"Standard" browsers?

[Geoff Hart]

Missed the start of the thread, but it seems to have been Sean  
Brierly who observed: <<We have trouble getting all our customers to  
use one approved version of a single browser, so getting them  
individually to download and install the patch from Microsoft is  
unlikely to succeed. Maybe your customers are better.>>

I'm appalled by the corporate arrogance (not Sean's!) that assumes  
everyone will change their computers or software to accomodate the  
company's browser preference. It's not rocket science to design Web  
pages for compatibility across all browsers -- provided you stick to  
the core tools and avoid all the fancy bells and whistles that are  
generally not necessary.

Yesterday I was investigating the upgrade eligibility requirements  
for Adobe Creative Suite CS3 -- and I couldn't even open that page.  
So far as I can tell, that's because the link pointed to a Flash  
file, and my browser (Safari) wouldn't load the file. (Yes, I have  
the Flash player installed and activated, and I was using the  
Macintosh page -- which you'd think Adobe would have tested on a  
Mac.) In what world does that make sense?

David Neeley responded: <<I respectfully take issue with this  
attitude on the part of so many companies, who seek to dictate what  
browser people use.>>

I disrespectfully take issue with this attitude. <g> It's nonsense,  
and it's time we stopped standing still and accepting it. I have  
occasionally written to a company's Webmaster and explained in words  
of two syllables or less <g> that I was taking my business elsewhere  
until they created a Web site I could use. If we all did that, every  
time, things would change. I'm as guilty as the next person for not  
complaining as often as I should.

<<I also have a hearty dislike for folks who produce browser-specific  
sites, using non-standard functionality of a browser...usually IE.>>

IE is a particularly poor choice because it's an ongoing security  
disaster, and "many"* companies have uninstalled it from their  
computers for precisely that reason. And designing based on IE  
remains a poor choice because Microsoft will have no incentive to  
clean up its act until people refuse to use its nonstandard  
functionality and start designing for standards-compliant browsers.  
If you're going to standardize, use Firefox. Better still, omit all  
nonstandard functionality. If you've got to depart from the  
standards, at least use Java so that it will be semi-standard across  
all browsers and platforms.

* No hard statistics, just anecdotal evidence, but I'd be curious to  
learn the actual numbers.

We rarely have any say in what our own Web designers implement, but  
by no means should we remain silent when they make boneheaded  
decisions. Someone has to stand up for the poor users of our product,  
and by doing so, we may save our employer considerable grief in future.


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-- Geoff Hart
ghart at videotron.ca / geoffhart at mac.com
www.geoff-hart.com
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Coming soon:  _Effective onscreen editing_ (http://www.geoff-hart.com/ 
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