housingmaps.com- Ideal handling of browser checking
By Eddie. Thursday, 29. September 2005, 16:13:39
A great service mixing google maps with craigslist: http://www.housingmaps.com/
But what I wanted to point out is the homepage. At least- the homepage that saw. There is a browser warming page that I got because I use Opera. The creator handles it pretty well I thought. In a nutshell (meaning- these are my own words), I got a
Hey- we've tested with all these browsers here: <lists them>.
Your's is different. Here's how to get one we've tested with...<link>
But if you still want to try it out- here's a link in. We can't promise anything though.
It's that last part that I really thought stood out... the "you've been warned, but if you want to try anyway..." type of link that is all too absent from websites. Mostly when I use Opera- I get "this browser is insecure- use IE instead" and I'm not permitted to go any further (without changing agent ID or spoofing of some sort). I understand that site creators don't want or need to test with every single version of every single browser on every single version of every single OS- but I'd be fine with telling me what you do test with and giving me a clear warning that you don't promise success with the tools I'm using- but still give me the choice. Often (no mostly.... no...almost always) I can get the job done just fine with Opera. Kudos to this site for letting me try.
Here's what I sent the creator:
...thank you for at least putting the option to let me try your service in Opera. I get REALLY mad when sites don't let me take the chance... Sometimes, there is a limitation with Opera (not full AJAX support)- but most often its simply because sites don't want to think about anything other than IE, and one or both Netscape/FireFox.
I understand that nobody wants to test in 100 browsers that less than 1% of people use. But at least let me have the option to try your site with my browser. You do a fine job of that- your main page is exactly what sites should do.
WIDGETIZE