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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."

101 of 582 comments (clear)

  1. Making IE Standards compliant? by Zone-MR · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm sure IE 6.05.1 will feature a small modification which happens to cause this fix to stop working. ;)

    1. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by Openstandards.net · · Score: 3, Funny

      I have found that the DoNotUseIE.patch file has upgraded it to 100% open standards compliance, and this cannot be overridden by any future version of IE or other Microsoft extensions.

      --

      Open Standards Portal
    2. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by I+confirm+I'm+not+a · · Score: 4, Funny

      My problem with this patch is its name - it was DoNotUseIE.phoenix, then DoNotUseIE.bird, now - apparently - its DoNotUseIE.patch. Enough already!

      ;)

      --
      This is where the serious fun begins.
    3. 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?"

    4. 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.

    5. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by I+confirm+I'm+not+a · · Score: 5, Informative

      Just to clarify slightly - IE7 doesn't rely on serving up a different stylesheet, but an additional 'sheet. In other words, if you reference IE7 as your first 'sheet, existing stylesheets for compliant browsers will then render OK in IE.

      If I've read it right you don't even need to sniff (well, at least not in the old-fasioned, java-script or server-side script sense): it's all done through CSS.

      --
      This is where the serious fun begins.
    6. 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.

    7. 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.........
    8. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by jonadab · · Score: 3, Interesting

      > what if you don't have a windows computer to see how 'it looks' under IE?

      Exchange screenshots with another webmaster who does use IE. I've got a couple
      of people I trade screenshots with regularly. They like this arrangement,
      because my screenshots show some edge cases that most people would miss.
      I always take a series of shots showing scalability from 640x480 up through
      at least 1280x1024, and I always show what the site looks like with and without
      page colors turned on (and my system colors are medium-contrast light-on-dark,
      which shows up stuff that gets missed if you use black-on-white). Also I tend
      to take screenshots with about three different rendering engines (always Gecko,
      plus usually Konqueror and one or more of Opera, W3, Links, Lynx). So my
      approach shows up a lot of edge cases that more typical setups (black-text,
      white-background, MSIE, 800x600, page colors enabled) won't see.

      Yes, it's possible to design a web page that looks "right" under all of the
      above settings. (By "right", I mean it looks like it was designed for those
      settings.) Eye candy in the graphical browsers, without breaking the text
      browsers; client-side scripts that automate things if scripts are enabled,
      without breaking the site if scripts aren't enabled. Images that look good
      (no jaggy edges) against either a light _or_ dark background. (This is
      tricky if you have to support browsers with no proper alpha channel, but
      it can be done; the trick is to set the background color when you save your
      PNG images, so that non-alpha-channel browsers (*cough* MSIE) will antialias
      against that color -- set that to the same color as the surrounding background
      and you get to be Bob's nephew. Or use the MSIE PNG-alpha-channel hack, but
      not all versions of MSIE support that, and it still leaves old versions of
      Opera out in the cold.)

      --
      Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
    9. 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?

    10. 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?

    11. 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?

    12. Re:Making IE Standards compliant? by Tackhead · · Score: 3, Interesting
      > I always take a series of shots showing scalability from 640x480 up through at least 1280x1024,

      You're probably doing this, but many other sites (heh, usually IE-only sites) sure as heck aren't. What about 320x480, 400x600, 640x1024?

      Not everybody browses with their web browser taking up the full window! Half a window, aligned portrait-style, is easier on the eyes because it requires less horizontal eye movement than "fullscreen". Horizontal scrolling is evil -- doubly so to users who go out of their way to minimize read-speed and comprehension-slowing horizontal eye movement by resizing their browsers to prevent it.

  2. All that's missing by blirp · · Score: 4, Funny

    All that's missing now, is a stylesheet that'll close all remaining security holes... :*)

    1. Re:All that's missing by scragz · · Score: 5, Informative
      I wonder if it's possible to implement a DHTML hack for proper PNG support :)
      Check here and here.
    2. Re:All that's missing by JimDabell · · Score: 3, Informative

      I wonder if it's possible to implement a DHTML hack for proper PNG support :)

      To a limited extent, yes.

  3. 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 kalidasa · · Score: 4, Informative

      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)

      What this does is allow developers of standards-based sites, which they have under their own control, to provide a stopgap for users who don't understand the issue of standards and so haven't themselves chosen freedom. So your digression doesn't quite match the facts. As a developer, I can choose to make my site work in Mozilla and KHTML - and will - but I can't choose to force my audience to use them. With this, if it works as advertised, I can choose to follow standards and still provide some means for those who have, for whatever reasons, chosen to use a non-free browser to use my content.

    4. 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...

    5. 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.
    6. 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.

    7. Re:Kudos, but... by Daniel_Staal · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Good theory. Unfortunately, MS has made that very difficult. There are several basic CSS/HTML formating options that work differently under IE than the standard specifies; differently enough that if you were to use them the page would either work in IE or in standards-compliant browsers. (But not both.)

      There are work arounds, using semi-legit CSS that fails in one browser or another and lets each browser see what it understands. But that is really just coding to the browser again, and occasionally breaks as groups upgrade their browsers. This promises a one-stop shop for all the main problems.

      --
      'Sensible' is a curse word.
    8. 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.

  4. Useful stylesheets by plams · · Score: 3, Funny

    I think I'd personally be more interested in a stylesheet that redirects IE browsers to www.mozilla.org/ :) Or even better: crashes them.

    1. Re:Useful stylesheets by Dashing+Leech · · Score: 4, Funny
      Or even better: crashes them.

      That doesn't require style sheets, just normal webpages.

    2. Re:Useful stylesheets by davetrainer · · Score: 4, Interesting
      I think I'd personally be more interested in a stylesheet that . . . crashes them.
      Your wait is over.
    3. Re:Useful stylesheets by Phidoux · · Score: 4, Funny

      Yeah! Doez enyone no off a goot spel checing stile sheet?

      --
      Free Firefox news reader.
    4. Re:Useful stylesheets by farlukar · · Score: 5, Informative

      try this one

      --
      Ceci n'est pas une .sig
    5. 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
    6. 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?

  5. Shows the power of IE by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This will probably get modded down - but this hack really does show the power of IE that you can deploy a script fix to browser problems.

    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. Most of these css3 features weren't even finalised as w3c guidelines when ie6 was released.

    Great to see the css3 support though - removes the need for so hard-to-manage javascript hacks.

    SharedID - Single Sign On for web applications

    1. 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.
    2. Re:Shows the power of IE by minus9 · · Score: 5, Funny
      but this hack really does show the power of IE

      The power of IE is that it's broken but it may be possible to fix it?

      I have a powerful car for sale if you're interested.

    3. Re:Shows the power of IE by ender81b · · Score: 4, Informative

      AFAIK there is no browser available that correctly renders CSS 2.0 -- the entire spec.

      IIRC Moz and Opera do render all of CSS 1.0 correctly and nearly all of CSS 2.0 correctly. But doing some advanced things with CSS 2.0 (especially doing all formatting with it, instead of old table hacks) you really run into problems with both Moz and Opera.

    4. Re:Shows the power of IE by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      Why does every post, which starts with the statement "This will probably get modded down", "Mod me down, but..." or similar get +5 Insightful? Reverse psychology, anyone? Mod me down, but that's the truth.

    5. Re:Shows the power of IE by next1 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      current project i'm working on i did all css layout (ie; no tables) and had opposite experience: same code was fine in moz / opera, needed completely different version for ie5 and ie6 due to various bugs in each.

      now actually reverting to tables for a lot of the layout because of it.

    6. Re:Shows the power of IE by gusnz · · Score: 5, Interesting

      And what's more, it doesn't even fully support CSS1, which was released in 1996! Try the ComplexSpiral demo, which is a neat demo of the effects possible in Mozilla, Opera and Safari with the 'background-attachment:' CSS1 property, which IE supports only on the BODY tag. Also, let's add 'position: static' support onto our wishlist (for watermarks/menus on pages) and PNG alpha support, and a whole bevy of regular CSS rendering bugs that have remained unsolved for years. MS claims "full CSS1 compliance", but in reality they only support the reduced CSS1 core spec.

      And to think it'll be a wait of several years before IE is updated with Longhorn... until then, writing pure CSS sites is going to remain a bug-whacking chore. Let's all be collectively glad that MS fought so hard for their "Freedom to Innovate" back in the anti-trust days ;).

      P.S. redesign slashdot using modern web standards, editors!

      --
      <!-- DHTML / JavaScript menu, popup tooltip, Ajax scripts -->
    7. Re:Shows the power of IE by JimDabell · · Score: 5, Informative

      AFAIK there is no browser available that correctly renders CSS 2.0 -- the entire spec.

      You are right, which is why some of the more esoteric features have been removed from CSS 2 and CSS 2.1 is about to be released.

      However this is a lot different to Internet Explorer 6's situation. There are massive amounts of CSS 2 that simply aren't implemented, such as a whole bunch of selectors and tables.

      The next time you see somebody complaining that CSS layout is hard, remember that there's probably a way to do what they want in a few lines of CSS, but that part of CSS simply doesn't work in Internet Explorer (but does in Mozilla, Konqueror, Opera, etc).

    8. Re:Shows the power of IE by Zaiff+Urgulbunger · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I feel your pain!

      I've had weirdness with different IE versions too, like where I have some content with images floated right; words okay in IE5 and IE6, but in IE5.5, the images cover the content. And don't forget that Mac IE is different again!

      But I have found myself that using standards compliant code, and then JavaScript to fix "anomalies" is pretty good. Using CSS hacks always seems to be asking for problems to me, whereas with JS you can target specific browser versions.

    9. 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.

    10. Re:Shows the power of IE by thesolo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      this hack really does show the power of IE...ie6 was released 2+ years ago. Most of these css3 features weren't even finalised as w3c guidelines when ie6 was released.

      I call BS on that. Even features which IE did implement, it couldn't get right. For example, IE's implementation of getElementById is extremely flawed. It also doesn't support lots of things, like the CSS Width property, properly. (IE treats width as min-width, and doesn't provide real width support.)

      This isn't a testament to IE's scalability, hackability, or another ability you might come up with. It's just another reason why it's a piss-poor browser. We need additional code to make IE properly understand standards; that's atrocious.

      Also, if you want to see how IE stacks up against a browser like Firefox, I have made a quick comparison between the two. Its a little old now, and it was using Firebird 0.7 (not Firefox), but it's still a valid comparison. IE 6 chokes horribly on CSS, plain & simple.

  6. All he has to do now by maroberts · · Score: 5, Funny

    Is ponder how to get over the Slashdotting of his site.

    I'm sure the CSS is a work of technical art; seeing it would be even better.

    --

    Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
    Karma: Chameleon

    1. Re:All he has to do now by Gabrill · · Score: 4, Funny

      Umm . . . Sourceforge?

      --
      Always going forward, 'cause we can't find reverse.
  7. firefox by selderrr · · Score: 4, Informative

    I wish someone would release such a sheet for firefox : /. itself still doen't render correctly on FFox 0.8 under XPpro. As shown here, the left column tends to dribble into the article summary...

    --
    When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
    1. Re:firefox by ideatrack · · Score: 5, Interesting

      But this is why FireFox still isn't onto release one. I also get problems on my XP box using some sites, especially forms; but there are also still sites that don't work correctly in any release.

      IE has the usual MS philosophy in that if something doesn't comply with the way they've done it, who cares because everyone will change to their way of thinking. I agree with those who don't like that someone else has to clean up after MS but what else are you going to do? For better or worse it is, and will be for a while yet, what most non-techy people use.

    2. Re:firefox by foolip · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Perhaps it's slashdot that needs to be made standards compliant! It would seem that someone doesn't want us to know how compliant it is.

      It seems WDG had better luck getting through, but look at all those errors!

    3. Re:firefox by tunah · · Score: 4, Funny

      Slashdot isn't valid HTML, so it doesn't _have_ a correct rendering ;-)

      --
      Free Java games for your phone: Tontie, Sokoban
    4. 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
    5. Re:firefox by Xugumad · · Score: 4, Informative

      Downloading the index page, then uploading it to the W3C validator throws an error about being unable to determine character encoding. Forcing character encoding to iso-8859-1 results in 371 errors!

    6. Re:firefox by Imperator · · Score: 5, Interesting

      That's pretty sad, for /. to mess with their server settings to disable the w3 validator. Their HTML has been terribly broken for years. I don't understand what they do with all that money they have, because they sure haven't been improving the site very much. Makes me glad I don't subscribe and I block their ads.

      --

      Gates' Law: Every 18 months, the speed of software halves.
    7. Re:firefox by /ASCII · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Check those errors a little more carefully. There are a whole bunch of errors about URIs of the type 'http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=2336&alloc_id=5672&sit e_id=1&request'. I'm too lazy to check if this is actually a valid to skip the pagename on an URI with a query, but I belive it is. But no matter what, each such URI generates about a dozen errors, which is bogus. Most of the other errors have to do with rendering hints like 'marginwidth' and 'bgcolor', which where not a part of the HTML 3.2 standard but are noncritical.

      --
      Try out fish, the friendly interactive shell.
    8. Re:firefox by Wullis · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Perhaps it's slashdot that needs to be made standards compliant!

      The magazine A List Apart has already redone Slashdot's design with web standards. Look here:

    9. Re:firefox by JimDabell · · Score: 4, Informative

      The SGML definition of HTML 3.2 declares attributes as CDATA.

      Actually, it varies; not all attributes are defined in that way. If you limit your remark to the href attributes of <a> elements, the HTML 4.01 specification defines them to contain CDATA as well. However you are misinterpreting the meaning of CDATA - CDATA includes character entities.

    10. Re:firefox by JimDabell · · Score: 3, Informative

      You are wrong. The HTML specification is very clear on the matter.

      to use the URI "http://host/?x=1&y=2" as a linking URI, it must be written <A href="http://host/?x=1&#38;y=2"> or <A href="http://host/?x=1&amp;y=2">.

    11. Re:firefox by Drantin · · Score: 4, Informative

      although: Slashcode has a recent article on the subject...

      --
      Actio personalis moritur cum persona. (Dead men don't sue)
  8. They're going to completely rewrite IE? by EmagGeek · · Score: 3, Funny

    Wow... who woulda thunk it?

  9. Google cache by Underholdning · · Score: 5, Informative

    Site is already slashdottet. Here's Google's cache of the document.
    So - how are the plans going with implementing a slashdot cache?

    --
    Underholdning.info
    1. Re:Google cache by nacturation · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I still don't know why Slashdot doesn't reference non-high bandwidth sites using the freecache service. All that needs to be done is prefix the URL with http://freecache.org/ and follow it with the full regular URL, eg:

      http://freecache.org/http://www.slowsite.com/big _p ictures.html

      It benefits the site owner by having reduced bandwidth costs and it also benefits Slashdot as we can read the articles.

      --
      Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
    2. Re:Google cache by nautical9 · · Score: 3, Informative
      Unfortunately, some (most?) sites are dynamic in nature, especially concerning advertising. By using the freecache service, a static version of the page gets cached and the same ad would _may_ appear if the site owner is using his own advertising code and not some remote service like google or doubleclick, likely going against the wishes of the website. Or perhaps the content itself requires dynamic code to work properly.

      Although this would be very useful for tiny sites like those hosted on cable connections, but it's hard to tell in advance which sites will be slashdotted.

      And either way, the choice should really be up to the web site owner. I'm sure most would prefer that people see their content versus having their server crushed, but you never know until you ask.

  10. Re:Gone with only 3 comments by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    on the root of the site (http://dean.edwards.name/) it says:
    * This is my site
    * for my personal use
    * running on my machine
    * in my kitchen!

    jesus christ, someone create a mirror before his computer blows up from being slashdotted.

  11. Id say by 222 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Judging by the loading lag, and eventual time out hes managed to make his webserver IIS compliant also ;)

  12. Get firefox. by MooKore+2004 · · Score: 4, Informative

    If you havent already yet, you should of switched from IE to Firefox. It is now my default browser on Windows, and on Windows XP it even puts it as the top Start menu item. It is fast, light, small download (6Mb), Tabbed Browsing, Popup blocking, Download manager, Cute icon and standards compliance are all good reasons to use it. So don't use an ugly hack to transform your pages for IE, put a firefox icon on your site.

    So if you havent downloaded it yet, get it now!. Avalible for Windows, Linux, Mac OS X and more!

    --
    found here
  13. 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...

  14. more than enough bandwidth to cover it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    ...thems sound lik fightin' words :)

    yehaw boys!!

  15. Fixed in nightlies by Jack+Zombie · · Score: 5, Informative

    Use a Mozilla Firefox nightly build, the bug (217369, I think) that caused this problem is fixed in them.

    More major changes since 0.8 here.

    --
    "You should never doubt what nobody is sure about." -- Willy Wonka
  16. MS releases patch to fix Security bug in IE by peragrin · · Score: 4, Funny

    MS released a patch today to fix a major Security Bug in IE today. MS offcials say that a malisious hacker, is destroying websites around the world, by making them compatible with other web browsers. We at MS can abolutely not have any competion, so we are funding a $1 billion reward to the person who finds this man and breaks his even hack. We would do it ourselves but all 80,000 of our developers are busy trying to get longhorn out by 2010.

    --
    i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
  17. 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.
  18. Misleading title : corrects CSS2 selectors only. by androse · · Score: 4, Informative

    The title of the news is misleading : this JS component only corrects some CSS 2 selectors that IE doesn't natively support.

    So it doesn't really make IS standards compliant, it just extends some functionnality. It doesn't, for example, correct the box model of IE5.

    So I'm afraid it doesn't spare us of using CSS hacks to filter out IE.

  19. 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!

  20. Dean Edwards by amigoro · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I thought this was something about the democratic nominations, but then saw Kerry was missing.

    Flippancy apart, I think using CSS to make IE7 W3C compliant is a really brilliant idea. However, the browser itself is a small part of the equations. Very few websites are W3C compliant. Vast majority of them are geared to a certain browser, depending on the whim and fancy of the designer.

    For my part, I run my sites thru Anybrowser to make sure they will render on, well, as the name suggests, any browser.

    --


    Nothing to see here
  21. 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.
  22. Microsoft should hire him by SlashMaster · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Anyone who cares this much about the company's product should be given serious consideration for employment.

    Microsoft should hire him...

    1. 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
    2. Re:Microsoft should hire him by l0wland · · Score: 4, Funny
      "Microsoft should hire him..."

      There's a greater possibility that Microsoft will pay him to STFU.

      --

      "Honey, I feel a certain distance between us..." "Really? A 31ms ping ain't that bad..."
  23. Mirror made by paulproteus · · Score: 4, Informative

    I made this mirror based on the Google cache. It has the full source code, as well as the docs he wrote.

    This is temporary, of course.

    --
    |/usr/games/fortune
  24. No wonder it's /.'ed... by lortho · · Score: 3, Funny
    Quoted from the main page of the site:

    • This is my site
    • for my personal use
    • running on my machine
    • in my kitchen!

    I imagine his ISP's going to want to have a few words with him about bandwidth usage... ;)
  25. Microsoft can fix IE by jonwil · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If what I have seen in the "file list" from the leaked MS code still holds true, all the HTML rendering, CSS, PNG and etc stuff is in DLLs that are totally seperate from the OS and could easily be updated independantly.

    When Microsoft says "we cant fix xyz", it usually means "we cant fix xyz because it would cost us more (in money, programmer time etc) than we are going to gain (in sales, PR etc)"

    1. Re:Microsoft can fix IE by hattig · · Score: 3, Interesting

      It wouldn't be a quick and simple task but ... ... couldn't someone somehow port the rendering part of Mozilla/Firefox/Konqueror to Windows, in such a manner that they export the same interface as those DLLs, and hence simply replace the rendering component of IE with something decent?

  26. MOD PARENT UP, SCORE +20 FULL ON TRUE by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Oh come on, people, do a View Source for yourselves. Go on, I dare you. Slashdot's HTML is hideous just to look at and horribly out of standards compliance.

  27. Source Code for IE7 htc by EqualSlash · · Score: 5, Informative

    via Google Cache : IE7.htc

  28. 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.

  29. 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
  30. This is a great idea by seldolivaw · · Score: 4, Informative

    The code itself at the moment is 27k, which is kinda hefty for most pages on initial load (though you'd only have to load it once per site). However, it includes loads of comments, which might slim it down to about half that if you stripped them out. And the savings in other code areas by not having to write double-code and browser-detection are probably worth it overall.

    This would certainly make development a lot easier... I look forward to trying it out :-)

  31. Mirror by DeanEdwards22 · · Score: 4, Informative

    Can someone temporarily host my site? some of it is php4. is that ok? mail me at dean@edwards.name and cc 9jack9@msn.com. i can chat on the msn account if necessary. thanks. dean edwards

  32. Re:Implementing CSS is HARD by JimDabell · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It really isn't so shocking that years elapse between the recommendations and implementations

    The W3C have now changed policy so that in order to get to full Recommendation status, a specification has to have at least two independent implementations. If nobody can implement it, it gets kicked back a stage or two for reevaluation. This should help combat the "nice specs, shame about the real world" problem a little.

  33. 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?

    1. Re:I was expecting another kind of patch by DeanEdwards22 · · Score: 3, Informative

      I've done this too: http://dean.edwards.name/moz-behaviors/ (when my site is back up!)

  34. 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.

  35. Corporate Business Strategy by SeaDour · · Score: 5, Funny

    Did you hear? McDonald's heard about this move by Microsoft, and was inspired to imitate their strategy. McDonald's is now pushing through the Department of Agriculture to add "Big Mac" and "Chicken Nuggets" to the Food Pyramid, placing them just below the highly-coveted "Dairy Products" block. McDonald's argues that since such a huge percentage of the population is eating their food, everyone should consider their products a nutritional standard.

  36. Let me get this straight... by orthancstone · · Score: 3, Funny

    MS should pay $1 billion for preventing this guy from distributed this, eh? So...

    That'd be the easiest money /. members ever made...the site is already slashdotted!
    :P

  37. Mirror by DeanEdwards22 · · Score: 3, Informative

    thanks to all those who have offered to mirror/host my site. i'm currently working on a solution so i should be back up again soon. thanks to Asheesh Laroia there is now a temporary mirror here: http://jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu/~alaroia1/dean/ please note: only the html test files work on this mirror. thanks again. dean edwards

  38. Still no cure for bug #97283 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Still no cure for bug #97283 in Mozilla. Simple thing:
    <div style="overflow:auto; height:50px; width:50px">

    1<br />
    2<br />
    3<br />
    4<br />
    5<br />

    </div>
    Mousewheel: Does not scroll down
    Space: Does not page down
    Page-Down: Does not page down
    Cursorkey-Down: Does not scroll down

    "Microsofts Invention", the iframe works like a charm in Mozilla, simple W3C CSS fails. Since 2001.
  39. Standards or just plain common sense? by pooh666 · · Score: 3, Informative

    I know this is not new to a lot of people judgeing by the number of hits I get when searching for solutions. IE's submit button doesn't lock, as many times as you click it, is as many times as it breaks its former connection and makes a new one.

    I can't believe even MS would do something that stupid!!! Since I learned about forms on Netscape, it never occured to me that this problem could exist until I saw it for myself.

    I couldn't care less about DHTML or CSS "compliance" when IE can't even act like a simple web client correctly!!

    Eric

  40. Re:What's up with that comma, dude? by platipusrc · · Score: 5, Funny

    Man, you need to leave Mr. Shatner alone when he's trying to make a point!

    --
    And the muscular cyborg German dudes dance with sexy French Canadians
  41. 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.

  42. Re:What's up with that comma, dude? by sydb · · Score: 4, Interesting

    You've been modded a troll and it's probably right. But it's Friday, and I'm fed up with illiterate morons and I agree with you.

    I come across this all the time. People send emails with stuff like:

    "Can someone, please look at, this."

    What does it mean? By the way, this is a manager. She gets paid more than me and yet she can't string simple written English together.

    Sometimes I wonder what goes on in peoples' minds, then I realise I'd rather not know.

    --
    Yours Sincerely, Michael.
  43. Re:What's up with that comma, dude? by operagost · · Score: 3, Funny

    We, need, more, dramatic, pauses, Scotty!

    --

    Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
  44. Re:What's up with that comma, dude? by MemoryAid · · Score: 3, Funny
    "Can someone, please look at, this."

    I'd send it back with a note:

    It looks good overall; just remove the two commas and change the period to a question mark. I'm happy to help.

    --
    Language students: Don't try to learn English here. This ain't it.
  45. Mirror of IE7 by gessleX · · Score: 3, Informative

    With permission of Dean Edward, I have copied the IE7 information and src download to my webserver for mirroring purposes. http://opensource.worldhuman.net/mirror/IE7