CSS Support Could Be IE7's Weakest Link 575
Ritalin16 writes "Many web developers may be disappointed to hear that Microsoft decided to hold off on full CSS2 support with IE 7.0. As said by Microsoft-Watch: 'One partner said that Microsoft considers CSS2 to be a flawed standard and that the company is waiting for a later point release, such as CSS2.1 or CSS3, before throwing its complete support behind it.'" More commentary available from ZDNet. Generally related to the IE 7 Acid Test thrown down by Opera.
So... (Score:5, Insightful)
Spare Me (Score:5, Insightful)
Just like... (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh The Irony (Score:4, Insightful)
Certainly not slashdot, it seems. In fact, they don't seem to be adhering to any standards at all.
Funny how that open source superiority give slashcode cruddy HTML code and horrible, outdated design.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
So In Other Words... (Score:3, Insightful)
Boo... Sort of (Score:3, Insightful)
This is silly... (Score:5, Insightful)
I made it in firefox with no problems. Then, I looked at it in IE and it was terrible. If I code to standards why can't microsoft make their products support standards?
At this point, who cares? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why I hate developing webpages... (Score:3, Insightful)
Businesses are out to make money -- why would they care about technology? God.
Strategy from a Different Age (Score:5, Insightful)
Once upon a time, this would have worked. Take the emerging layout standard that doesn't use your bizarro extensions and strange layout tactics, decide not to support it, and force everyone who wants slick new layout features to write for either you or everyone else, or else write every page twice.
But I'm not so sure this is a good idea now. The fact is that more and more people are getting to the point that they would rather write for everyone but IE rather than just IE. I think falling behind on standards while steaming ahead with the next generation of crappy proprietary extensions just isn't going to work again. In fact, I think this might accellerate the death of IE.
Bottom line: bad move. The correct response to more competition is to compete, not to stick your fingers in your ears and scream "LA LA LA I'M NOT LISTENING!"
Re:Why I hate developing webpages... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Irony at it's best (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, it's really only "flawed" because MS doesn't control it...
Translation (Score:4, Insightful)
Someone should start an organization that publicly hands out awards to companies that severely hinder the progress of technology. Microsoft would win every year. The web has been held back for seven years now because IE won't properly support CSS2. That's like someone developing an improved version of gasoline that costs and pollutes less, and then none of the gas stations adopting it for close to a decade even though it's cheap and available. You look back and shake your head that all this time, people could have been saving money and polluting the air less and they have no idea.
The general public doesn't even realize the web would look and interact much better than it does now. We should have been visiting more advanced websites years ago. But the web still looks and functions the way it did in 2000, because the majority browser IE doesn't adopt technological progress. It's times like these I wish I was rich enough to run public service commercials that stated all this, just to inform people how they're being hindered without even knowing it.
Re:So... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So In Other Words... (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:Why I hate developing webpages... (Score:5, Insightful)
Designing pages for one particular Web browser is a bad idea
Using CSS2 and designing for the set of all browsers known to support most of CSS2 isn't "designing pages for one particular Web browser".
time to spend some karma (Score:4, Insightful)
Can we get the parent modded up? It's ridiculous for any employee of Slashdot to be criticizing anyone for their lack of support for web standards.
Please excuse my ignorance here (Score:3, Insightful)
Wouldn't supporting CSS 2.1 or CSS 3 imply support for CSS 2? These standards are backwards-compatible, right?
Re:So... (Score:4, Insightful)
The only reason Microsoft doesn't support CSS properly is that they don't OWN it. MSIE supporting CSS properly would be a massive step towards web interoperability, which is definately against what MS wants.
Re:Why I hate developing webpages... (Score:3, Insightful)
one question (Score:2, Insightful)
If Microsoft doesn't back CSS2 then CSS2 has no chance of becoming a standard.
Re:So... (Score:5, Insightful)
Is Microsoft seriously arguing that they've never thrown their weight behind an imperfect work-in-progress technology/standard before? Is the imperfectness of CSS2 made better by making IE render it improperly?
Now, I'm not trying to keep people from discussing the finer points of possible improvements to web-standards, but can't we all agree that it's better to have all browsers interpreting the same standards the same way?
Re:What does CSS2 give you that is needed? (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, hey Microsoft -- I say F*CK YOU right back (Score:5, Insightful)
Why single IE out on my invoices and proposols? To let companies know where that extra $2,000.00 went for 20-30 hours of my time. That's why. And in hopes that they will opt not to engage in that expenditure.
I'd urge all other UI designers and developers to do the same.
And if the client decides that they wish not to support IE, a small victory shall have been won.
It was fine 5-6 years ago to say "Ooops -- you're using that Netscape piece of shit, please come back using a real browser"
I say it's time we start doing this again, but for IE and for the exact same reasons.
Re:What does CSS2 give you that is needed? (Score:5, Insightful)
All that can be done with css, and its very easy to do. And all without any tables.
check out www.csszengarden.com or do some googles.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So... (Score:5, Insightful)
CSS 2 is clearly a flawed standard; it had pages of errata [w3.org], then CSS 2.1 got released as a maintenance release. You can't implement a standard fully when it isn't self-consistent.
The big problem was that, for once, the standards people were some way ahead of what was supported by the browsers. That's dangerous, because you really want at least two independent implementations of a standard to see if there is any ambiguity.
The problem is self-perpetuating. If you take the attitude of not starting on implementing a standard until it's finish, then you're providing no feedback to the standards process.
Re:Oh The Irony (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:So... (Score:2, Insightful)
width = width + margin, not content width = width - margin, as you would expect.
This makes layouts trickey.
Also, it's hard to properly layout dynamic content, say for instance: I want all members of class abc to be the same with, but that width is dynamic dependant on the content, or I want my page body to be the menu width away from the edge and I want the menu width to be the size of the largest entry + a 1em margin. No can do.
You should be able to use group sizes and reference other elements sizes in style sheets. Otherwise it's almost impossible to make a nice dynamically sizing website using CSS.
I smell male bovine fecal matter (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm guessing it, in some way, has to do with Market edge. More specifically, since a great deal of web sites design their pages to work with [flawed] MSIE rendering, all other browsers might be perceived as broken or inferior by the end user. "It worked fine under MSIE... let's just go back to it."
Essentially, I believe this demonstrates harm to the internet community at large and an effective hijacking of internet standards. Perhaps it would be considered a frivolous lawsuit in the end, but perhaps the W3C should file some sort of suit against Microsoft over the matter. It's the only thing that they and the public at large seems to understand really. "Why is Microsoft being sued again? Breaking the internet? Crap!"
Re:Flawed? (Score:4, Insightful)
myclass{
width = grouped
}
myclass2{
left = myclass.right
height = id.height
}
etc...
Re:IE7 & Google (Score:3, Insightful)
I submit that the unwashed masses would now prefer the former to the latter.
p
Re:Flawed? (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd agree to that. In fact, I find a lot of the positioning control a little hard to deal with, but I wonder if some of that might be the browser implementations rather than the standard itself. You know, sometimes I try to place something, and I'm pretty sure I've done it the right way, but it takes a hell of a lot of tweaking to get it to show up where I want it. That might be browser issues, but it might also be that I'm somehow confused by the standard and missing some detail of what I'm doing.
Just as an arbitrary illustration, I get sick of writing:
Personally, I think I'd end up getting *more* confused by your layout. Too many brackets, too much nesting. Maybe you're right that there's a better way, but I'm not sure what.
But I think you're right to refer to these issues as 'things you dislike' rather than flaws. I don't believe I'm arguing with you if I say that these are areas where CSS has room for improvement, but they aren't "flaws".
Re:This is silly... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:So... (Score:2, Insightful)
It doesn't conform to Microsoft's version of CSS. They believe that however IE does things, should be the standard. Otherwise, it's flawed.
Re:Why I hate developing webpages... (Score:2, Insightful)
You're rationalizing. Suppose IE gets down to 60% market share. Are you prepared to go back and fix all those non standards-compliant sites? It's much better to write to the standards to begin with.
The upshot of developing with Mozilla/Firefox, is that cross-browser compliance is a breeze. But if you develop your site with IE, then try to fix it for other browsers.. good luck!
Re:Why I hate developing webpages... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Wait till CSS2.1/3? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Well, hey Microsoft -- I say F*CK YOU right bac (Score:4, Insightful)
Kind Regards
Re:Oh The Irony (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:time to spend some karma (Score:3, Insightful)
we can, but MS can't (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know how many times I've read this statement from other people - "I like Firefox/Mozilla, but it doesn't render my bank/news/etc site correctly so I have to use IE." Or "I would use another browser but I support IE at work." A lot of people are stuck with IE because of its poor interoperability.
Now why would MS decide to spend money on extra development effort on a project that earns no revenue in order to increase interoperability, thereby incouraging web developers to fix their web sites so that competing browsers can render them correctly? This loses them both dollars and marketshare.
Re:Well, hey Microsoft -- I say F*CK YOU right bac (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:But it renders (Score:5, Insightful)
If a page doesn't adhere to standards, but renders well in popular browsers, what's the problem?
The problem, IMO, is that you don't know why or why not things render well.
By conforming to standards, you have a (debatably) clear set of rules that define certain behaviours. For example, you will know that if you want to have some number of pixels pad your elements, then you will not have to resort to ugly hacks [incutio.com] to get the same layout in BrowserX as you do in BroswerY. Why? Because each browser will reference the rules for adding the specified amount of padding to an element, in the right place, and in the right proportions.
By not supporting standards, you have a number of problems:
Imagine whipping up a simple page to test out a new design idea in your browser of choice. Everything looks good. Now you try to use it on your production page. Something looks wrong. Is it because you've included it in a tag that overrides your specifications? Is it because you've arranged it next to an element whose properties are spilling over into your space? Is it because you tested it inside of a tag, for which the specification holds, but have erroneously tried to apply it to a tag that does not support it? How will you know, unless your browser developers tell you -- assuming they know themselves?
For me, that's why CSS is useful. For the most part, it's pretty clear as to what things support what attributes.
Since your post was originally about Slashdot's (non-)adherence to CSS and other web standards, here's one major incentive to switch over: bandwidth [alistapart.com]. Does anyone really like throwing money away?
They've supported directX all these years. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:IE7 & Google (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Firefox rendering engine for ie (Score:2, Insightful)
But it IS flawed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Well, hey Microsoft -- I say F*CK YOU right bac (Score:2, Insightful)
I guess this explains why you think it's a good idea to snub customers.
In what way is he snubbing them?
As important as web standards are, cross-browser site compatibility is NOT the customer's problem to solve.
It becomes their problem when they have to pay extra to have a website that works in Internet Explorer. They have to pay extra because it's more work. It's more work because Internet Explorer is extremely deficient in a number of areas.
To give an analogy, let's say you were paying a moving company $2000 to move your stuff from Chicago to LA. Then they say that it will take a month instead of 2 weeks unless you pay $1500 extra because one of the stretches of highway is rough and doesn't have nice rest/gas stations. Are you going to start lobbying and writing to state officials for highway improvements or simply find another moving company?
If the analogy were accurate, the other moving companies would simply charge the extra without telling you why.
Other web developers don't magically take less time to work around Internet Explorer's problems just because they don't list it as a separate line item on the invoice.
I'd be happy to compete with the original poster for his business by using internally available and re-usable tools/techniques to solve the compatibility problems.
You can't solve the compatibility problems, only Microsoft can do that. Things like Dean Edwards' work goes a long way, but is dependent upon Javascript, which is unacceptable for many purposes.
Re:Why I hate developing webpages... (Score:2, Insightful)
I think you're overstating the case for browser differences in regards to emerging web technologies (XMLHttpRequest, etc.). At least 95% of today's web sites can easily be made cross browser compliant without resorting to the insanity of UserAgent sniffing.
By using a valid DOCTYPE, modern browsers will be placed into standards compliance mode. This will eliminate most rendering differences. Next, define CSS whitespace attributes for block level tags, which will eliminate any differences in spacing. For scripting, usage of getElementById and getElementsByTagName will allow cross-browser DHTML with few browser-specific hacks.
So you see, it's really not that hard to achive standards compliance. When I am forced to include some browser-specific code due to lack of standardization or differing implementations, I try to make it as generic as possible, and provide a fallback method.
we just need to do better marketting for browsers (Score:3, Insightful)
Heh (Score:5, Insightful)
*snip*
For a long time I've been trying to get a list that will appear like a table. You can make a list set them to display as inline. It works, but then you can not set a width, which then makes it useless.
I find it funny that the example you used to document CSS's failings is solved by a modification that you profess nobody needs.
The Web Industry Is Screwed Up (Score:3, Insightful)
Having spent the last couple MONTHS trying to get a Web site to:
1) Load external content using iframes or object tags in four different browsers;
2) use CSS to emulate frames in four different browsers (all current - forget about the older ones entirely);
it is clear to me that the Web industry is screwed up beyond all recognition.
Big surprise - it's a part of the IT industry...
First, the Web was never intended to be either an application platform or a desktop publishing platform - which seems to be what a lot of Web site designers and standards committees want to achieve.
Sorry, the technology simply isn't there in HTML, CSS and JavaScript to do this.
Second, the industry has as usual spent all of its time producing dozens of browsers - NONE of which support the standards in their ENTIRETY and ALL of which are incompatible with every other browser in existence in at least some respects.
Microsoft of course, as usual, is the worst offender. Web designers talk about the "IE factor" - the incompatibility and bugginess of IE with respect to virtually every standard which adds twenty percent or more to the development time for a Web site.
The industry has a LONG way to go to get the same functionality as client-server approaches to app implementation.
And as long as Microsoft is in the game, it ain't ever gonna happen.
My advice:
1) Stop trying to make your Web site FANCY (which is not the same as making it LOOK GOOD) and start trying to make it USEFUL to people.
2) If you want a "Web app", use other technology than HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
Re:we can, but MS can't (Score:2, Insightful)
The 'enlightened' internet browsing population isn't large enough to effect change in a reasonable timeframe. We need to recruit anyone we can...Just because they don't understand the issues doesn't mean they can't help.
10 print '$preferred_standards_compliant_browser is good'
20 print 'IE specific web pages are bad'
30 goto 10
-Ben
Re:"* html" hack (Score:3, Insightful)
Yuk! How about because it's unnecessary, unreliable, harder to maintain and extremely kludgy to boot?
Browser sniffing is the worst way of making web pages, the way that was favoured around the time of the dot-bomb. Instead of testing for actual abilities and using what is available, it relies on assumptions, which are often wrong. Why restrict something and say "sorry, your browser can't do that" when instead you can just do a general, easy test for it and use it if it's there?
The correct way to cope with the capabilities of different browsers is by using feature detection to weed out the ones that don't support things fully, and giving the more advanced stuff to the ones that do - entirely on the client side.
Browser sniffing based on user agent strings really needs to die the death it should have died many years ago. I suggest you buy a copy of Designing With Web Standards [zeldman.com] and get reading about the right way to do things.
More of the same (Score:2, Insightful)
This is exactly what we've seen time and time again.
1. a standard exists
2. good products support the standard
3. Microsoft creates their own proprietary "standard" and uses it instead
4. because IE has the largest marketshare, websites are designed to render properly on IE
5. customers try a standards-compliant product, only to find that their sites don't render 'properly'
This is deliberate anticompetetive behavior, plain and simple.