Sunday 21 December 2008

Denouncing Internet Explorer

If you're having problems viewing this blog - awkwardly aligned pictures, strange margins etc - chances are you belong to the shrinking population of Internet Explorer users. While I feel obliged to cater to the needs of all potential readers, I'm quickly running out of patience tweaking the template to run properly in IE. Earlier, it took me two frustrating hours before I eventually got the layouts of the div components right. Now, I'm having problems with the alignment of images.

Alright. That was the last straw. I hereby pronounce this blog IE-unfriendly!

IE is a major headache for all web developers. (No wonder the folks call it "the cancer of the web".) Even the pros are having a tough time with IE, not to say an amateur like me. I'm totally a PHP illiterate; neither can I perform fancy magic with JavaScript and XML. The only trick I've got up the sleeves is CSS. Unfortunately, IE is as much a retard in CSS as I am in art. Especially when you're dealing with the margins and paddings of div components, IE can be very cantankerous. Of course, it's possible to work around those problems - ironically - by utilizing IE bugs , but why take the trouble, I say.

The design of a website depends on the target audience. All this while, I've strictly kept my blog to 800 pixels wide for the sake of those with low-resolution monitors. But check out this latest statistics provided by W3school. While they may not be 100% realistic figures, they at least give you an image of it.

Display Resolution
Obviously, more than 90% of the computers nowadays have at least a 1024x768-pixel display. That's why I set this blog at 1000 pixels wide. Now my blog can afford to spare a bigger piece of the real estate for the photos I intend to post.

Now, check out the browser statistics.

Browser Statistics
As you can see, both Firefox and IE share almost the same size of the pie. But there's a steady trend in the dropping percentage of IE users - down by about 10% compared to last year. I guess that justifies my decision to stop wasting my time tweaking my template to suit IE.

4 persons flung their shoes:

K.O.J.A. said...

I'd like to comment that this blog is streamyx unfriendly too... takes eternity to load

Kryptos said...

sorry but i dodged ur shoe.
so, you're in pg eh? face it, dude. shitmyx sux. i guess the header and the photos are heavy weight. anyway it takes less than 2 seconds to load over here Xp

Yap! It's 3088.. said...

sorry what's IE again? Is that an animal or a toy? o sorry! i just read the title. took me a while to recall as i've been with Firefox since the time Dr M descended the throne ;)

Kryptos said...

oh, ie's the greatest miracle in the world of IT. it makes everything that is suppose to run well go wrong/ XD