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Confessions of a Web Developer

Posts tagged with "msie"

Browser Discrimination hits IE7

Thursday, 21. September 2006, 00:18:01

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I just read an interesting post from Microsoft's Internet Explorer team on The IE7 User-Agent String. This statement in particular illustrates a problem not unfamiliar to Opera users:
There are a few remaining sites which fail to recognize IE7 because they are performing exact string matches to look for specific IE version strings. Those checks will need to be removed or updated to accommodate IE7.

Yes, you read that correctly: there are websites out there using bad browser sniffing code which will send the wrong code to Internet Explorer 7. In fact, they go on to say that they've released a tool which will let IE7 pretend to be IE6!
To enable you to workaround any remaining sites that block access to Internet Explorer 7, we developed the User Agent String Utility. The utility comes in the form of a small executable that opens an IE7 instance that sends the IE6 user agent string. It also provides a mechanism for you to report problem web sites to Microsoft so that we can follow up with the affected site owners.

I'll admit to a certain amount of schadenfreude, but it also points up just how bad a strategy browser sniffing can be when done thoughtlessly: It effectively builds an expiration date into your website after which even the browser you designed it for will run into problems.

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Know Your Enemy

Monday, 15. May 2006, 22:21:52

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There's a lot of misinformation out there about various browsers. Opera can/can't do this. Firefox can/can't do that. There's only so much you can do to promote one product when you only know rumors or outdated facts about another.

If someone told you that Firefox was better than Opera because it doesn't have ads, you wouldn't take them seriously. You'd know the ads have been gone since last year, and you'd wonder what else they have wrong. Similarly, you won't convince a Firefox user that Opera is better because you can reorder tabs (you can, starting in Firefox 1.5). And you won't convince an IE fan that Opera is better because of tabs and a built-in search box because they'll tell you that IE7 has both.

When you're trying to convince someone that X is better than Y, and they know Y very well, you'd better know Y well enough not to make statements that the other person knows are false. When you do, you'll lose credibility, and the rest of your argument -- the part you do know well -- will suffer for it. (I suspect a lot of software flame wars get started this way!)

So here's my suggestion: If you want to promote Opera, go and download Firefox 1.5 and (if your OS will run it) the IE7 beta. If you're on a Mac, fire up Safari. Mess around with them enough that you're familiar with how they work, what you can do with them, and how they handle your favorite web pages. That way the next time you face an IE fan (to the extent that IE has fans), or a Firefox fan, or a Safari fan, you'll be armed with accurate information.

As for the post title -- I don't think it's necessary for the major browsers to be enemies. I think there's plenty of room for cordial competition rather than a cutthroat struggle. But "Know Your Enemy" is a better attention-getter than "Familiarize yourself with the competition." :wink:

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