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Windows Operating Systems Software Internet Explorer The Internet

How to Avoid IE-Specific WWW Development? 100

Posted by Cliff from the avoiding-developer-lock-in dept.
IE-less asks: "Can any Slashdot readers help me gather evidence to support the notion that developing an IE-specific WWW site is a bad thing? A state-level US-gov't organization we are contracted with (hence the anonymity) is about to embark on converting a Citrix-based application to a browser-based application, but in order to do so will make it IE Only. Our repeated screams of, 'No! Consider the standards!' have fallen on deaf ears. One of the few things we have found that helps is the Department of Homeland Security's recommendation that people switch browsers (look for 'Use another browser') care of the Get Firefox site. That's the sort of comment that makes people pay attention. The departments in question do not care about monopolies, non-Windows users, closed source expenses, etc. They will pay attention, though, to statements from powerful sources...such as the aforementioned. Anyone else find anything that works?"
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How to Avoid IE-Specific WWW Development? More

How to Avoid IE-Specific WWW Development?

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  • well.. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by SocialEngineer ( 673690 ) <invertedpanda.gmail@com> on Saturday August 13, 2005 @06:38PM (#13313427) Homepage
    One argument I always give for my fellow developers is that standards compliance means your website will work for a lot longer if you adhere to the standards currently in place.. Who says MS is always going to support their IE-specific code? IE7 is supposedly going to have better standardization, which is going to take a lot of work on their part. Browsers have more reasons to adhere to standards that are in place, rather than their own specific little extras they came up with back in the day, which developers are pushing against..
    • And the best argument of all:

      We're a government agency and we should be accessible to everyone. If we require MSIE, that means we require that someone have Windows, which is expensive. Not only is it an "endorsement", but it sets an entry-level for a lot of users who may not have or want to spend the money on Windows/IE.

      Not to mention that a significant percentage of people don't use IE these days.

      • Re:well.. (Score:5, Interesting)

        by cloak42 ( 620230 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @10:40AM (#13316253) Homepage
        The biggest reason I'd use is the lawsuit argument. IE is a horrible browser for disabled persons (screen readers, for example, have a great deal of trouble with IE, I've heard). As a government agency, they're required to give equal access to all people, and by making it IE only, they're limiting access to a government resource. That's just waiting for a lawsuit to happen.
  • Well, for one, they will understand that vendor lock-in is bad.
    So, let them know that what they are doing is essentially the same and creating a solution based on standards would create less pain if a transition would occur.
    • Well, for one, they will understand that vendor lock-in is bad.

      Asker already said customer doesn't care about monopolies et al. They will understand that vendor lock-in is bad, but won't care. Look at all the Java and .Net projects going on. PHB's don't care about single-source lock-in.
      • The answer is simple. Convince a decision maker that they would like to use Firefox. Sell it to them on the shiny skin and the gee-whiz functionality. Don't mention web development at all.

        Then, once they use it for themselves, they'll care about the fact that they need to go back to IE and throw their weight behind vendor-neutral apps.

        Self-centered people need selfish motivations.
    • Of course vender lockin is bad. But at least with the Air Force (my employer), that's the way it is, they have standardized on Microsoft, there is nothing anyone can do about it, so it doesn't make any sense to concern myself with browser nutral apps. We use IE. That's it. So, I develop apps based on using the non-standard MS technology, to do anything else would be silly. I think for the story submitter, this is the situation, so it makes little sense for him/her to bother thinking about it.

      Anyway, you st

  • What department it might be? The IRS???

  • AJAX (Score:5, Insightful)

    by pokka ( 557695 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @06:42PM (#13313446)
    Well, you could simply explain that client-side scripting has matured in modern browsers over the last five years or so, and therefore it's much easier to develop an application that works consistently with modern browsers. Point them to articles about AJAX (such as this one [adaptivepath.com]) and explain that it's becoming the rule, rather than the exception. You could point out that most modern web apps (such as almost everything Google develops) use the technologies mentioned above and work well with almost any modern, standards-compliant browser.
    • Google apps don't work well with my Konqueror 3.4.1.
    • JavaScript/ECMAScript is a huge gaping security hole in your browser.
      Nine out of ten serious security advisories[1] are due to problems with scripting (and the temporary workaround until a fix is issued is frequently "disable JavaScript").
      Any person who is serious about security will disable all browser scripting.
      If a site insists that scripting be enabled in order to browse it, well then, I just won't browse it.
      Instead, I'll go to some other site that doesn't demand that I compromise my system's security.

      [
      • Sorry for replying to my own post, but I just want to clarify that I am not against server-side scripting, where the environment is more tightly controlled; it's client-side scripting that I oppose.
        Also, I have no objection if a site wants to cater to those who are not as security-concious as I, as long as they include <noscript> sections that provide similar functionality to the <script> sections.
        • It's all very well to say "do it without scripts", but in practice, as web applications get more complex using client side scripting gives developers the opportunity to make the user interface much more useful, more efficient and much more pleasant to use. Take gmail for example, without javascript it would be much, much, much less pleasant to use, constant back and forth to the server, google would be serving hundreds of times more bandwidth, everything would be much slower - but with scripting, well, you

          • Anybody who requires javascript for LINKS to work deserves a serious kicking

            I'd second that. The worst pages I've seen have used javascript to poke values into form variables during the submit process. How stupid is it when the form has a field called txtUsernameView and a hidden field called txtUsername, and while submitting, it copies the visible field to the hidden field while left-padding with zeroes?? Like that couldn't possibly be handled on the server side... And other forms that have no actio

    • Re:AJAX (Score:5, Insightful)

      by WebCrapper ( 667046 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @04:53AM (#13315356)
      The main problem is that the government uses IE on almost every single computer on their network. You're lucky to get other types of browsers anywhere in the gov. On top of that, you're even luckier to get your home computer to connect to something that is even half important to anything...

      They get discounts on MSFT products, therefor use IE specific development programs (IE: Word/Frontpage).

      Now, on the other side of things, I have started seeing a move in GS postings towards Handwritting code and using non-Frontpage programs like Dreamweaver.
    • If you're working for rednecks stupid enough to want to do an IE-only site (especially government rednecks), it might not be entirely politic to use Germany and France as an example.

      Finland they've probably not heard of.

      Say something like "the terrorists use Windows--should you?" Be sure to pronounce it "terry-wrists".

  • Americans with Disabilities Act (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Clueless Moron ( 548336 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @06:47PM (#13313469)
    Stick that in their stupid faces: If it won't work with lynx, it ain't no good.

    I really like that Act, not because I'm disabled, but because it forces MORON web designers to actually write web pages to be media-neutral, which was the entire goddamned point of the web to begin with.

    I use Firefox, IE, Opera on my 640x480 Zaurus, lynx when I'm ssh'ing, and on occasion I even google via my cellphone. Sites like BBC really shine there. Even slashdot works out as long as you use the "light" rendering option.

    • Re:Americans with Disabilities Act (Score:5, Informative)

      by c ( 8461 ) <beauregardcp@gmail.com> on Saturday August 13, 2005 @07:51PM (#13313663)
      I really like that Act, not because I'm disabled, but because it forces MORON web designers to actually write web pages to be media-neutral


      Amen to that. The Canadian government has a set of web guidelines which, among other things, say:

      • meet W3C Accessibility guidelines level 1 and 2
      • W3C formats are primary. Sure, go ahead and post that Word document, but the primary format has to be an accessible HTML doc.
      • if you do anything with JavaScript, there's gotta be a non-JavaScript implementation too. None of that onClick instead of href crap.

      I couldn't even begin to count the number of times I've been able to shoot something down because of CLF compliancy issues.


      c.

    • Constructing an accessible website is not the same as making sure the website works with Lynx. Two of the most popular browsers used by blind surfers are IBM Homepage Reader and JAWS. Both of these are built on top of Internet Explorer.

      • Well, sure.

        But you have to ask, what non-standard features are giving the decision makers a hard-on for IE7? The bottom line is that to make anything really useable to disabled users, you need to do a good job separating content and presentation. Once you've done that, even if you've lost the browser fight, it's a lot easier to update the UI later for standards compliance.

        Contemplating this should also dispel the illusion that you can just sketch the system in an IDE then push a button to magically depl
  • The departments in question do not care about [...] non-Windows users

    Any particular reason? Do they know that all their clients will be using IE? IE usage in the wild is only at about 85% these days and will probably decrease in the future.
    • "IE usage in the wild is only at about 85% these days and will probably decrease in the future."

      ...and in nerdy websites IE comes second or very close to Firefox. That's what the statistics from my site [wikinerds.org] show.

    • Any particular reason? Do they know that all their clients will be using IE? IE usage in the wild is only at about 85% these days and will probably decrease in the future.

      Some organizations with the US Department of Defence are very unlikely to change, and have standardized on particular platforms whether they make technological sense or not. Very often going up against that kind of bureaucracy is a battle that few can win, including heavy hitters like SAIC.

      In cases like this it is a known fact that a

  • simple... (Score:4, Informative)

    by polyp2000 ( 444682 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @06:58PM (#13313501) Homepage Journal
    Cite W3C standards. Considering your client is a government one I would imagine that standards compliancy is of the uppermost importance. I work as a web developer in the UK and a couple of our clients are goverment bodies. They have in place the reqirement to adhere to standards such as W3C and bobby compliancy and accessibility such as screen readers etc. If we were to produce an IE only web application the chances are it would fail on all those points.

    Personally I think that the cases as I have outlined above are paramount for your situation. You need to point out the reasons why what they are doing is not the best idea. If you are working for a government organisation it is your duty to think about everyone no matter what operating system or browser thet are using.

    If your application is rendered useless to anyone (within reason) then you are doing the wrong thing. Regardless of what technologies you are using it would be wrong for a governmental institution to do this.

    • They have in place the reqirement to adhere to standards such as W3C and bobby compliancy

      That's a lousy idea. Bobby is only a tool, not a specification. When you write your pages according to Bobby, all you end up with is a page that jumps through the hoops Bobby has laid out for it. It has a history of making recommendations that actually decrease the accessibility of the pages being tested, e.g. I think at one time it complained about empty alt attributes, thereby encouraging authors to put in

      • I agree somewhat. We use it however if our clients state its requirement. It is however always the last test in the chain. Getting W3C passes being the first.Bobby checks are always an annoyance and a lot of its checks are a matter of opinion.

        Also if you make good use of CSS, use "div" tags instead of tables where possible you can largely eliminate the need for spurious alt and title parameters. Its always a good idea to populate "alt" and "title" parameters. anyway it saves going back later when doing your
  • There's very little you can do with IE6 that you can't easily do with Mozilla, Opera, Konqueror, and Safari without difficulty. Cross browser development used to be a burden, but that was like like 6+ years ago. The development speed advantage to only supporting one browser is minimal, and is quickly eaten away if/when you change your mind.
  • Because if you're in Texas or Washington, you can bet that MSFT products will dominate the decision makers.

     
    • I understand Washington, but why Texas?
    • Heh... odlly enough, I was the web developer at the Microsoft Health Club where 98% of MS employees have memberships including Steve B. and I convinced them to run on Apache, MySQL and PHP (they refused to allow LInux).

      And in fact, the market is changing up here to the point that LAMP developers are a commodity and in high demand; I usually only have to interview with one to two other people for positions.

      The market IS changing even in the land of Microsoft.
  • How do they intend to make it IE-only? Other than ActiveX or some freaky javascript, I fail to see how you could make a website IE-only. Code to standards, and it should work in any browser. I'm not sure why you even have to tell them it's standards compliant. Stick to standards, develop with whatever browser you want, and deliver.
    • Aren't there some proprietary CRM systems out there that do exactly that (ActiveX and freaky Javascript)? This could be what the OP was talking about. His work will likely be to customize a package (probably closed source) that has been developed exclusively to live on IIS and run on IE.

      Once a slick salesman convinces the PHB of a particular solution, it gets difficult to change his mind.
    • I use a time sheet web application that will only work with IE on Windows. IE on the Mac isn't "good enough". I don't know how they made it so picky about web browsers. It's a pain in the neck to have to find a Windows box with IE every time I need to update my time sheet.

    • Re:How? (Score:3, Informative)

      by Asprin ( 545477 )

      Three words: XML Data Islands.

      For those not in the know, they're an IE-only way of appending data to the end of the HTML doc and the using DOM and javascript to use that data to fill in form fields in the document. If you remember typing in BASIC programs from magazines in the 80's, it's a lot like the BASIC READ...DATA statement combo, or you can think of it like a really slick hack for doing an XML stylesheet transformation without using XSLT. (In both cases, XML data + Form layout produce HTML, but d
    • Not coding to standards is the main cause of web sites not working in different browsers. Usually this is done by someone who doesn't really know how to properly create a site but just keeps messing with the code until they get it the way they want in their own browser (usually IE). They don't bother to test it in other browsers and are not even aware of how badly it performs.
    • Here's how;
      1. make a presentation in Powerpoint,
      2. save as html,
      3. post as a webpage,
      4. browse with anything other than IE and see almost nothing!

  • You might want to consider accessibility. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Artega VH ( 739847 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @07:32PM (#13313611) Journal
    While its possible that your state level government doesn't need to comply there are several laws and policies in the US that could possibly apply and at least would make people listen:

    w3.org has the list at:
    http://www.w3.org/WAI/Policy/ [w3.org]

    Don't try to appear to be on a moral crusade against MS and IE. But hopefully once the lawyers sniff out that there could be potential hassles from building a website in a non-accessible/standards based manner the development process will be forced to change fairly quickly.

  • What are the requirements? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Kaenneth ( 82978 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @08:32PM (#13313801) Journal
    What about the application would make it IE specific? active X controls?, or using the Browser object as a control? needs a recent feature, that is implented differently?

    Is it simply a means to control costs? the testing and bug fixing time would be much greater if multiple platforms are supported, and for an internal application, where the client is under their control, I can't think of a good business reason not to use the browser that comes with the PC's. Do the PC's even have access to the internet to be vulnerable to attacks?

    Firefox is not bug free, for example, if I mouse over to the scrollbar in the text edit box, the left edge of the thumb gets filled with random pixels, this happens on both Windows 98, XP and Linux/KDE for me. Randomly scrambled pixels is not a good sign. Also the more amusing case of the installer saying something like "click 'Next' to continue", when the button was labeled 'Proceed', I forget the exact words, but if the software isn't consistant in a single window, it dosn't install a sense of confidance.

    Some applications just don't work within the standards; as far as I can tell, there is no mechanism in HTML, CSS or SVG to rotate characters in a font. Which is something I needed to do in a web application recently. (I ended up sending .PNG's of the text)

    I was asked the other day how computers store numbers, and ended up describing fixed vs. floating point, decimal, binary, hexidecimal, COBOL, bc, little endian, big endian, how to do basic math in binary, char/int, signed vs unsigned, wraparound, fibonucci...

    Different solutions for different applications.

    as the saying goes, "The nice thing about Standards is that there are so many to choose from."
    • Is it simply a means to control costs? the testing and bug fixing time would be much greater if multiple platforms are supported

      Actually depends. My experience shows that when you use IE as development browser (and are clueless about standards) it takes later significantly more time to get this working in Firefox.
      But using Firefox (forces standards on you) as dev browser means you probably get it working in IE later with almost no additional time.
      And since Firefox javascript debugging capabilities and
      • If the pages are not for public consumption, but rather an internal tool, keeping costs down for something that might be used by under 100 people in it's lifetime might be the way to go.

        for a public website, not testing multiple platforms would be just stupid. but that dosn't sound like what is being developed here.

  • MSIE-only US Copyright Office? Say No! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by wikinerd ( 809585 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @09:08PM (#13313919) Journal
    The US Copyright Office asks whether we would have any problem if we were required to use Microsoft Internet Explorer in order to pre-register a work. I sent them an email explaining why this would be a bad thing. Please help me prevent an MSIE-only US Copyright Office website by sending them your views on this issue. Together with more information and links about this issue, you can find my letter on my blog [wikinerds.org] and use it as a base for your letter. The government of Norway recently embraced open formats, it would be a pity to see US government sites to require MSIE!

  • What's the Point? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by bill_mcgonigle ( 4333 ) * on Saturday August 13, 2005 @10:12PM (#13314202) Homepage Journal
    So, if you're on Windows, and you're going to require IE, hence require Windows XP, why in the world would you write a web app?

    Write a fat-client app. The Web plays weak second fiddle to a Rich Client UI, even on Windows.

    The point of web apps are portability, so if you're doing to dash portability, don't write a web app.

    I know, somebody will say, "so you don't have to install any software". Yeah, right, this is being deployed on an Active Directory network with client management and login scripts and full control over the clients.
    • the point of web apps are portability, so if you're doing to dash portability, don't write a web app.
      No. THey're currently using Citrix, and for a reason (most organizations who use citrix use it because of this reason): your fat client app works on any system where citrix runs on. No client-side crap, conflicts with dll's etc.

      A webapp simplifies this: no more citrix installations, the browser is already there. This means even less maintenance for sysadmins as no installation crap on the client has to take
      • It's really not hard to develop and deploy a client app, especially in an AD environment. Really. Sure, theres issues - but these things have been known about for 10 years or more and are solved problems. In an intranet where you control the client machines (exactly the reason people excuse using IE), theres not even any serious concerns about DLL conflicts or versioning.

        Theres all kinds of reasons why "web apps" are stupid. They're highly suited for some specific areas (reporting is an obvious one), and t

  • Expenses (Score:4, Insightful)

    by photon317 ( 208409 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @10:21PM (#13314240)

    The departments in question do not care about monopolies, non-Windows users, closed source expenses, etc.



    Perhaps they should start caring about the expenses. It's our damn tax dollars they're blowing.
    • Perhaps you should tell them about future maintenance costs: revising or rewriting everything with each new IE release (at least with IE7 that is supposed to "break things" by partially following standards). Then about the cost of making the system accessible, and rewirting it from time to time when regulations about "what is accessible" change. Then about possible legal costs because of not being accessible. Or because of having to provide alternative way to get the info to non-M$ customers (such as manual

      • "Is there a partnership between the US government and M$? Are US citizens required to also be M$ customers? "

        Well, who really knows? [pcworld.com]

        ..."Among computer and Internet companies, Microsoft, through its PAC and employees, is the largest contributor during the 2004 election cycle. The software giant's employees and PAC have donated nearly $1.9 million to federal candidates or political groups. Microsoft's donations more than triple those of any other tech company, according to Opensecrets.org.

        Microsoft's

  • Look at existing logs (Score:4, Insightful)

    by dreamer-of-rules ( 794070 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @10:59PM (#13314387)
    Look at existing logs from their website, or similar (friendly) websites. If they are building for a controlled audience (their employees), then they can do whatever works.

    However, if the logs show access from non-IE browsers, then they have to justify why they are refusing to serve those people.

    Good luck.
  • We recently did a project for a company, and we simply said "It doesn't cost any more to support the top two browsers than IE alone". We write the code on Firefox, and then run our full test passes on IE. Our experience has been that only a few minor issues will crop up, even when writing lots of Javascript. Once you understand the few important differences, you should be able to write apps for both platforms with virtually no extra effort. For the record, the app we wrote was AJAX, so it was a non-triv

  • Simple solution: Don't tell them. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MobyDisk ( 75490 ) on Saturday August 13, 2005 @11:17PM (#13314458) Homepage
    Management doesn't need to know details about standards and compatibility and such. Just make it work on both browsers. I highly doubt that the business requirements for your project say "Req 43z: Make sure the product does not work on Mozilla, Opera, or Lynx." :-)

    If your development team wants it to be cross-browser compatible, then just make it so. If your development team doesn't know about standards or doesn't care, then I might start looking for another job because the product is doomed anyway.

    My experience is that development teams tend to use a mix of browsers, so unless they are total newbs they make it work with what they've got, in addition to what management wants. There's nothing insubordinate about that. It's good design and it is planning ahead. So don't fret, just make it work.
  • Are you the contractor? Then just do it! Make the application browser neutral! It's a no brainer. I seriously doubt your contract will have anything to forbid cross-browser functionality. So make sure the site/app works 100% in IE, then make it work in Opera, Safari, Konqueror, etc.

    There's a world of difference between "Must work with IE" and "must work only with IE." Yes, I know that sounds blasphemous to most web developers, but it's true.

    p.s. If, however, they are deliberately specifying that it must not
    • If you are a contractor, and your contract states to make it IE-only, then you should do as you are told and contracted to. Voice your opinion on why this is a bad thing, why you are against it, and why it should be cross-browser, but don't hurl yourself overboard.

      Don't, under any circumstance, deviate from what your contract states - if it states IE-only, make it IE-only. Do an insanely supurb job on making it IE-only. Make them remember you for it, but provide commentary in the code where IE-only stuff is

      • If you are a contractor, and your contract states to make it IE-only, then you should do as you are told and contracted to.

        My point is that the contract in all probability does NOT state that. Rather, it probably says "IE support only," which is a much different thing.

        And since adding support for Industry Standards(tm) (HTML/CSS) ought to be your *starting* point, getting the site to work with all standards conforming browsers (Firefox, Konqueror, Opera, Safari, etc) should be a no-brainer.

        If you are a cont
        • My point is that the contract in all probability does NOT state that. Rather, it probably says "IE support only," which is a much different thing.

          I agree with you there, it likely doesn't state "IE-only" - but if it did, and after I (if I was a contractor) told them why it was a bad idea, they still insisted on IE-only - then they will get what they want. That is their spec, and I could be fired (at best) or sued (at worst) for not designing and coding to the spec (they could claim that I was doing extra w

      • if it states IE-only, make it IE-only.

        if ($User_Agent != "IE") {
        print "<html><head></head><body>your bowser isn't supported</body></html>";
        exit();
        } else {
        $title = "Welcome to clueless.gov!";
        }

        Then later when they pull their heads out of their asses under court order; you can charge them a thousand bucks to upgrade the site for non-IE browsers by yanking 4 lines of code out of a php or asp file and spending a month testing what you all ready know

  • Appeal to their sense of self-preservation... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by constantnormal ( 512494 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @12:01AM (#13314675)
    Go ahead and compile the list of impressive references that say why you shouldn't chain yourself to IE.

    And throw in some references to companies or organization's that have successfully abandoned IE.

    It would be nice to see if IBM or your favorite local contractor will give you a quote for software support of Firefox/Mozilla/Opera/etc (I'm sure they will), just so you can prove that support IS available. The cost doesn't matter, just the proof that support exists.

    But be sure to wrap it all in an obsequious concern for the reader's well-being...

    "Sir, there's some rumors of a nasty goomba-virus out there, and what with all these references about how bad IE is, well, I'm just concerned that the senior management might take it poorly if they found out that we had committed to use IE in the face of all this, if we should spend a lot of money recovering from it, like we did for that Code Red thing, or the XYZ worm, that is. I just wanted to make sure you had all the information so you could support your decision should any questions be raised down the road, sir..."

    Self-preservation is the only currency one has with pointy-headed management...
  • That if you don't make it fully standards compliant you are screwing over disabled people, especially those who use screen readers to browse the web. I don't know what the laws are like where you are but government organisations in Australia MUST make their websites fully compliant with the w3c. I assume you don't have any such laws where you are at the moment (or else standards compliance would probably be part of the contract), so a demonstration of how a non-compliant site sounds in a screen reader comp

  • Assuming that it is the use of Active X that will make the planned approach IE-only (and there isn't much else it could be), I would point out that Active X is an enormous security problem. State agencies that don't care about standards, lock-in, and non MS Windows users may well care about security.

  • You dont need any high profile announcements or other such declarations to convince them, just point them to this info:
    1. The only thing they can use to make an IE only web application is ActiveX and tell them how vulnerable THAT is. You can use Secunia [secunia.com] for that. The last thing they would want is government computer security being compromised by a script kiddie who has just enough skill to navigate BugTraq [bugtraq.org]
    2. If in the future they wish to move to a non-Microsoft or even a non-Windows platform, they would exper
  • If this is a public site tell us what agency in what state and we will arrange for them and the legislators they work for to hear from voters.

  • Rehabilitation Act (Score:4, Insightful)

    by tiny69 ( 34486 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @07:20AM (#13315640) Homepage Journal
    Mention that the new web app would violate the Rehabilitation Act and deny those with disabilities from being able to access the information.

    http://www.access-board.gov/508.htm [access-board.gov]

    Any mention of breaking the law and violating the rights of those with disabilities will get the attention of any decision maker. (Think lawsuits!!!)

  • Accessbility is your friend (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Dracos ( 107777 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @11:48AM (#13316522)

    All federal, state, and local government websites are required to comply with section 508 of the Americans With Disabilities Act.

    Developing an IE-only web application makes this compliance impossible.

  • Tell them that any preferential treatment of a particular class or category of users (only users who own a copy of IE) is considered discrimination. Maybe Apple/Linux/etc. users should/would submit a lawsuit of their own, considering how their own government is discriminating against them. The only way to avoid a lawsuit is to follow agreed upon web standards. This lawsuit can easily be won be a first year law student, let alone by all of the professional lawyers that would come out of the woodwork.

    • Tell them that any preferential treatment of a particular class or category of users (only users who own a copy of IE) is considered discrimination.

      That's just like saying that most private companies that release a Macintosh software product (e.g. MacFixer, a computer diagnostic program for the Macintosh) would be discriminating against other users that use things like an Amiga. It's just as absurd.

      The trick is to minimize browser-specific development by working for the standards first. When problems ar

  • Umm, sadly I can't find the link wasn't IE declared a National Security Risk by some important agency?

  • I know what app, agency, and state you're with. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by crazyphilman ( 609923 ) on Monday August 15, 2005 @03:45AM (#13319875) Journal
    I won't give it away, but you've sure got your work cut out for you... :)

    Here's my advice:

    1. If it works in Firefox, it'll work fine in I.E... BUT NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND. So as you build your web pages, test in Firefox, THEN in I.E. for good measure. Pay special attention to tables and stylesheets. If you stick to plain-vanilla JavaScript you should be mostly ok, but if you're going to do something fancy, get the O'Reilly pocket guide. It arranges features by browser so you can see what is supported where.

    2. When the agency management tells you they want you to only support I.E. say very carefully "yes, yes, don't worry, I'll support I.E. fully". Don't elaborate! Let them think that Firefox interoperability is a happy accident. Play dumb. Trust me on this, I've had the "IE sucks" argument with them over and over, they will NEVER get it. They're in love with Microsoft products; they're practically addicted to them. At a time when many other agencies in this state are going with Java on Linux, they're going .Net, and not C# either -- VB.Net, to calm down the old timers. Just play along, build the app properly and keep mum.

    3. Although you shouldn't discuss this with the agency management (it'll just spook them), .Net works perfectly well with FireFox if you set it up to be compatible with multiple browsers. All you have to do is make sure your build target isn't I.E.

    Good luck!
  • If they are going to lock onto only one browser, and one that is not particularly hot on standards how are disabled people going to be able to use their website?
  • ...first, a large thank you for those who took the time to respond helpfully. I really appreciate it. I sincerely hope your efforts will reduce the number of IE-centric WWW pages.

    It has been interesting to note the assumptions made by other /.ers about the circumstances related to this request. Some are right on...others are just funny. I wish I could respond to them all to clarify things, but doing so is likely to identify me. Which would be No Good.

    Finally, I am responding to seek clarification on

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