Internet Explorer. I just spent 45 minutes trying to get a Java Plug -in to install on a students computer. Downloaded the latest Java, made sure security wasn't set to high, configured the firewall. Care to take a guess at the fix?













EFFING FIREFOX!!! F**K you and your web browser M$.

Internet Explorer. I just spent 45 minutes trying to get a Java Plug -in to install on a students computer. Downloaded the latest Java, made sure security wasn't set to high, configured the firewall. Care to take a guess at the fix?













EFFING FIREFOX!!! F**K you and your web browser M$.

I never use IE anymore. It, like many MShaft applications, is bloated and buggy. Firefox is so much better and I would even be willing to give Safari a try.

Well you started it, I'll join in on the rant :p
Note: This text was originally written March 8th 2007 on a different website forum.


Ok, so Microsoft releases IE7. Sweet! Every web developer holds their breath for better standards compliance - yours truly being one of them. Unfortunately as the use of IE7 becomes more prevalent, it's becoming obvious that the only changes they REALLY made to IE7 are Tabbed Browsing (to compete with FireFox) and Security tweaks (to cover their own asses).

That doesn't leave much for the Web Developers you say? Well you'd be wrong, they did in fact decide to fix something... They decided to fix the one thing that allowed any developer who is coding in compliance with W3c standards to bypass the IE "version" of it's own standard... they coded IE7 to ignore the "Star-Hack", which is sometimes referred to as the "Holly Hack".

Basically this hack came about because IE treated the root document node of HTML as a child of a "Root" node, denoted by a *. This means that to get around IE CSS quirks, a developer could do the following:

* html .myclass{

css: code;

}



and "Voila!" suddenly you've got a class (or child) that's parsed ONLY by Internet explorer. This is particularly useful when making proper use of Margins in any W3c compliant browser, but then go back and notice that IE has the margin WAY out of whack and throwing everything off the page. Using this hack, the original CSS class can be over-ridden ONLY in IE based browsers and therefore be shown correctly without modifying the otherwise correct CSS code.



So all is good and well - yes it's a pain, but that's life with Microsoft somtimes. They're the global leader in Internet Technology so I'd be an idiot to hope that someday more people are using, say, FireFox than IE. It's just not going to happen.

But now that this "Fix" has been used in millions of websites, Microsoft decides to "fix" this root node issue - I might add that it seems to be the ONLY CSS fix that they added to IE7 - basically a big middle finger to all the devlopers out there that coded their websites with standards compliance in mind. Never mind the fact that the Expanding-Box bug in IE has existed since IE5... nevermind all the cascading "position" bugs that are laying about. Nevermind the fact that roughly 30% of useful CSS functionality (such as min-height, min-width, child selectors, pseudo classes) are not even implemented. Lets forget all that nonsense and just take away the 1 thing that made developing cross-browser sites quick and easy.

Fortunately Microsoft DID leave another out - but it's certainly not as convenient. Since IE5 there has been an HTML browser selector that can be used to define a 2nd stylesheet that contains ONLY the IE hacks (excuse me, work-arounds) that make your site work cross-platform. Take this for instance (as seen in the source code of this very page...):

<!--[if IE]>
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href={scripturl}/themes/simple/ie_fixes.css />
<![endif]-->

Now only IE browsers will parse that CSS file. It's loaded AFTER the other CSS files so that any declarations will take precedence over the pre-existing declarations. This was the only way I could fix the main menu here due to, *gasp!* a Margin display error in IE7 that could not be worked around without the Star-Hack which no longer works.

So I'd like a round of applause to Microsoft please - thanks for introducing a fix that wasn't needed, and thanks for not adding anything else useful. Now any web developer who's developed something more complicated than a FrontPage website need go back and move their Star-Hacks into a separate file and re-test entire websites.

/rant

My favorite quote from MS of the last 8 months is

"If we say 'here's your new browser- it's standards compatible,' we actually disrupt the the existing ecosystem, and it doesn't actually make it better for anyone".

So wait.... if all browsers met the same standards, and you could code one page for all browsers.... the intertubes would asplode?? OH THANK YOU M$!!! THANKS YOU FOR SAVING T3H INTARWEBS!!!! effing retards.

That line of thinking might work on the "it's not a dump truck guy: (it's way to early to look up his name lol) but do they *really* think that the community they're supposed to be catering to is going to fall for this BS? Oh and he was that quote is about IE 8 so don't think things are going to get better anytime soon.

Illinifan, I use Firefox too but for the UOP website everything is designed around IE so when it doesn't work it pisses me off.

Tips hat to Opera 9.2 as my browser of choice. Firefox is a close 2nd. IE is a very, very distant memory... I think... I can't be sure if it was a dream or if I did at one time use it... blech...

IE is obviously the worst one - because it's user-unfriendly, standard-incompatible and it hardly allows you to extend its capabilities (there are no extensions in the strict sense of this word; however, you can install some add-ons like Maxthon (http://www.maxthon.com/)).
Although Opera is the nicest and most user-friendly one, I use Firefox because of its great Web developing extensions (FireBug (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1843), Web Developer (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/60)). There's one thing I'd like all these browsers to have - resizable textarea fields, like in Safari. And I'd like to see my site displaying properly in IE (when IE will be able to display CSS3 and XHTML properly, these won't be the current web standards anymore)...

I downloaded Opera and I didn't care for it that much. The only reason I can give is "it's not Firefox." Which means that if I use it long enough I'll learn to like it. I *did* like the full screen viewing. I didn't uninstall it which is a good thing. Maybe I play with it some more but right now I'm happy with my FF.

Check this page out: http://www.opera.com/support/tutorials/opera/using/coolfeatures/

Explains a lot of things I could not live without. Not to mention, it is THE fastest browser. It has been for years. Opera had instant back and forward cache way before Firefox did, and it still runs better (more time to perfect).

Built in mail client/RSS reader, built in Bit Torrent client (I don't use it though), mouse guestures are more responsive than any plugin that does it Firefox, crazy amount of shortcuts (that are fully customizable), and so much more.

It has the fastest start-up time, but it's page generation time is slower than both IE and FF. Don't ask me for a source, because I just remember reading about a test somebody did in some PC magazine. :p

Never used IE and FF. I get used to opera. Cause I use it from version 6.5.
For the firs time I used it cause it was wonderfully fast on modem connection. Then i get stuck to it. For me it's really handy.

http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/9601/mosaicxp5.jpg

Been using this since 1997.

You know the old saying: If it ain't broke, give it to Dave and he'll break it.

But seriously, Opera is a damn nice browser. Not sure why more folks don't use it. Must be the intelligent man's choice.

Most people don't even realize that you can use something other then IE to see the intartubes. When I ask people to download firefox I get a barrage of questions ranging from "what's this and what does it cost" to "will it take me to the same webpages"

The general populace is full of window lickers that don't understand the technoworld around them.

It has the fastest start-up time, but it's page generation time is slower than both IE and FF. Don't ask me for a source, because I just remember reading about a test somebody did in some PC magazine. :p

Are you saying Opera is slower than IE and FF? If so, you're wrong (http://www.howtocreate.co.uk/browserSpeed.html)... there are several other sites that've done independent tests as well...

Um, if you would've read the first paragraph of the page you linked to, you would've noticed that the article is about two years old. They claim the data is kept up to date, but I'd rather use a reference that doesn't mix old test results with new ones. ;)

And from what I can dig up, I was wrong. But I distinctly remember reading that Opera's page generation time was slower than IE and Firefox, but maybe it was an older version...I really don't know. :)

Children, let's get back to the real topic.... IE sucks. who cares which browser you use as long as it ain't IE!

Um, if you would've read the first paragraph of the page you linked to, you would've noticed that the article is about two years old.

Dunno what to say... Opera 9.01 isn't two years old... it came out in August 2, 2006. You can check for yourself (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Opera_Browser)...

I was simply stating what the article itself said:

This article is around 2 years old now (although it has been kept up to date)

Fire fox rules its more safe and fast plus it can be modded