RSSMovement to dump IE6 from the Web gets its own site
By Scott M. Fulton, III | Published August 5, 2009, 5:43 PM
If anyone knows about the pitfalls and headaches of managing evolving platforms for downward compatibility, it's Microsoft. But the Web is a platform that is maintained, effectively, by the publishers that produce content for it; and in recent years, it is they who have been plagued with the task of propping up their HTML code to remain compliant not with what developers consider the "standard," but instead with what analytics firm NetApplications reports, even to the very minute of this writing, is the single most used Microsoft Web browser: Internet Explorer 6.0.
Some 27.21% of global Internet users, based on July data, run IE6, compared to 23.09% using IE7 and 16.21% using Firefox 3.0. That's an astonishing statistic when you take into account how many Windows Vista-based systems are geared, by default, to alert users and administrators of the availability of IE8. Microsoft's U-turn toward very gradually embracing some accepted W3C standards began with the advent of IE7, which itself is leagues behind modern Web browsers including IE8.
The move has prompted the proprietor of the blog hosting service Weebly to host a Web site dedicated to the eradication of IE6. The strategy of IE6NoMore.com is to sign on support by other prominent Web sites for the inclusion of a snippet of code that alerts IE6 users specifically to the fact that they're using an outmoded Web browser.
This in the face of a Digg.com users' survey that Weebly itself cites, saying as many as 70% of IE6 users are forced into doing so due to such factors as lack of interest on the part of their business' admins in upgrading...which may be related to many of those businesses continuing to use older versions of Windows XP and Windows 2000.
"We've heard from several sources that many corporate IT departments don't feel any need or urgency to upgrade, and receive very few complaints," the Weebly site reads. "We see this as a start -- the more complaints the IT department gets (especially from the top), the more pressure they'll feel to upgrade. Even if they can't upgrade IE6 due to legacy applications, they could always install a version of Firefox side-by-side and only use IE6 for the legacy apps."
But even that would be a problem, for it's the continued use of IE6 by institutions even for outmoded Web apps that contributes to the 27% figures cited by NetApplications and others, that in turn leads Web developers to conclude they must continue to support IE6. YouTube is among the major Web services that are no longer developed with IE6 support in mind, although businesses have even used that fact in defense of procrastination, saying that it's not their policy to support YouTube anyway.
IE6NoMore.com has already signed up a veritable garden of Web developers, including the popular Justin.tv. There are even some developers at Microsoft today who would appreciate Weebly's efforts.
Does this new site work in IE6?
Score: 0
|It might be that there is no need for more than that in some cases? Like servers with no browsing usage or corporate computers that should have only use of internal applications that are IE6 compliant and where web usage is not encouraged.
Score: 2
|According to these stats (http://www.w3schools.com...sers/browsers_stats.asp), not even all versions of IE added have more market share than Firefox since December 2008. IE6 is less than 15% and going down...so what's the fuss?
The guys at IE6NoMore forgot one small detail: when you upgrade IE, it also upgrades all HTML dependent Windows libraries which affects all programs. In my case upgrading IE would break a mission critical program... So it's not just a browser, ok folks?
Score: 2
|Make sure you read what's below the tables to get a context for the data:
"W3Schools is a website for people with an interest for web technologies. These people are more interested in using alternative browsers than the average user. The average user tends to use Internet Explorer, since it comes preinstalled with Windows. Most do not seek out other browsers."
On my sites IE represents about 75% of users, with about 50% of those running IE7 and the rest split between IE6 and IE8.
Score: 0
|It is all amusing because every time someone posts that link the stats are adjusted slightly by people not necessarily interested in "web technologies" but more "wtf is this" visiting it.
Score: 0
|You are right. I had never noticed that warning. In fact, the warning should be displayed _before_ the data. Thanks!
Score: 0
|Based on some of the comments so far on here, and what the Weebly people are saying, it's obvious none of these people have ever worked in a large corporate environment. When corporations change technology, they do so because of one of two reasons -- either the business (meaning non-IT departments) wants it, or for security reasons.
If the business wants an upgrade to IE6, then they would need to be able to justify the expense of the upgrade (testing, development, rollout, resources, user training, etc.) In this case, it is very unlikely the business would care what browser version they have, as long as their websites work. And since the only priority websites that the business would care about are typically internal sites, obviously they do still work and will continue to work. So the business would have a hard time justifying the time and expense of upgrading, especially in this economic climate.
That leaves security. Unless there are major security issues related to IE6, the IT department would have difficulty justifying an upgrade for the same reasons as above. And since Microsoft keeps releasing patches for IE6, and will continue to do so for those corporate customers that have extended Windows XP support, it would again be difficult for IT to justify the time and expense of upgrading.
The reality is that IE6 won't disappear until at least a year after Windows 7 is released to the general public, as corporate customers finally upgrade from Windows XP and with it, IE6.
Score: 7
|Great and all, but large corporations are vastly outnumbered by home users, small and medium corporations, where such controls are much less likely to be in place. Even in large corps, most users are not allowed to proxy through many popular sites, many features like scripting are disabled, so the browser of choice doesn't matter much.
Score: 0
|"That's an astonishing statistic when you take into account how many Windows Vista-based systems are geared, by default, to alert users and administrators of the availability of IE8."
Except that Vista ships with IE7, not 6. The high numbers indicate that a lot of users are probably still running XP. 2000 and earlier can't even upgrade past IE6.
Score: 0
|IE6 was a good browser for its time, 2000+
what other browsers existed then that pushed any envelope, none, except IE6, weren't alot of 'standards' to abide by then or even thought about yet
IE7 came and went with little adoption from many users because IE6 was good enough :P who knows why, same goes for IE8, wanna blame someone or something? blame stupidity and laziness on the part of the majority
Score: 0
|it's rather ignorance, not stupidity. many just don't know.
but if i were Microsoft, i'd have given a big "warning" a year ago, and would force IE8 by 2010 to step over ie6 or 7. for security and standards reasons.
Score: 0
|Microsoft has little interest in standards so scratch that part. Evidence, while the other browsers pass Acid 2 and now very high if not passing Acid 3, Microsoft somehow can not pass either one, in fact, score near zero. Mind you, Microsoft is the worlds largest software company.
Scott said he was going to include standards support, in his charts, however, i guess those Microsoft marketing dollars proved too hard to turn away.
Score: -1
|Be careful with the word "standards". Acid3 also requires things that are still W3C drafts such as CSS3 Text and Fonts. They will become standards some day but are subject to change, too.
Score: 0
|"i guess those Microsoft marketing dollars proved too hard to turn away."
There's that Pro MS / Anti-Apple BS again.
Funny how you always seem to forget the countless stories praising and lambasting both companies for their countless examples of genius and stupidity.
Score: -1
|As I recall, the W3C cannot make standards, just Recommendations.
Score: -1
|It's not that Microsoft can't make a standards friendly browser. It's they don't want or they don't care. But it seems the world turned not the way they wanted and they will have to play catch up soon enough.
I still think splitting Microsoft would have been much better for the company at that time.
Score: 0
|The w3c does indeed make standards: http://www.w3.org/Consortium/
Score: 0
|@yohimbe9, yeah that is the common Microsoft marketing line. how does everyone else have something that either passes or comes close to passing? Firefox, check. Opera, check. Chrome, check. Safari, check. IE....scores close to zero out of 100.
Score: 1
|...and yet somehow all my pages render just fine in IE. :)
Score: 0
|Just had a daydream in which I was hired to run one of these companies, summoning everyone in the IT department, and firing them all for negligence.
Score: -2
|And then paying 6 figures for upgrading all your software platform so your employes can browse the web while they WORK. [sarcasm]Yes, that was a nice dream. I would do the same if I were the owner of a company with my own money in the line.[/sarcasm]
Score: 2
|"Microsoft's U-turn toward very gradually embracing some accepted W3C standards began with the advent of IE7, which itself is leagues behind modern Web browsers including IE8."
...which itself is leagues behind more modern Web browsers including pretty much ANYthing else on the "market" at the moment. :)
Score: -2
|Wow, what a comment, that comment is LEAGUES behind any rational or proper thinking!
Score: 1
|