31 percent of all browsers out there (versus only 22 percent for IE7 and 36.5 percent for Firefox). This upgrade lag is simply unacceptable—to programmers, that is, who find it a real pain to make sure their Web apps work on five different browsers. Not only that, but IE6 supports some non-standard features and functions that are not compatible with other browsers. The security vulnerabilities aren’t too much fun either.
It’s too much work and, quite frankly, it is driving some programmers batty. Which is why a group of them have created SaveTheDevelopers.org, an organization dedicated to making the Web a better place for developers (and thus for users as well). Web developers can grab a piece of code to put on their Websites which will detect if a visitor is using an outmoded browser (IE6, cough). When the offending browser is detected, a pop-down window will appear (assuming those aren’t blocked) which will direct the user to a page where they can upgrade to IE7, or the latest version of Firefox or Safari.
More campaigns are planned for the future to whip those laggard Web surfers into shape, and once again make the Web safe for developers.
@Evan
Microsoft HAVE got css right, obviously they failed with IE6 and 7 but IE 8 will be one of the most advanced browsers available regarding CSS. This is a good thing and we should support the IE team as much as possible for making changes within MS and pushing for a better browser. Heck this may even force Mozilla and others to improve their own CSS and technology support.
Easiest way to make people update is to steal a trick from the OS lot – block older browser versions from your site.
On the one hand, people will update if you give the message “IE 6 not compatible, please update to version 7/8″.
On the other hand, a big chunk of daytime web surfers are business users, and business’ upgrade slowly, but any company still using IE6 with all it’s flaws and security headaches deserves to have angry employees!!
Developers – stop whining, and start bullying people into upgrading!! It works for Apple and Microsoft with their auto-updates – why not the big browsers too??
Microsoft just don’t get it!
Just like using email with Gmail has better performance than hotmail, and other IMs have better performance than MS Messenger, the same way is with the Web Browsers. Microsoft IE7 performance does not compare with that of Firefox. Ever since I discovered Firefox i have not turned back! Only non-conesours users are still using it (which is the wast majority).
The days of MS are counted! So, let us start developing for Firefox …
Guys, you’re a bit morons. Probably the most important reason why MS pushing its IE7 is pirate versions of Windows. You can’t imagine how many pirate versions of Windows are installed all over the world. IE7 is nice, but is requires Genuine Windows check. And this campain – “save the developers” – seems to be all the same. OK, probably by pushing IE7 MS also is pushing its own technologies – Silverlight, some non-standard extensions, etc. They want to kill FireFox, but first of all they need to kill IE6 which also dont support many of that new things. Anyway, that is not a fair play.
IE 7 instala dll que no son para xp, sino para vista, por lo que varios programas dejan de trabajar. Si estas programando, como es mi caso y distribuyes los programas compilados, estos no funcionan en windows xp que no tengan IE 7 instalado.
Por mi parte uso firefox desde hace años y me va mucho mejor.
Automatically translated text:
IE 7 installed Dll for non-XP, but to Vista, so several programs stop working. If such programming, like myself and distribute the compiled programs, these do not work on windows xp not having installed IE 7.
For my part firefox use for many years and I am going much better.
I can appreciate the call to develop consistent browser standards but what really gets old are those people who have their browser preference as a religion. The constant whining of the Firefox fanbois is about enough to make me want to uninstall the thing and block Firefox from my sites.
For all the “firefox does more hard than good” comments I’ve seen here, I’ve yet to see one valid argument explaining how such a conclusion was reached.
As much as I’d love to say w00t for FF’s higher numbers, I know that one of the reasons it is getting up there is there’s a good deal of companies that mandate its use over IE because the boss (who knows little about technology) hears that it’s much more secure than IE so that must be what we should use, right?
And as far as trying to get people to stop using IE6, keep dreaming. I work for a company that customizes a data reporting framework that is only now starting to work towards IE7 compatibility. IE6 made such a dent in the way people developed proprietary business tools that IE7 won’t be the “standard” overall until those tools all get upgraded. With how often most companies avoid upgrading a proprietary software until they absolutely have to, this will be a long time coming.
Granted, if you know your audience well enough, you could support this movement as long as you’re not alienating your readers/clients/etc. (e.g. pretty soon, if not now, most gaming sites could already be designing without much in the way of IE6 compliance)
@Law: You need to be REALLY careful with that idea. I’ve heard it a million times already, but if those users are your revenue, you just put yourself out of a job. Doing that for your personal blag is one thing, but any other site is quite another matter.
For my site, I have 65% IE (33% IE7, 31% IE6), 21% Firefox, and 2% Safari. Those are the three I test for. The one thing that I don’t like IE6 not supporting is transparent PNG files, other than that I’ve been able to use CSS and cross-browser fine. On the other hand, I looked briefly at the IE8 beta 1, and it handles some stuff way different than IE7/Firefox/Safari does…I’m hoping that’s just because it’s in beta!
Granted my sites are fairly basic (non Web 2.0) but I don’t need to support 5 browsers, just standards compliant ones and IE6. Unfortunately I don’t have a PC to test IE6 with, so that makes my life a bit of a hassle. (Please don’t tell me to buy a cheap Dell for my testing. I’d rather go to the public library to test pages than have a piece of vomit like that cluttering up my office.)
HELLOOOO – Those of us with complex websites to support aren’t all that fussed about IE 6, it’s the bloody endless parade of AOL browsers with their weird rules for how windows work that are the problem. Lets outlaw ALL aol browsers and then we can stop working on weekends.
I think a big problem is with corporate users.
The company I work for has many sites that only work properly in IE. They’ve tried upgrading to IE 7 but from what I understand many of these sites have problems being rendered in IE 7 and the company just doesn’t spend the money to fix them so it can upgrade.
I imagine there is a lot of similar problems across the corporate sector.
I work for a large corporation that will not allow us to upgrade to IE7, and I for one am glad. We had a few people who were allowed to test it (after it was released) and between the awful interface and the way it would have required complete re-design of most of our web apps, they were all glad to get back to IE6. BTW, most of these were MS fanboys.
I myself use Firefox, Safari, and IE depending on what I’m trying to get done. I wouldn’t necessarily consider myself a fan of any of the major browsers out there, although I do find myself using Firefox more than any others. I would probably be more likely to use IE7 if MS had remembered to consider Backwards Compatability, something that we actually test for in our apps.
For all of those whiny devs out there wanting to block anyone using anything except IE7, I say go ahead. Just don’t come whining to me when they lay you off due to a lack of customers.
@Workposter: I’m with you on that one. I can deal with IE6. Unfortunately, much of our user base is still *required* to use IE 5.5, by forces beyond my control. IE 5.5 really likes to crash over silly things. I had to spend weeks completely rewriting a large DHTML webapp to make it IE 5.5-friendly. Not fun at all! From what I hear, IE5 on the mac is ridiculous, and I’m thankful that I’m not required to develop for it!
I have to agree with #62 and #94.
Basically the deal is that most people aren’t going to upgrade their browser unless they’re required to or compelled to in order to complete whatever task they’re undertaking on the web. Most consumers could care less about whether it’s tough for a developer to create a functional website in their browser. They think it’s all magic anyway. They have no idea of the effort involved in cross-browser development or the lack of the ability to use cool specialized browser features because you have to support the lowest common denominator.
Yes, it’s a pain to get your site working “perfectly” in every major market-share browser, but that’s just the way it is, and it will always be that way. At least there are several browsers out there that give informed consumers a choice and promote the development of new and better features through competition.
The reality is that if you’re developing websites for corporations, you don’t have a choice but to make them cross-browser compatible and support the majority market-shares. It’s not acceptable to block users or prevent them from being able to use your site through developmental laziness or the business loses customers/money. So get over it. If it were easy there would be fewer jobs for developers and we’d get paid less for our trouble.
If you have the luxury of creating personal/experimental/creative websites then, by all means, do something awesome that works best in your favorite browser and only provide raw data in a plain format to the platforms that you hate. Be the standards bearer that plays the all-or-nothing game since you have less to lose financially and the moral high-ground to support you. Maybe someone will be so impressed by what you have done in your favorite browser that they’ll be encouraged to upgrade. Or they’ll not even realize that the site is “broken” in their outdated browser, declare it ugly, and move on to other sites.
Ack! So many stupid, stupid people here!
First off, to all those people that say that this is Microsoft’s fault for not pushing the upgrade: Microsoft DID push the upgrade. That’s how I got IE7 installed on my computer.
And then, after it had been sitting there for a while (I was using FF predominantly at the time), I had some reason I don’t remember to need IE. So I ran IE7, and lo! and behold: the UI was a piece of $@%!! After wasting a few hours searching, I discovered that while a select few UI downgrades were fixable, the single biggest one (to my mind), the Address bar repositioning, was completely unfixable. As well as some other ones, which have been covered extensively elsewhere (where are my navigation buttons, again?).
Which brings me to the point I’ve got to bring to all’y'all who are saying that “people need to be informed about IE7″, and “we need to drop support for IE6″, and “the users concerns should be sacrificed for the concerns of the developer” (and I really hate you “tech-types always upgrade” MORONS): Sure, go ahead and try this childish – nay, babyish – tactic. But you had better have content that’s worth forcing people (against their will) who probably don’t care a micro-give-a-hoot about the “poor, defenseless developer” to “upgrade” (read: downgrade) to a very much worsened UI that will persist across EVERY web page they have to navigate through, just so you can be saved from the trouble of making your apps work against the single most popular browser available.
Quit your whining, you morons, and please – please, please, PLEASE – stop insulting the consumer’s decision-making processes by making blanket statements about something you know nothing about.
And anyone who does this idiocy – consider yourself boycotted. I’m sure not going to succumb to your whims, and I’ll tell anybody else who asks that any developer who participates in this outrage is a doody-head.
Morons. (Yeah, I feel kinda strongly about this)
Hold on now…
I absolutely support those of you who want to “save the developers” and stop supporting older versions of the major browsers.
After all, that will help to weed out you hobbiests from us professionals.
I am a developer and a user of IE6 who does not want to switch because MS took away functionality. I am able to set up IE 6 with a 2-line command bar consisting of menu, a few icons, search box on line one and links on line 2. You can not do this on IE7. They completly hosed up the great configurability that they had in IE6. This is a common theme among users that I have to deal with every day. Allow us to upgrade without having to change!
stop it, Adam! Can’t you see you’re a dam’d “hobbiest” (or should it be “hob-beast”) if you can deal with IE6? Shame! Out yourself as a IE7 evangelist and you’ll be held professional again…
btw, some other day, my boss – a real professional – told me professionals never ever do configuration on applications, only hobbyists do. Unfortunately the company went down in the meantime.
But the day will come and people will recognize all your professionalism, sure…
In IE6, I can ctrl+tab to access my address bar. This is gone now. I hate you IE7.
As for the rest? I’m a developper, sure, but I like to take it easy at home. I honestly have no reason whatsoever to upgrade because I don’t gain any functionalities I’d ever use (I hate tabbed browsing; I know I’m part of a minority, but I just do.
) and I lose one I use very frequently, even if it’s such a small one – I rarely touch my mouse, so to me, it’s important. And yeah, I know there’s an alternative way of doing it, but it’s not the same – I’m used to THIS one, and gain no benefits from changing.
Sorry guys, but I’m keeping this, and I’ll just miss out on your oh-so interesting blogs that block my browser of choice. To be frank, I could care less – it’s just elitism and in no way makes me feel a need to switch.
We’ve been a bit successful in making people upgrade to IE7 or switch to FF, Opera, or Safari by simply displaying a “time-to-upgrade” page every time a user with IE6 or below visits.
I’m sure we do lose a bit of visitors by doing so, but according to our stats, they end up upgrading anyway when they realize their friends are enjoying the site.
It’s just not worth our time to hack for IE6 anymore…
I have a better idea. Form savethesufer from moronic developers. Take away all their toys (flash, javascript, etc) until they learn to use them responsibly. Almost every time i visit a re-launched site, it is an overblown nightmare.
Why must i have javascript enabled to read a simply list, or go to page 2 of an article?
Hope it happens soon
@Dean
I totally agree. Developers (like me) and software companies also come with the resposibilty to promote the “clean” technologies. Bubbles like Ajax, Web 2.0 are gonna pop one day, not because of what they are, but because of how they are being used. It would be great to work on some common standards across browsers to benifit developers as well as users. so that we do not have problems with this cross browser issues. Currenlty there is a cult which is with microsoft or agaist microsoft. The ones with MS ignore the fact that how poorly microsoft implements its own standards and the ones agaist MS, in hating MS forget that there are lots of things that microsft has given to this industry and there are lots of good things that we can learn from it. When we dislike something, we shouldnt ignore the good things that we can learn from it.
IE7 has too many problems yet. I have had to REVERT to IE6- SP1 on two different computers at the agreement of Microsoft Techs in order to restore net ability to BOTH of them. Personally, I use Firefox 1.5.0.10 in all cases EXCEPT those sites which refuse to “play well with others” and instead demand IE be used. It is NOT as secure and all those who have switched to Linux will attest to that simple fact, regardless WHAT you might read here above. Just look at the continous patching of XP, IE, and various other vulnerabilities Microsoft products have. Don’t get me wrong, I too am PRIMARILY using XP but as stated above, with FAR FEWER problems, STRICTLY because of the use of FIREFOX as my default browser.
Besides the reasons noted above, most folks I deal with don’t like the look and feel of IE7 in ANY regard and it takes too much of the screen.
“Tell you what lets first do- lets KILL all the lawyers”. Dick the butcher, Act III, Henry the Sixt. Wm. Shakespeare
Ha ha. Good article.
Everyone knows that developers want the world to use one browser, cos they’re lazy.
Why don’t we only buy ford cars to make it easy for the mechanics?
Oh, I know why. Cos they’re sh…..
Developers could save themself, if they would stop to code plain HTML. In programming, nobody codes Assembler anymore. That’s what HTML is: a basic renderer-specific language. Code your applications in a high level language and let a compiler create the rendering code (the HTML) for the device. Also solves accessebility problems.
Maybe more people would upgrade to IE 7 if they allowed it to be installed on Win 2K!?!?!?!. I bet most of the people still on IE6 are Win2K users that dont want to “downgrade” to XP or Vista but like IE browser.
My companies tech dept is not moving to IE7 right now because of yet to be discovered security and performance issues, they have gotten themselves bit in the ass by Microsoft’s time honored tradition of letting it’s customers be the beta testers for their software. Sounds like this, time it as with Vista, it has bit them in the ass.
i’ve made a simple and small wordpress plugin that includes the savethedevelopers say no to ie6 script automatically:
http://mochapow...rdpress-plugin/
To Scott (#6): the statistics are based on data gathered from w3schools’ log files. Thus, they are not representative of the entire internets, just their domain.
Are you developers really boohoo-ing because your job is so hard cause of IE6? good lord! DOCTORS- if they could just get those darn people to stop getting sick, there job would be soo much easier! why cant everyone just do the right thing. Im not saying i can program (or could ever) but… to try and get the masses to upgrade to something they dont (or feel) they need so you dont have to work so hard? heh =) you so silllly! (i use firefox and have never heard a negative thing about it to substantiate “developer woahs”)
Firefox is a piece of shit browser that creates it’s own standards, such as “-moz-inline-box”.
Browsers like Opera have made development easier, while browsers like Firefox have only made it more difficult.
As a web developer for 7 years now i would rather put a message on my sites saying to Download Opera if your using Firefox.
That way i don’t have to bother fixing websites that conform to Firefox Only standards.
Seems the site doesn’t work in IE7, IE8 Beta, Firefox 2.0, Firefox 3.0 Beta 3 and Safari. Only Opera works as far as I can tell from the browsers I have installed.
Developers?!
For over a decade the developres trend is to turn software from bad to worse. Instead of optimaseing their applications to work faster and error free, they degrade their performance. Did the aliens change the curriculum for programming over at the college?
We better stop them “developing” if we want things working or we may need an 800W powered computer to run the notepad, as soon as next week. I fear to presume the power it would take to run the average CAD aplication of tomorrow.
Now they want us to move from Internet Explorer 6 to IE 7. Well, i’ve never used IE 6 anyways. Thank you & goodbye!
Some youngster was unable to develop (things got out of control the 1st time people started developing instead of programming) unless you had IE4 installed on the machine. Then, some even younger started complaining that applications don’t work if you don’t have IE 5.5 and now, IE7…
My humble opinion is that todays highest speed*usability rating browser is Mozila’s FFox 1.5.X, but some statistics here say it’s usage is less than 1%.
Ofcourse Opera 4.X would always be the fastest, but modern web developers had made it somewhat inoperative.
To resume the resume, the problem is with people.
Reasons to keep IE6:
1. I am a Developer! I need to it test my Web apps and design on!
2. I’m still running Win2K and don’t plan to upgrade – for starters, it works, and again, I need it to test application development on.
3. Many sites were designed for IE6 and are not compatible with IE7, regardless of what people believe. I was recently using a very interactive site, http://tulseluperjourney.com w/IE7 and having all sorts of problems, until I switched to using it with IE6, which was what was around when it was developed 3-4 years ago.
4. Change for the sake of change is too much a part of high-tech “culture” and a major problem. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. IE6 was around forever because it did the basics and worked and became the market standard. IE7 just adds a bunch of features to try and keep up with Firefox, yet is definitely not anywhere close to 100% backwards compatible with IE7.
5. Again, it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Change for the sake of it has got to stop, esp. on the InterWeb tubes.
I run IE7 on WinXP and IE6 on Win2K because I am a both a Web and desktop app developer, and that setup is not going to change any time soon, esp. with the disaster that is Vista – why should I buy a new OS which will then force me to buy all new hardware when it doesn’t work or slogs my machines to a crawl.
Lastly, I’m replying to this post using Firefox running on a Linux Redhat 7 PII-450 Dell built in 1998. If it ain’t broke…!
seriously, wtf …….
how can you all say this crap?
@melissa – comparing doctors to programmers and web developers is just wrong. its 2 complete different subjects that arent related. we can change what software is being used, because we created it. doctors did not create humans, they cant change the core of a human. programmers can change the core of an operating system, the web browser, anything that runs on a chipboard because it was made my us.
@phillip – wow dude, seriously. your talking utter shit. lets begin with, firefox is a brilliant browser, firefox has helped make the web. mozilla invented the standards in most of the web technologies, including your beloved opera. opera have done nothing to make web development easier, if anything they have made it harder by using different models from microsoft and mozilla. back to your it point again, mozilla implemented things like “-moz-inline-box” into the gecko because there was nothing similar yet in the w3c standard documentation. since you’ve been a developer for 7 years, your lacking in your knowledge about web technologies. the reason there still in the gecko engine is to provide backward compatibility. switch to firefox, then you dont need to fix websites that conform to outdated opera standards, not that many people write websites for opera.
@rob -
1. your a developer, you dont like ie6.
2. your a developer, your still using windows 2000? what kind of developer are you? do you not like the new technologies? hows your pentium 4?
3. if a website doesnt work in a new browser, then the website should be updated to conform to new standards. this is down to lazy developers like yourself who seemed to be scared of the new features and platforms that are around. so thats not really our problem, its up to the website owner to keep there website up to date.
4. if its not broke lets not fix it. dude, your getting lazier. ie6 failed to do the basics, and it failed to meet standards. christ!!? why are you all so behind??? nope, ie7 is getting closer to the standards, ie8 is even closer. there not trying to beat firefox, its just new standards are being pushed (from w3c), so web browser developers need to keep up.
5. its fuckin broke?! its old!! it doesnt support opacity, a true box model etc… it doesnt fuckin work!!!!!! so your point is null and void.
6. maybe because your using old machines?
7. yeap its not broke, but its nothing like a 8 core mac pro …… you need to upgrade to stay ahead in this game of computers. were evolving!! keep with it or switch careers!!!!!
ie6 needs to go, it doesnt meet standards, it fails at the new features of the web. it gives developers headaches, and causes major problems with web development. if you think otherwise, you should really consider switching to a career that has a slower pace. computers / the web is evolving rapidly, you need to keep up or you make the rest of us look like twats when you come up with all this ridiculous bullshit.
/rant over
its broken, it cant be fixed. lets get rid of it.
@melissa: Following through on your doctors comparison, think of this as a public health campaign. Convincing people to use a better browser than IE6 is like convincing them to eat less junk food. (And about as difficult, it seems.)
Hey, I’m running a similar campaign to stop IE6. I’ve running it for some months now, and I think mine came first. So their idea of a site devoted to wiping IE6 off the web is not new at all.
So, please check my site also
http://www.stopie6.org
and you’ll find a similar js script to warn your site users that still using IE6 is just insane (or any custom message you want to show them)
Oh, and fell free to leave a comment there, thanks.
Matteo – Stop IE6 campaign
http://www.stopie6.org
please develop what you like to develop but no need to wipe-out ie6 for the sake of your project. wait until w2k dies then feel free to do that. So in-short have some considerations for other.
OMG, there is an error in the statement, the 6 has nothing to do with it.
“There is a scourge on the Web. It is called Internet Explorer 6″
In other words the scourge on the web is called Internet Explorer ANY VERSION.
As far as I’m concerned we should redirect all users using any version of internet explorer to upgrade to firefox or opera and NOT display a page at all.
Internet Explorer is the MS attempt for FORCE Microsoft Nonstandards on us all and to control the market…. The only reason it works
1. We allow it and even some webmasters actually accept and modify code on their site to allow IE browser to work.
2. MS ships only their browser with the OS, still a totally UNFAIR Market advantage.
Just think of what we webmasters could do if we banned together and BANNED Internet Explorer from our websites, then MS could no LONGER tell us what to do.
Just think if only 10% of the internet banned IE and forced Opera or FF
All my 5 sites show FF in the lead
58% Firefox
11% IE7
21% IE6
10% other
I am 100% frustrated with 6, but I have been in 3 top 100 companies in the past 4 months and wouldn’t you know most are using the old 6! One company had the IT department tell them 7 was a joke and that 6 is the normmmmm. Well guess what that IT idiot was afraid to perform a little extra work. Whay does MS just kill 6 thru a service pack and force the issue once and for all!
Hmmm, it takes me tops 1 hour to get a page working in IE6.
Develop completely in IE7, then check it against FireFox and usually theres no issues there.
Finally some minor spacing tweaks for IE6 and everything is up and running.
conditional comments rock.
Bad idea. IE uses non-standard code. Make it work in FF first, then add the hacks with conditional statements for IE. That’s a better practice.
The actual problem with IE6 is, as someone already wrote, the corporations using Windows 2000. IE7 can’t be installed on it and why the IT admins wouldn’t want to install their co-workers Firefox or Opera is beyond me.
I am very disappointed to see that even the savetheDevelopers movement was killed by a powerful corporation…either that or they just gave up. For the last week the savethedevelopers.org and .com sites are pointing to Microsoft’s IE7 site.
Anybody know more on this subject?
Just ban IE altogether. It’s unsafe, much less compliant and slower than FF.
I am webmaster of a little hobby-vanity web site. About 50% of my traffic is IE6. I helped a 70 year chessplayer install FF3 and it further damaged his computer, which was already beat from IE6 security flaws. My point is: why bother trying to help these old ‘tards? They won’t thank you. They resent you. You don’t need IE6 users, you don’t want them. Forget ‘em, guys! In a few years these guys will be dead. Don’t complicate the issue of their ignorance.
Those statistics include us testing on IE6 for those still using it! Catch 22.
I did not read all the comments here, but i agree with the post. One problem is that many people will not deal with Microsoft for any updates. Myself included. I run an old xp box with IE6 , Firefox, Opera, Amaya and Avant browsers. Opera is ok, but not what it was years ago. and i have to run an old version on my xp box.
My view is that windows should come with a choice of browsers from the base install. Can you say Monopoly ? Yep, it is suppose to be against the law in the USA. If microsoft can’t do it right, the they should get out of the browser market.
http://www.ipet...ion/forbidMSIE/