Why web developers should hate IE7 by Matt
Matt

Why web developers should hate IE7

by Matt in Journal

Yesterday I was working on a very large community website for my main client. We were in the phase where we put the development website in production. Everything went smoothly due to a great job in both parts (on their side with the IT director, and of course on my side). Except one thing, one page wasn't showing up correctly in IE7.

That's not something I wasn't expecting, of course it's IE, so no surprise here. Naturally, I started searching for what can be causing that bug. I didn't found it after 4 hours of tweaking in code and CSS. All the page of the website are using the same templates and that one buggy page was no exception, so in the end modifying the code or the css wasn't doing any good to the rest of the pages.

It's only after a good night of sleep that I did found where the problem was. Specifically on that webpage, the CMS was inserting a comment in the first two lines of the document. I removed it since they were the only difference with the other pages. And voila ! That ******* two lines comment was triggering a bug in IE. Add a comment before the DOCTYPE and IE is not able to load it properly. Way to go Microsoft !

And that's why developers should hate IE. If your code work on every web browsers on the market, you are almost always certain that it will not properly in IE.

I had great hope with IE7 and Microsoft working hard to make it better. But unfortunately, days after days, I am forced to note that it is not much better than before. Just type "IE7 css bugs" in Google and you'll know what I mean.

In the end, IE7 is pretty much like Vista : it's a waste of time.

Firefox 2

;)

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  • Lyrilith

    Lyrilith

    Jepp, I don't realy like Microsoft stuff.. I'm thinking about getting myself a Mac cause I'm only doing grafik stuff and don't do any gaming.. XD I'm using XP and of course Firefox. ^

    Aug 18th, 2007 Reply
  • luminire

    luminire

    i don't even believe you thought ie was gonna get any better. ;p
    stay on safari or firefox and you're pwnage!

    Aug 8th, 2007 Reply
  • solace

    solace

    Definitely. If someone uses IE, it's because they don't know that there are other better browsers out there.

    My job completely revolves around making sure my CSS looks the same in both FF and IE. Eventually you get used to predicting IE's problems...

    Aug 6th, 2007 Reply
    • Matt

      Matt

      Yeah eventually we get used to that. But it's really a shame that Microsoft is not putting is shit together to make something better. It's not like they have not the ressources...

      Aug 17th, 2007 Reply
  • Folioware

    Folioware

    often a bug appears when the doctype isnt the first line in the html.
    i have yet to develop a website which works first time in IE
    everyone ditch IE, get Firefox !!!!

    Jul 13th, 2007 Reply
  • Maryl

    Maryl

    All the Microsoft tools are a waste of time, after they steal every single idea from Opera , Safari and FF, they can't even get it to work properly, they think that copying is good enough for Microsoft users but they don't worry about web developers, they just worry about the people who checks their e-mails and stuff like that.

    That's why i love FF and Apple.

    Jul 12th, 2007 Reply
  • vex

    vex

    i hate all the browsers cause they refuse to work in harmony =/

    Jul 6th, 2007 Reply
  • richholt

    richholt

    I'd like to add.. PNG FILES ARE *calms down* png files are are still different in colour in IE and FF.. which is correct? one of them need to sort it out, im pointing at IE as they are suspect for most f*ckups!

    Jun 21st, 2007 Reply
  • luminire

    luminire

    dude everything related to windows is a waste of time.
    firefox or safari ftw! ;p

    Jun 16th, 2007 Reply
  • Matt

    Matt

    "I don't understand the point of releasing such a horrible product despite years of development."

    That's the statement defining what Microsoft has been doing since Windows 2000 which was their best product of all time.

    Jun 16th, 2007 Reply
  • axl99

    axl99

    Firefox ftw. Nuff said.

    I hate having to calibrate my webpage to work with IE in general. Last time I checked my site it looked like it had erroneous iframes all over the place on IE7, which is like a complete step backward on its predecessor. I don't understand the point of releasing such a horrible product despite years of development.

    Jun 16th, 2007 Reply
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