RE: re Rant

Well, I am out of this one.

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-hwg-techniques(at)hwg.org
[mailto:owner-hwg-techniques(at)hwg.org]On Behalf Of John Allred
Sent: Tuesday, October 09, 2001 1:54 PM
To: hwg-techniques(at)mail.hwg.org
Subject: Re: re Rant


It's been an NN vs. IE thing for years. The crux of the problem for
Netscape is that the W3C decided on a DOM (document object model) more
in line with IE's DOM than Netscape's. This effectively killed any
upgrade path for NS 4.x. As I'm sure you know, Netscape skipped ahead to
NS 6, which incorporates the W3C-approved DOM, but hardly anyone I know
of is thrilled with it. With Microsoft cramming IE upgrades down
everyone's throat with each OS upgrade, IE definitely dominates the
browser field, and its dominance will continue to grow.

So that leaves developers, for the next couple of years anyway, to
decide whether they go all the way supporting IE or continue to support
other browsers, including NS 4.x.

I would put it in perspective with this analogy. Both present-day
English and German descended from Old German. Do we castigate the
English for not adopting German, or do we make allowances for the split
along two different paths and do what's necessary to translate between
the two languages? If the issue is that the languages split, then
there's no solution. They are simply not the same, despite their common
heritage. But, if the issue is communication of information, then there
are ways to deal with it.

I can tell you, as a person who uses NS 4.78 almost exclusively for
browsing, I rarely find a site that will not let me in or give me the
information it presents. A notable exception is the Microsoft Gaming
Zone. My conclusion is that there are an awful lot of developers and
designers who accommodate the idiosyncrasies of Netscape, whether they
prefer to or not.

My advice is to make a conscious decision what you are going to do. If
you feel you need to continue to support NS, then educate yourself on
how to do it. If not, then forget it.

If advanced features are really needed, but you can't afford to drop
support for NS users, then consider the advice from the WAI (Web
Accessibility Initiative). You don't have to dumb an application down to
make it accessible to all. All you have to do, at a minimum, is provide
a text alternative for those parts of a site that are inaccessible to
some. That's just one approach--there are lots of others available as
well. The W3C recommends the use of CSS for display attributes, leaving
the underlying HTML as free as possible of markup. It's a relatively
minor matter to create two different style sheets for the same HTML. One
takes advantage of the newer features of IE. The other presents the site
in a way that Netscape can handle.

HTH,
John Allred

Lisa Howell wrote:
>
> It appears now it is a NN vs. IE thing. I give up!
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-hwg-techniques(at)hwg.org
> [mailto:owner-hwg-techniques(at)hwg.org]On Behalf Of
> bryan.westbrook(at)amd.com
> Sent: Monday, October 08, 2001 4:57 PM
> To: hwg-techniques(at)mail.hwg.org
> Subject: RE: re Rant
>
> HTML was not intended for browser publishers to have to make allowances.
> HTML was made for compatibility.  Yes, Netscape has some proprietary tags,
> but there is no worse offender when it comes to abusing the standards than
> Microsoft.  The fault for those tags not working in Navigator lies with
> Microsoft not Netscape and seem to be part of a larger strategy to
eliminate
> the competition by making it incompatible.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Lisa Howell [mailto:nstar92(at)bellatlantic.net]
> Sent: Monday, October 08, 2001 1:14 PM
> To: Lois Wakeman; HWG techniques
> Subject: RE: re Rant
>
> But my anger is at NN for not making allowances!

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