The premise is simple: Internet Explorer 6 is antiquated, doesn’t support key web standards, and should be phased out. This isn’t about being anti-Microsoft, it’s about Microsoft’s lack of development in the browser market. With IE7/8 not available for Windows 2000, IE6 accounts for up to 20% of web usage, primarily via business users. Clients pressure designers to ‘force’ sites to work in IE6, and designers, not wanting to lose business, comply, using hacks and workarounds. This wastes time and money. Microsoft needs to fix this, designers need to unite, and we all need to move on.
Show your support, link to Bring Down IE6, and let’s get rid of this useless piece of annoying software!
Instead of complaining all the time, perhaps developers should simply stop developing with IE6 in mind? (and present a suitable alert to users browsing their product with IE6)
yeah fuck these IE6 using mafakaz.
sorry abot the lingo..but im very passionate about this shit
I’ve posted a solution on my blog on how to kill IE6 once and for all (including how to crash the browser if the user doesn’t upgrade to at least IE7): http://www.mycee.net/blog/2009/03/04/kill-internet-explorer-6-once-and-for-all/
What I do these days, I warn the user the first time they access the site (and I don’t load stylesheets for IE6 either), then I set a session variable, if the user continues to browse ignoring the warning, I set a cookie and crash IE6 every time they visit the site (see the code snippets on my blog)
Kill IE6!!!!
Capiche
@Craig – I totally agree with you mate! I think that’s the only way to move forwards and it will take some big players to represent in this manner before the rest follow..
@blade – Hahahhaha, for sure dude :)
@Re@Per – Interesting, but would you do this on a client’s website?
@Chris – The short answer, yes, obviously after discussing the social dynamics and the impact of crippling IE6 user’s experience with the client and how it will benefit both the user and the client.
Questions I’d ask the client would be something like: If a user is using IE6, do you really want that user as your client? Obviously it depends on the industry and what it takes to make the client buy the idea, but in most cases you should be able to convince the user to upgrade their browser by prickling a fear of getting infected or hacked because of internet explorer 6′s vulnerabilities.
Client relations can be improved (and lead generation can be achieved) by offering to send a CD containing a proper browser upgrade and alternative browsers for users still stuck on dial-up (the minority I believe) and the option to have one of the client’s marketers go install the update for the user if the user is unable to do it. While they install it, they’re doing the user a favor which means they can pitch whatever product they want to pitch (while installing the update) and a have much better chance at selling as the user is indebted to the marketer / client for doing the user a favour by coming out to install a “security update” on their system.
If all else fails, I’ll charge overtime on the project for having to build an IE6 specific version. If you’re a professional at what you do, you can charge pretty much anything. The client obviously wants to keep the cost as low as possible and the chances of buying into the concept of upgrading the user’s experience if IE6 is detected might just work.
If all developers do their research and decide on the best solution to cripple IE6 while giving the user the best reason as well as solution to get rid of IE6, IE6 will be gone before we even know it.
I’m speaking from a systems engineering point of view, to me it’s all about streamlining the development process for the long term and in the long term, give the user the best web experience without having to waste developer’s time on building the same layout twice.
And for the record, I have several sites doing the IE6 crippling / crashing thing and sites that have been designed to work perfectly in IE6, they will at least display a massive warning about the dangers of IE6.
Hey bud,
The primary reason for asking was more to understand how many people are letting their clients know, you seem to have this covered prefectly. I definitely think it’s time to move forwards with technology and enlighten clients when it comes to technologies such as IE6 and the problems it presents. Outlining additional costs based on the selection of IE6 is also important, as you said.
I decided to take a look at iMod’s visitor browser break down to get an understanding of what crashing IE6 would do:
Internet Explorer – 45.24%
Mozilla Firefox – 40.25%
Safari – 6.22%
Chrome – 3.91%
Opera – 3.57%
PS3 – 0.26%
Camino – 0.07%
NetFront – 0.05%
Now, naturally, Internet Explorer has several versions, so let’s take a look at the percentage split of that 45.24%
- IE6 – 29.01%
- IE7 – 68.88%
- IE8 – 1.89%
Ultimately, what this means is that 13% of the visitors to iMod use IE6, which means that I would potentially be affecting around 8612 unique visitors a month, which is a fairly substantial number of readers, which I reckon I would prefer to have than destroy..
It’s an interesting debate, but truth be told, I’m all for discontinuing respect for IE6.
29% is a rather large percentage in which case I would cease the anti-IE6 aggression a bit and politely suggest that the user upgrade their browser either via a massive flashing banner (since they probably don’t even know what IE6 is, just telling them that they need to install a security update should be in order), pop-ups and pop-unders.
The cases I was referring to was mostly sites with IE6 usage below 5% in which case I’ll aggressively market how bad IE6 is and crash the browser after a while, less than 10%, crashing the user’s browser becomes a little problematic and one should stick to only marketing the other browsers, above 10% you’re losing a lot of users, a pop-under looking like a “Did you know” or “Tip of the day” type thing in which you explain to the user what a browser is and why IE6 is bad should be in order with some links to where the user can upgrade his browser to add new functionality and fix security problems.
Will write some code when I have time, something that users can just pop into their site, an AJAX type popup might even be a better idea, especially if it’s styled like a standard Windows XP error / warning dialogue.
Absolutely, for lower usage sites, then I would totally agree and I must say, I do think it’s a good idea to build something in, which alerts visitors that they should upgrade, if everyone starts doing that, then we’ll see the progression take place :)
I wondered about writing some code too – the best idea, imo, would be to make a WordPress plugin which does it – giving the author the ability to easily turn it on and off..
A wordpress plugin sounds like a fabulous idea, will tackle this mini project when I have some free time to waste, the “copy and paste code” is already on my blog, just need to wrap it into a plugin.
Shouldn’t take too long, just a couple hooks really..
Plugin already exists: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/shockingly-big-ie6-warning/
Haha, we should have known!
For sure IE6 is going to have its permanent place in museum
Hahhahahah, good one :D