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Making IE Standards Compliant

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the clever-css-tricks dept.

spin2cool writes "Dean Edwards has taken it upon himself to make Internet Explorer W3C compliant. How? Well, it isn't by patching the application, as you might suspect. He's created a stylesheet, dubbed 'IE7' that uses DHTML to load and parse style sheets into a form that IE can understand. Just include the style sheet in your HTML pages, and things should render correctly. The complexity of the CSS transformations is really amazing and shows off the power of this stuff."

29 of 582 comments (clear)

  1. Kudos, but... by Channard · · Score: 5, Insightful

    .. it's a sad state of affairs when a developer outside of Microsoft actually ends up doing something that MS should have done themselves. So they can say 'screw it' to standards and someone else does the finger-work.

    1. Re:Kudos, but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It is even a sadder state of affairs that they are a large enough company for this fix to matter, all things considered when it comes to customer service as a whole.

    2. Re:Kudos, but... by MartinG · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Not really. It's perfectly natural to many of us for someone to change things to work in the way they want them to. It's a basic freedom that many of us try to protect.

      What's unusual in this case is that closed proprietry software has been "changed" without access to the source.

      It's not sad that someone other than Microsoft had to do it. It's sad that people other than Microsoft can't do such things a whole lot more.

      (in reality, they can of course by not using closed source software, but for some it seems percieved convenience is more important than freedom, but I digress)

      --
      -- MartinG To mail me: echo kewyjlcxyzvjfxbqwh | tr bcefhjklqvwxyz .@adgimnoprstu
    3. Re:Kudos, but... by CeleronXL · · Score: 3, Insightful

      This being the open source loving community it is, I'm pretty surprised to see diappointment at people doing work for a piece of software that the actual developers themselves did not or could not do. This is very often the way things are done in the open source world. Sure, this browser is not open source by any means, but still...

    4. Re:Kudos, but... by doj8 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      > If you are not making totally browser agnostic sites,
      > with no consideration for what browser they may be using,
      > then you are taking the position of Microsoft: "Let's
      > commandeer the html standard so that ppl write for our
      > browsers instead of according to standards!"

      Not right. You can build pages that conform to HTML standards which won't work right in IE due to defects in IE's handling of the HTML standards. This style sheet appears to work around those bugs in IE. Those same standards-compliant pages may well work (or not work) in Mozilla, etc. So, you aren't creating pages that only work in a specific browser, you are creating pages that are valid, standard HTML code - that won't work in IE. There's a difference.

      Of course, you can also create pages like that that fail in other browsers. IE is the most prevalent and, arguably, visibly deficient of them.

      --
      -- Dan Jenkins, Rastech Inc.
    5. Re:Kudos, but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I know. They are the largest software company in the world, they have billions in the bank, and it takes one individual without access to the source to fix up some of the most glaring errors that have lain there untouched for over two years. Microsoft ought to be ashamed.

    6. Re:Kudos, but... by blackbear · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you could build really bad software that looks good on the surface, get other people fix it for you for free, and still get paid, would you do it?

      I suppose that the reason I'm not rich yet is because I wouldn't. Building software is usually time consuming and costly. Building good software is more so. I wonder that the OSS movement didn't gain popularity so much because of a desire to contribute, as out of a sense of frustration that there was very little good software available at any price.

      The market dosen't reward good software because most users are so ignorant of what is good software that they just buy whatever is most shinny and pretty and expensive. The only alternative seems to be to write good software and give it away for free so that you don't have to sit in the Microsoft (and others) stench all day long. It's not just Microsoft, but they're the best example.

  2. Re:Shows the power of IE by Nadir · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Fact is that IE 6 doesn't even support CSS2 properly which became a W3C recommendation in 1998.

    --
    --
    The world is divided in two categories:
    those with a loaded gun and those who dig. You dig.
  3. Nice by foolip · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The site is /.ed, but from what I can make out from the front page, this is making IE CSS standards compliant. Does it also work some magic to make it compliant with HTML (or even better, XHTML) standards (which would be far more useful), or is that just impossible?

    In any event, this may allow me to actually use some CSS 2, a standard that was published in May 1998 (almost 6 years ago!) and still isn't (fully) supported by the leading browser in the world...

  4. No-one has a copy of the stylesheet?? by xxx_Birdman_xxx · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Sometimes to me /.-ing a site doesn't compute with me- So the server has had so many incoming requests its gone kaput, but in all those hits not one person has kept a copy of this stylesheet.. ??
    It's just simple text!
    Do people just blindly click on links just because they are posted?

    --
    Live in your skin. Keep changing the scenery.
  5. Re:firefox by Basje · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This isn't a problem with FFox not being standards compliant, but a problem with the slashcode not being standard html. See the faq. Bugs have been filed already.

    --
    the pun is mightier than the sword
  6. Re:MSIE is the standard by next1 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    that's right, and that's why all developers have the right to bitch about it and let off some steam, i myself having just spent the last 2 weeks developing 3 versions of a site design; firefox/opera (ie; standards compliant), ie5 and ie6.

    at least in ie6 they've fixed that div padding and margin issue (where ms blatantly ignored w3c standards and made their own), but it's still annoying because now it means you have to do a version for ie5 and a version for ie6!

    and ie6 ignores div heights, aaargh.. never ends!!

    and unfortunately i can't add any comments on this actual article cos i still can't get to it!

  7. Shows the power of Open Source by fidros · · Score: 5, Insightful

    > mozilla was last released yesterday - ie6 was
    > released 2+ years ago

    So, you're saying that the problem is not IE but the broken proprietry way of building softwarwe that can't can release new versions in time to answer real customer needs?

    I think I agree :-)

    Gilad

    --
    Gilad.
  8. Re:Microsoft should hire him by 0x0d0a · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Microsoft has little benefit in ensuring that IE complies with standards -- as a matter of fact, now that they have over eighty percent marketshare, I would go so far as to say that it is to their benefit to have divergent behavior. Nobody cares about a bunch of web designers grumbling about a broken browser when the masses Just Want It To Look Right and blame the designer when it doesn't.

    Wouldn't life be grand if Microsoft shipped the open source Mozilla as their default browser?

    --
    May we never see th
  9. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by nhorman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So I'll ask the burning question here: How is creating a stylesheet to be included in individual web pages considered making IE standards compliant? Wouldn'the the article be more acurate if it read "modifying web site allows it to be rendered correctly in IE6?"

  10. Why did notobdy grab and torrent the file by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Seriously the slashdot effect is one of the reasons that Bittorrent was originally developed.

    If somebody had grabbed the files we could had a torrent mirror delivering the files in seconds.

  11. Re:Useful stylesheets by Openstandards.net · · Score: 5, Insightful
    What sites do you go to? I've been using Mozilla on all my computers (Windows and Linux) for over a year now without problems except for a few sites I had to use for clients (time reporting and Outlook web mail). I complained to the time reporting company, which explicitly says it only supports IE, that one cannot report time from a Linux box.

    Other than that, every other site I use works great in Mozilla, including banking sites and other sites that you'd think would be tempted to make the IE-only mistake.

    What I don't miss is the pop-up I used to have to endure in IE when I disabled ActiveX, not to mention it's countless lack of features (tabbed browsing, popup blocking, etc,...).

    --

    Open Standards Portal
  12. Re:Shows the power of IE by weave · · Score: 5, Insightful
    And before people start attacking ie for saying that mozilla supports xyz css and ie6 doesn't - mozilla was last released yesterday - ie6 was released 2+ years ago.

    Remember when Microsoft was releasing and improving IE on a rapid basis? Let's see, when did Microsoft allegedly win the browser war? Oh, about two years ago. When did Microsoft stop innovating IE? Oh, about two years ago. Since then, Microsoft doesn't care cause they have the browser market locked up. Therefore we need to download stuff like this and google toolbars to add pop up blocking and all kind of other third party stuff to get IE up to some modern day level.

  13. Re:MSIE is the standard by FireFury03 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Unfortunately if MS continues like it has done, the web will stagnate with no cool new features appearing. MS has made it clear they're not interested in making IE standards complient or adding any new enhancements. Since 95% of people use IE (and probably have no clue that there is anything other than IE available), if IE is never enhanced then web developers will forever be stuck in the trap of never being able to use any cool new features that IE doesn't currently support. Very few web developers will be happy adding features to their website that make it unusable for 95% of their visitors (although it seems that professional web developers have no problem with making their sites only work with IE).

    What I'd love to see someone do at some point is re-skin FireFox to look like IE and then abuse one of IE's many security holes to replace IE with the reskinned FireFox on any machine that visits the website. :)

    --
    http://blog.nexusuk.org
  14. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by PeeweeJD · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you can just sniff and serve up IE a different style sheet to make your site render correct, who cares? No more hacking to make work arounds for IE. As long as you dont have to change the design of your site (except for a sniff for IE), who cares.

  15. I was expecting another kind of patch by armando_wall · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Rather than fixing IE, how about using the same method to make Mozilla render pages designed for IE correctly?

    Mozilla is my favorite browser in both Windows and Linux platforms, and it works so well that whenever I stumble with a broken page, I blame it to site designers, not Mozilla, and move along.

    However, sometimes I need to browse the broken page. Wouldn't it be cool if you could fire up some DHTML code to parse the broken page and make it standards compliant, so Mozilla (and others) can read it flawlessly?

    This wouldn't encourage correct site design, but while in that fight, it would be a nice temporary solution.... do you think this could be done?

  16. Cute, but... by SloppyElvis · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This type of solution doesn't really fix the problem that the CSS2 W3C standards aren't correctly supported in any browser. We deal with having to support old browser versions all the time, and believe me, the W3C standards (particularly the DOM), really help to reduce the amount of logic we need to duplicate for various user agents. However, we haven't the luxury of saying, "bah, forget the old browsers, our users have only the very best". So, our server scripts output HTML 4.01 and scripts redirect on failed functional tests and noscript tags to non-script versions of the site.

    The point is, CSS2 doesn't fill its intended purpose for those who must support legacy apps. Its faster to bite the bullet and format layouts with tables, and it works for ancient browsers (Netscape 4.x anyone?). To me, that's one of the main advantages of JSP, PHP, ASP, and the like: I can include complex logic in my site and output lame ole' HTML 4.01. Code and UI are separated, and everyone is happy.

    Besides, take a lesson from Google, simple layouts are best.

  17. Re:Useful stylesheets by WWWWolf · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That would be silly, because it would be stooping to the IE's level.

    If I ever see a web page that specifically excludes me because I use a Non-Supported Browser, or deliberately crashes my browser, I'm not going to listen to that web designer's plea of Using Another Browser. Instead, I go elsewhere.

    But if I see a site promoting the author's favorite browser in a sensible, non-intrusive way, I'm not annoyed at all - still might not be interested to switch this very instant, but at least I'm not annoyed. =)

    Didn't we learn anything from the last browser wars?

  18. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by imkonen · · Score: 4, Insightful
    I think the OP had a good point...the problem as I understand it isn't limited to IE users who can't view compliant web pages. It's also lazy web developpers who use a M$ products to produce a web page that only renders well in IE...complete with the "This page best viewed using Internet Explorer 5.0 or higher" to make it all okay.

    So your analogy would be more accurate if you said "Here's a dictionary so you can read the signs around town. If you want to talk to a native, though, I recommend you continue shouting slowly in English."

    It's not useless, but it's also not a complete solution to the fact that IE isn't standards compliant.

  19. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by cayenne8 · · Score: 4, Insightful
    "f you can just sniff and serve up IE a different style sheet to make your site render correct, who cares?"

    The trouble is...what if you don't have a windows computer to see how 'it looks' under IE? I can run just about any other browser under the sun on my development stations, all linux....except IE.

    I'm still trying to figure how to run IE under wine...but, never have been able to do it with no windows partitions...

    --
    Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
  20. The correct way by at2000 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It is meaningless to comment by saying "hey I use firefox", because the rest of the world is not using it. Now still 25% of my visitors are using IE 5.5, given that IE 6.0 is there 4 years ago.

    Yes, it is much easier to make Mozilla/Opera more IE-complaint. [See IE Emu]

    It is also quite easy to design a new set of API such that they are deligated to the correct version supported by the browser in runtime. [See DHTMLLib] [See CBE]

    But these are just the wrong way.

    1. It gives excuses for IE people to think that they are right. It works well for all sites. (but of course we can't afford IE not supported (tm)
    2. It makes our code bad. We are not coding for the standard, but for the bad browsers. It created the economics that bad browsers will never be gone.

    A patch to IE means:

    1. We are coding for the standard. Sooner or later when there is no more IE, just remove the line and our code works pretty well.
    2. IE works by emulation. This means it will definately be made slower. When there are enough such sites, it gives people one more sites to move away from IE. That is, IE works, but not as good.
    3. IE is considered second class. We focus on standard, and IE just work, by mistake. This is important when IE-to-Mozilla has become 50%-50%. It gives people more comfort to use Mozilla because it has the "brand" to work better.
    4. Be prepared that IE can stop working at any time. When IE-to-Mozilla has become 30%-70%, we can start withdrawing this script, forcing extinction of IE.

    It is exactly something like Cygwin, which implies UNIX-style programs are correct programs. When you move to Linux is just your choice.

  21. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by GreyPoopon · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Wouldn'the the article be more acurate if it read "modifying web site allows it to be rendered correctly in IE6?"

    That's a pretty good question. But the beauty of this thing is that it allows web designers to use all W3C compliant techniques and then make them work correctly in IE6 without massive changes to their code. Just saying "modifying web site allows it to be rendered correctly in IE6" leaves people with the impression that they need to go through a re-coding project instead of just including a style sheet.

    Maybe a better headline would be: "New standards compliancy stylesheet for IE6 clients eases cross-browser development for web developers." Or something like that.

    --

    GreyPoopon
    --
    Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?

  22. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by Doctor+Crumb · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Don't be so sure; I wouldn't be surprised to see a message saying, "this security update is incompatible with the following programs, please remove them: mozilla, firebird, opera, ..."

    It's all part of the 'secure computing' initiative. The fewer vendors you are dealing with, the more secure it is, right?

  23. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by GreyPoopon · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The trouble is...what if you don't have a windows computer to see how 'it looks' under IE?

    This is an age-old problem for web developers. Good developers test their work in multiple browsers, and should also do a test in browsers a few versions back. This might mean keeping an extra box lying around that runs Windows, or using VMWARE or WINE to run Internet Explorer. People might flame me and say that any good developer KNOWS what the content will look like in different browsers and tries to produce a browser-agnostic design, but experience tells me that there's nothing like a quick test to find your mistakes.

    --

    GreyPoopon
    --
    Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?