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CSS Support IE 7.0's Weakest Link

Posted by timothy on from the can't-squash-superiors dept.

dilbertspace writes "Anyone who has ever developed a website knows that cross-browser and cross-platform compatibility is a nightmare, mainly due to Microsoft's willful non-compliance with the CSS2 standard. As this eWeek article points out, it seems Microsoft will continue their poor support for CSS2 even in the IE 7.0 release. This may have worked when IE was the only game in town, but now that Firefox is a serious player, it won't help them keep market share as they think it will."

8 of 339 comments (clear)

  1. Don't count on it by Ckwop · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This may have worked when IE was the only game in town, but now that Firefox is a serious player, it won't help them keep market share as they think it will.

    Don't count on it, sunshine. The reason IE is losing market share to Firefox is two fold.

    1. The public perception of the IE's security has declined.
    2. It's missing a lot of nice features such as: tabbed browsing, international domain names and a bunch of other stuff.

      1. These are things that matter to the end user. If I'm joe-sixpack I don't give a damn about CSS 2.0 compliance. Hell, I probably don't even know what CSS 2.0 is. The only person who actually cares are the people making the web-sites, and those people are us and in terms of market share we typically sit at the one-percent noise level. To Microsoft, IE not being compatible with other browsers is a good thing. It means people have to design to their feature set and not to the offical standards it simply means we can't ignore their platform.

        So what can Firefox do to take out IE once and for all? It's actually rather simple. Do the thing that IE would never do. Implement something as powerful as Windows Forms (or it's Linux equivelent). It's the thing Microsoft fears the most - that Javascript will evolve into something powerful enough to be able to right a Microsoft Office clone in. As soon as this happens, then we suddenly have a platform independant version of office and that means we don't have to run Windows anymore. In short, they can kiss Goodbye to their market share.

        I'm not saying anything new here. Joel Spolsky has talked about this at great length in a very interesting article that i'm having trouble finding. We all know this day will come it's just a question as to how long Microsoft can stall the process. This CSS 2.0 issue is a single battle in the war Microsoft is waging to prevent their demise.

        Simon.

    1. Re:Don't count on it by say · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Firefox growth is declining

      Well, I would say that is natural. If the market share continued to grow like it did the first month after 1.0 (33% per month), it would cross the 100% barrier in a year (actually, it would wind up at 124% market share). So I guess the growth has to decline. In absolute numbers, and in terms of market share, Firefox continues to grow. The delta of that growth is smaller, though.

      --
      Roses are #FF0000, violets are #0000FF, all my base are belong to you
  2. The Average User by glamslam · · Score: 5, Insightful

    With close to 90% share of the market and a LARGE unsophisticated userbase (who will not change browsers when the one installed works on EVERY website that joe-nascar ever uses), I don't think Microsoft will be losing any sleep over this.

    Sad but true....

  3. With all due respect to Firefox and standards by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Since when was Competitor B, which holds 6% of the market, considered a "serious player" capable of holding sway over Competitor A, which holds 89% of the market.

    Though we might wish it were so, it's time for a reality check.

  4. If you're MS, why support standards? by bigtallmofo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In Microsoft's short-term thinking, they're less likely to support standards. Despite losing market share, their browser is still the defacto standard on the Internet.

    Supporting standards only makes other browsers a viable alternative. How many people use Firefox but have to continue to use IE at work because of sites that only work in IE?

    --
    I'm a big tall mofo.
  5. Actually... by Rylz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Actually, this may help MS more than you would think. Sites will continue to be written for a non-standards-compliant browser, which makes them less likely to render correctly in the browsers that do follow standards. If enough pages render incorrectly when somebody is trying out Firefox or some other standards compliant browser, they'll give up and go back to IE.

    --
    Sometimes you've gotta roll the hard six.
  6. MS doesn't care by lawpoop · · Score: 4, Insightful
    The only thing that can get MS to change their browser is website developers. If they design CSS2 compliant websites that break IE, MS will fix it.

    Bet let's get real: MS still controls over 90% of the browser market. Web developers will develop sites that function more or less identically in IE, FF, NS, etc. CSS will not break MS' monopoly on web browsers.

    --
    Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
    -- Pablo Picasso
  7. Firefox a major player? by Lysol · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "..when IE was the only game in town, but now that Firefox is a serious player..."

    Uh, so don't get me wrong, I loathe IE like the next guy, but how does - at best - 6% of the browser market already make Firefox a major player?? Apple's got around, what, 2%-3% of the desktop market, yet no one's calling them a major player.

    Frankly, we should be blaming all those web 'developers' for their lazy and frankly, filthy, coding. I've worked in quite a few places and only those on the outside or real passionate web programmers care much about anything non-IE.

    This will become more and more of an issue in the coming months and years as people start catching on to more of the Google halo effect: the DHTML/xmlrpc sorta 'fat' web client app. Customers and company higher-uppers are going to start saying more and more "why can't we do that like Google Suggest or Google Maps?". Be prepared.

    I just have to also say it really pisses me off, as a enterprise developer, that I have to deal with a market like this. I mean, we have standards for a reason. And the fact that you IE only guys out there take quiet joy in your coding lazyness is beyond me.
    Take a little more pride in your work and look at the bigger picture! Regardless of what Micro$oft may think, the world should not revolve around IE! Hopefully some day, for real, Firefox will change this.