Browser-incompatibility: lazy author?
Tuesday, 13. March 2007, 12:19:03
My day job involves creating web applications (and related stuff like business consultancy, information analysis, and education). One of our solutions is a CMS manufactured by a third company. This CMS is based upon Microsoft Windows technology, so guess with how many browsers its Control Panels are compatible?
Yes, a rhetorical question.
To enter a new article, an Editor needs to open the Editor Control Panel. It features a wysiwig content editor, not unlike the one I'm using right now to add this post. With one major difference: it's based on the MS HTML Editor object. When the system's architect or initial implementor made that choice, they severely limited the potential of their editor to whatever functionality Microsoft decides to offer.
Then people like me start using the CMS and ask: why doesn't this work in my browser of choice? Why do you force me to use Microsoft's browser? Inevitably, the incompatibility issue is raised, but when we dig deeper, at the heart of the matter we find a different issue.
No, the CMS programmers aren't lazy. They also aren't stupid: mostly, they know what they're doing. They know their system is limited. But their hands are tied by their managers, who decided to invest in Microsoft technology.
Why is this important? Because of the steep learning curve most Microsoft technology imposes. After spending thousands of hours and buckloads of money on creating something that finally works kind-of appropriately in a Microsoft realm, management fears that supporting a different realm requires a similar investment. That steers the problem away from technology and usability, and into commerce.
We can recognise a similar process in the minds of web authors. After spending hours, days, weeks, to get their web site to work in the world's most used browser, they fear that supporting any other browser requires an equal investment, thus they cop out and label their site "best viewed with..."
This isn't laziness. Instead, it's an unbalanced r.o.i. They might even recognise the problem, and still choose to continue, because they know no other way. They're stuck.
How can we overcome this problem? A highway allows cars of any brand to use it, then why limit the brands on the information super-highway? Can we convince the people who make the investment decisions that leaning on any technology vendor this much, results in loss of potential clients, and thus loss of profit?
Yes, a rhetorical question.
To enter a new article, an Editor needs to open the Editor Control Panel. It features a wysiwig content editor, not unlike the one I'm using right now to add this post. With one major difference: it's based on the MS HTML Editor object. When the system's architect or initial implementor made that choice, they severely limited the potential of their editor to whatever functionality Microsoft decides to offer.
Then people like me start using the CMS and ask: why doesn't this work in my browser of choice? Why do you force me to use Microsoft's browser? Inevitably, the incompatibility issue is raised, but when we dig deeper, at the heart of the matter we find a different issue.
No, the CMS programmers aren't lazy. They also aren't stupid: mostly, they know what they're doing. They know their system is limited. But their hands are tied by their managers, who decided to invest in Microsoft technology.
Why is this important? Because of the steep learning curve most Microsoft technology imposes. After spending thousands of hours and buckloads of money on creating something that finally works kind-of appropriately in a Microsoft realm, management fears that supporting a different realm requires a similar investment. That steers the problem away from technology and usability, and into commerce.
We can recognise a similar process in the minds of web authors. After spending hours, days, weeks, to get their web site to work in the world's most used browser, they fear that supporting any other browser requires an equal investment, thus they cop out and label their site "best viewed with..."
This isn't laziness. Instead, it's an unbalanced r.o.i. They might even recognise the problem, and still choose to continue, because they know no other way. They're stuck.
How can we overcome this problem? A highway allows cars of any brand to use it, then why limit the brands on the information super-highway? Can we convince the people who make the investment decisions that leaning on any technology vendor this much, results in loss of potential clients, and thus loss of profit?
WIDGETIZE
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