Declaring War on Internet Explorer 6
Microsoft just released Internet Explorer 8.
It's taken a bit longer than I'd hoped, but it's here. And it's good. If you've been holding back for any reason, please download Internet Explorer 8 today.
It's time to move on.
Somewhere between 10 and 20 percent of the web's worldwide users are still running IE 6. If you're still using IE 6, it's time to move on. Your browser is eight years old. It has been five years since the last release. You are wasting a tremendous amount of time, money, and intellectual resources. Your dogged use of an archaic browser is responsible for more developer headaches than any other piece of software. It's time for IE 6 to die.
I won't go into all of the arguments here, they've been debated to death elsewhere. If you want more background, please check out the Bring Down IE 6 project.
There is a growing movement for a more peaceful demonstration of solidarity. But I don't think this is enough. Suffice it to say that I'm done arguing. I am convinced that outright war is the only remaining argument.
It's not too late. Download a better browser today. If you're willing to change, my fight is not with you.
Developers, bloggers, and friends. I invite you to join the war.
Please insert the following snippet in a blog post, in a comment, in your site template:
<!--[if lte IE 6]><style>*{position:relative}</style><table><input><![endif]-->This HTML snippet is an antidote to Internet Explorer 6. Thanks to the magic of conditional comments, it will only inconvenience visitors using IE 6 or worse. And inconvenience them it will.
Note that in some content management systems, comments are automatically stripped out of blog posts and comments. If you publish on one of these platforms, I encourage you to add this snippet to your site template.
If this is too drastic a measure for you, please use one of these other tools to alert your users.
Comments
All I have to say is:
Sorry, I don't have the ActiveX plugin required to see your comment.
WTF! Why are you asking people to switch to IE8? All of the problems and issues in IE6 and IE7 will eventually be in IE8...why? Because Microsoft is unable to think more than ten minutes into the future when it comes to software development. You should encourage people to switch to Firefox or Safari. The single biggest headache is not because people choose to use an archaic product, it is because the coders responsible for this product do not take STANDARDS into consideration. IE6, IE7, IE8 Crap, Crap, Crap. I've tested sites in all of them. I am sick of designing sites that can be veiwed beautifully in IE!
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a fan of Internet Explorer. But IE 8 passes CSS 2.1 with flying colors. Each generation gets closer to standards compliance, and I think that's commendable. Sure, it's not quite where Safari, Firefox, Chrome or Opera are, but at least it's headed in that direction.
I would much rather they chose any other browser. But you see, if someone's still using IE 6, telling them to switch to Firefox isn't going to help. There is a reason they haven't already made the change... And with that in mind, I'd rather have them upgrade to IE 8 than make me keep designing around IE 6.
I'm done with png fixes. IE 6 users can deal with blue backgrounds. I'm done with hover fix hacks. IE 6 users can deal with missing hover highlights. I'm done with the retarded box model. IE 8 has taken care of these three problems, and a grip of other ones. And I'm grateful for these small blessings.
In summary: Use a good browser. Download and use anything but Internet Explorer. But if you're going to keep using IE, at least upgrade to one that sucks a whole lot less.
KTHX.
I tried to upgrade one of my coworkers from IE6 today and found that she was running on Windows Server 2000 for some reason. Apparently IE7 doesn't even run on it.
Just back away slowly...
P.S. I've had a lot of designers tell me within the last two weeks that they've stopped supporting or designing for IE6.
I really wish we were at a place where that was a reasonable thing for a web designer to say rather than a display of their incompetence.
Getting stuff to work in IE6 is the only hard part about the job. Once it's out of the picture we're going to see the market flooded with web designers!
No, design is the only hard part of the job. Getting things to work in IE is masochistic, nontrivial, and completely unnecessary.
You can also include ie7.js (search for it) to help you forget all about ie6. Like Justin has said, you don't need to design for ie6 to work perfectly. It's ok if there's degredation. But you do want your site to be functional (or, in Justin's case, he wants it non-functional, to force people to upgrade.).
I say, implement so you can support it, just don't implement FOR it.
Implement to w3c standards! Include ie7.js. Keep any required IE hacks organized seperately in your css... so they can easily be removed later.
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