IE Team, We Have a Problem
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Uh yeah… we have a problem, IE team. Its not really that big of a problem. But, its gonna be huge one pretty soon. Actually you know what? Its already a big fucking issue!
The problem is related to Internet Explorer, of course. Wait a minute, I know what you’re thinking. I didn’t find a big ass exploit in IE7 that will allow me to reach my goal of world domination (somehow). Well its about IE6.
I’ll give you a little history lesson. IE6 is a browser from Microsoft which came out before IE7. (Pretty obvious.) IE6 came out in 2001. Its 2008 right now, so its been 7 years since IE6 was first released. Pretty ancient, huh? Well the thing that bothers me is that why the fuck is 25% of the market share using IE6?
Like WTF? IE 7 came out in 2006. Two years! Two fucking years and you still have 25% of the people using the old ass IE 6? Fuck me! 25%! Something is seriously wrong. I can’t even believe that people didn’t get their browsers updated in 7 years.
When we make a site we need to mess around to get it to work with IE6. IE8 is about come out and I wonder if that means a pretty big fraction of IE7 users won’t update to IE8? And then we’ll have to make sure our sites work in all three versions of IE? Oh crap!
That’s not the only problem. Its could also be a potential security issue and why let those people live in the past? Imagine someone leading his/her life without knowing there’s such a thing called a microwave oven. Plus why work on newer version if a significant number of your users are still using the antique version? IE team doesn’t seem to give a shit about this.
The IE team has a lot to learn from the Windows people. They should have done the things they did. Like how they put up a message that pops up every day and says “bitch activate your copy of Vista!”. That would have totally worked. Or just automatically upgrade it for them. You need to make it really easy and simple. You need to push people to do it!
Just because IE is the most popular browser doesn’t mean you give little or no effort at spreading the word about the latest version. I wonder if IE6 users even heard of IE7. Like seriously, when Microsoft offers a new service or product all they do is talk about it on their stupid newsletter which no one actually reads. Spend some money! But, don’t spend 10 years’ marketing budget on Jerry Seinfeld!
Microsoft you have an advantage. Windows! 91% market share! The best place to advertise. Just put up a nice little message that will pop up on people’s desktop whenever there’s a new update, news or other stuff. The simplest solutions are the best solutions.
Well IE team do whatever you need to do, but get those damn people updated. Please no more IE6 after 2008! This problem is going to be a huge pain in the ass within a few years. And you guys (the readers) have a role to play too. You need to tweet, plurk or spread the word about this problem. Like just in case the people from Microsoft doesn’t read WebRampage for some weird reason.
Oh and let me know if you think they can manage to get most of the people upgraded and if not, what problems would we face?
9 September 2008 at 12:03 am
Well, a big reason for that is that IE6 ships with Windows XP and there’s still a lot of people who uses that OS. Not all of us are tech pros, many don’t know how to update IE, some don’t even know that there’s IE7 or other browsers. Others go along the line of “If ain’t broke, don’t fix”.
Now, of course this is a major problem, as webmasters have to configure their website for IE6 and IE6 is full of flaws which comprise the user’s security.
The solution? Make IE7 part of an automatic upgrade for Windows, which is not optional.
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9 September 2008 at 12:41 am
@Mathieu: Well Microsoft (and especially the IE team) didn’t really give a crap about this. They need to spend a bit more time and effort on other products and services too.
I don’t get one thing. Why does a lot of public and work computers run IE6. And also a lot of school computers.
Seriously the IE team should consider doing something like what you suggested. Or maybe they could wait and get all the people to switch over to IE8 at once rather than getting IE6 users to upgrade twice.
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9 September 2008 at 2:51 am
25 % is probably the number of people who own illegal windows xp, in the world - and updating to ie7 means u have to go through some verification stuff i think
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9 September 2008 at 2:56 am
It’s called a monopoly man. Cost of switching OS can be very high, especially when the rest of the mainstream world in on Windows.
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9 September 2008 at 2:58 am
I dislike IE6 with a passion due to the pain they have caused us webmasters. Your solution could be a viable option…
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9 September 2008 at 3:37 am
I guess this is aimed at me…..I still use IE6 but only on sites that are stuck in the middle ages and won’t let me use Firefox….
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9 September 2008 at 4:20 am
Well, try this for a different statistic, I’ve got a couple of websites where around 70% of users use IE6. and 1% use IE 5!!!
I’ve been designing for the web for a while now, and the only reasonable solution that I can see is to ask users to move on to a good browser such as Firefox, Opera, Safari or even Google Chrome!
If you’re a FF fan, put up a small banner and link on your website.
Oh, and I do have a couple of blogs that have a 15% IE user base and only around 40% of that 15% use IE6.
So, the issue is more of getting the non-web-savvy users to upgrade to firefox (or at least IE7, for goodness sake)
Cheers!
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9 September 2008 at 8:31 am
“Just put up a nice little message that will pop up on people’s desktop whenever there’s a new update, news or other stuff. The simplest solutions are the best solutions.”
“The solution? Make IE7 part of an automatic upgrade for Windows, which is not optional.”
IE7 Does have a nice BIG pop up telling you you need to upgrade to it when it became available two years ago. The problem? You need SP2 to even see it. If your computer isn’t updated to SP2, MS can’t do automatic upgrades, including the pop up telling you to get IE7. The big problem is that there are 24% of computers running XP SP1 or lower and have no idea how to upgrade, even though there’s a link in the start menu. (The other 1% is web designers forced to still use it to test code.)
Automatic upgrades, whether I like them or not, are a good thing, but people need to be on SP2 or higher for it to actually mean something. IE6 isn’t the problem, because it’d go away if people would actually learn and see the necessity to keep their computer up and running in pristine conditions.
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9 September 2008 at 8:33 am
Some people are just like that,updating is cumbersome for common people.So we can’t just complain. Everyone has his right to choose. They have chosen an older version,and Microsoft doesn’t care as long as they are using IE
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9 September 2008 at 9:57 am
Another big thing to remember is not only is the update from IE6 to IE7 change a lot of the security but the interface itself changes. People don’t like change, especially 70 year old grand parents with dial-up. The major time people switched from IE6 to IE7 was in the first year, that was when the updates bugged them the most about it, during that time though there was a lot of issues with IE7 not displaying some web pages correctly. Now there is very little reason to not upgrade now, the positives way out weight the negatives. But again, anyone above 25 who does not have a hobby in computers or a career does really give a second though to upgrading.
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9 September 2008 at 3:21 pm
The only version of windows that CAN run IE7 is XP, Server 2003, and Vista. (maybe server 2000 as well)
All the businesses that are still using Windows 2000 (non-server) for all their workstations are completely unable to upgrade. Some businesses are even using win98se still. Usually because the programs running on the machines have no updated version that will run on newer operating systems.
I can understand them not supporting IE7 on win98se, but win2k?… some on! That came out less than a year before XP came out. Why the hell can’t win2k run IE7?
(I doubt any businesses are using Windows ME. aka Windows Mistake Edition, but there might still be some home users that don’t know any better.)
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9 September 2008 at 4:45 pm
@spoonTRex: Hmm… I guess I’ll have to say that Windows isn’t very friendly for the average day Joe and senior citizens.
Like I mentioned, people need to be convinced. Microsoft should have really convinced people why they should upgrade to XP SP2 rather than just releasing it and just sitting back.
@Mike: Yeah there is a change in the interface. I know that a lot of people (especially old people) hate changes. They want things the way it always has been, so its easy for them.
If I were working for the IE team then I would have made like a flash tutorial that teaches people how to use the browser properly and what the new features are. People wouldn’t be that scared of the changes then (hopefully).
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10 September 2008 at 1:19 pm
If I may interject a corporate viewpoint here - I can’t upgrade to IE7, and I can’t push it to my users.
Not because I don’t want to, and not because of a distribution issue - most of my users are running XP SP2 just fine. The problem originates with Microsoft itself - the poor design of IE6, and the fact it was so long until IE7 came out.
Several of my web applications simply WILL NOT WORK in IE7. The vendors designed and hard-coded the applications for IE6. I’m stuck with it - I can’t upgrade to IE7, and I can’t use any other browser. I’m screwed. I’m screwed until the vendors all fix their applications to work in IE7, and that will take time, money, testing, and in the health care industry (where I am) sometimes FDA approval before I can upgrade. Once the government is involved, well you can guess where that goes.
I’m screwed because Microsoft had to fix so many things for IE7 that it is not completely compatible with IE6 - there are just too many differences.
I think we all know that Microsoft is famous for this - XP is a solid OS and runs nicely. The only way Microsoft can make more money is to design a new OS that’s just different enough and supports new things that they won’t incorporate into the old OS - things like extra security features that are more trouble than they are worth, and DirectX 10, and a prettier interface.
Only because Microsoft has such an enormous market share can they get away with this - they can bully us all into spending millions of dollars “fixing” applications that are only broken because they had to be to work in IE6. It’s irritating, it’s bad business, and they’ll get away with it. Yet again.
In the meantime, I’d be willing to bet that the majority of that 25% using IE6 are corporate users.
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10 September 2008 at 4:58 pm
Some people can’t update to IE7 since some people are still on Windows 2k.
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10 September 2008 at 4:59 pm
I don’t want to know how many people are still using IE 5.5
I’ll be happy when the 8.0 releases
One way to push users using a version lower then 7… is by pushing them ourselves… there are enough scripts…
in javascript and even htaccess fixes
makes me think of it… going to design a really nasty update banner for my site right know… to display at users with such old browsers
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10 September 2008 at 5:38 pm
I think the main problem is that webmasters care a lot about them…FUCK them, you dont have IE 9.9.9 ultra last edition? Mozilla Firefox super-auto update?, get an empty page and a sign that says “GET A DECENT BROWSER you lame monkey”
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10 September 2008 at 7:07 pm
@anon: IE7 only runs on Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3), Windows XP Professional x64 Edition, or Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1). That’s directly from the IE7 page. So people like me that still run 2000 on some machines can’t upgrade, and even if you have XP you can’t upgrade without the right service packs. Thankfully, there are alternate browsers, but if you can’t be arsed to upgrade one, you probably won’t go out and get another.
(And at my last job we did have one lonely ME machine in the office, but it was rarely used. The funny part? It was a computer store.)
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10 September 2008 at 8:41 pm
IE Team, We Have a Problem…
7 years after it’s original release, a fair amount of web traffic is still using IE6, whats your traffic using?…
10 September 2008 at 8:41 pm
I totally agree. When IE users visit my site they get a message prompting them to upgrade to Firefox. Your welcome
One day Firefox will stomp the smoldering remaining of IE and we’ll never again have to worry about IE hacks, work-arounds or headaches!
Kevin
http://www.teslamap.com/
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10 September 2008 at 10:02 pm
I have to concur with Jes…..in the corporate environment upgrading to IE7 is just not possible for a lot of companies due to existing web sites/applications that just do not work in IE7.
In several industries web sites that are used haven’t been updated in forever or are updated just enough to “get by”.
A couple of examples:
A well known telecommunications company has a web site that is used by other telcos to provision phone lines. Back when the DST changed they HAD to upgrade the Java being used to compensate for the change. But did they upgrade the web site to the latest version of Java (1.5 at the time) NO!! They upgraded to the first version that would work (1.4.2.11) Meanwhile other applications were using 1.5 which can cause major headaches having to use different versions.
Meanwhile this SAME telco post a warning on their site: This web site is NOT compatible with IE7!
I could go on and on about issues like that in the corporate world as I’m sure Jes could too. The bottom line is Microsoft has created this problem and there is no way out of it……corporations have a hard time justifying the time and money that needs to be spent on updating web sites that currently work as they were intended to every time Microsoft comes out with a new browser or OS or application. The old adage: If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
And yes….I would bet that the majority of that 25% is corporate users.
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10 September 2008 at 10:58 pm
From the corporate and university settings I’ve been in in the last few years, another reason that those groups didn’t upgrade was that IE7 broke other applications unrelated to internet usage, making the computers useless. If you have software that’s vetted and at least has the bugs documented, you can actually get some work done. Aside from security issues (which can be handled other ways when you control the entire network the computers are connected to), there aren’t a whole lot of compelling reasons to upgrade.
Of course, I use firefox….
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10 September 2008 at 11:01 pm
The company I work for has a policy prevents me from upgrading beyond IE6. Seems the IT dept is worried that their web-based apps will stop working if we all use IE7 or later. So I use FF3 or Chrome for browsing and IE6 to run the company’s apps.
Noel.
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11 September 2008 at 5:59 am
My main reason for sticking to IE6 when I was using Windows was very simple. IE7 regularly crashed my computer - within minutes, each time I tried to run it. At work our IT person told us *NOT* to upgrade, because it was so unstable.
No clue if they ever fixed the problems, but by then it was too late. I’d switched over to Linux and Firefox.
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11 September 2008 at 6:04 am
Just remember that IE6 was the last IE for users of Windows 2000/98/Me and previous. That’ll really skew your figures
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12 September 2008 at 10:20 am
People probably just prefer IE6 to IE7. Its not that big a deal.
You are basically telling people to buy a new car every time their current one is updated so the mechanics don’t have to sell parts for both old and new.
There will be hardly any people using IE8 because it will probably be very slow and websites that are compatible in IE7 will almost definately work fine in IE8.
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13 September 2008 at 2:40 am
@Freemble, I do get your argument, but IE 6 support is likely to decline by the end of this year. The only probable uses will be proprietary software…
Think about it, if it was meant to be opened in a browser, why would you want to have to specify a single browser? It should work with any browser…
Working with the misfit IE6 has definitely cost web design an arm and a leg in the last few years, and web designers and developers are no longer going to put up with IE6’s idiotic quirks and non-standard implementation of ‘web standards’. I for one will definitely not support IE6 specifically, even if my clients request it.
The battery has to go… the new parts are needed, else you’ll be running on a road that your cant use…
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13 September 2008 at 5:12 am
Support may be stopped for it but people will still use it. I recently used IE5 on a Windows 2000 or ME PC.
25% of people still use IE6 so I think it is going to be necessary to support it.
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13 September 2008 at 11:48 am
@Freemble: I beg to differ.
Yes, it is still available, people still have old OSes… but that does not mean that we should retard ourselves for their convenience… Instead, if people start noticing that more and more websites do not support their outdated browser, then they’ll be more inclined to update. This will be a big step forward in web development.
Supporting a mediocre software only encourages complacency. What we need is this emotion “Why does this damn browser not work like it should?” We then introduce Firefox, or Opera, or Safari, or Chrome to the user…
Bang! We’ve got a convert, and one user less in that 25% block of pain.
What do you think?
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13 September 2008 at 4:03 pm
Yes I think it is a great idea but today 30% of the people who viewed my site were using IE6. I think I might have something popup for users in IE6 to get them to upgrade though.
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13 September 2008 at 4:27 pm
@Susheel Chandradhas: I guess you guys should try what I do. When I make a site, I don’t care about IE6. I don’t even test my site out there.
Plus I think a lot of readers here said that most of the 25% are corporate people who can’t upgrade because their web apps aren’t compatible with IE7.
And I don’t want those IE6 users to switch to Firefox or Safari. Forget Chrome! They should use IE8. I used IE8 last night and I freakin’ love it. I’m thinking of even switching to it. Try it out!
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13 September 2008 at 4:36 pm
Not all of them are corporate people. What would corporate people want to do with Freemble?
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13 September 2008 at 4:40 pm
@Freemble freemble.com: I said “most of the 25% are corporate people.” And then there’s the old folks and tech-retarded people.
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13 September 2008 at 4:42 pm
Sorry didn’t see that but still old folks and tech-retarded people would have any use for my website.
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13 September 2008 at 4:46 pm
@Freemble: Don’t forget public computers! Most of them still use old, shitty computers.
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13 September 2008 at 5:01 pm
Yes but in this day and age very few people use public computers and even if people do most people use more modern and up to date internet cafes unless you mean the library but still not many people use them especially not 30%.
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14 September 2008 at 8:59 pm
But ie7 looks like shit.
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17 September 2008 at 3:34 am
Microsoft doesn’t care about the web designers or who uses what browser. As I am sure that all of you know well, there are standards for web design out there, yet ie doesn’t follow them.
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17 September 2008 at 4:00 pm
@timmy: I think it looks great.
@Brian: IE is great. I don’t see what the problem is but a lot of other browsers are just better.
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