Quoting: Big Mouse
I think I speak for most when I say that most of us can't see any on screen difference between browsers unless someone's written code specifically for one or the other.
But that defeats the argument doesn't it?, Web designers still have to work to the masses - or should do if their customers want their web sites seen by the masses - so why not work to the standards of the masses.
If you can't see any difference between sites when using different browsers then the web designer has done their job very well (or it's a *very* simple site).
The problem is that as a web designer you put things in the html code to define, for example, that one column is say 300 pixels wide, and the column next to it is 600 pixels wide. You'll tell it to leave a margin of 10 pixels between the columns. IE will double that margin to 20 pixels whereas Firefox, Safari, Chrome etc will give you 10 pixels as you asked.
this is a (slightly) simplified example but the point is that each browser will interpret your commands differently, and in the case of IE often in a nonsensical way.
IE will interpret it one way, and every other browser will interpret it the same way as each other. In other words they will interpret it the way the standard was written. Microsoft break all the rules, cause major headaches, and get away with it because people can't be arsed to download a free browser and install it.
To make matters even more fun, IE6 will interpret the code on the page differently to IE7. Which is interpreted differently by IE8. Microsoft are just not consistent. A site that has somehow been massaged to look consistent across IE6 and IE7 (and not to mention Firefox et al) can look different on IE8. Then when you fix it on IE8 you break it on IE6.
The Internet Explorer team at Microsoft need taking outside and shooting.
As for developing for the majority (Internet Explorer), no. Developers should make a stand and develop for the standard the whole world has agreed on. And when IE users go to a site they should be presented with a popup warning them that the site may not display correctly and they should consider downloading Firefox. If every site did that it would be the end of IE and good riddance to it.
I develop sites for Safari, Firefox and Chrome.
I ensure it works and looks *ok* on IE7 but don't worry about the details. I don't even test it on IE6 anymore as it's too much work.
Getting IE7 and IE6 compatibility bang on doubles my development time and thus doubles the bill to my customer. Think about that next time you get a quote for a website for a business and wonder if the world really should still be using IE...
With computer use likely to decline due to mobile devices and tablets, a market which Microsoft is struggling desperately with, Apple and Google who write their stuff to stick to agreed world standards will hopefully relegate these problems to the digital past. And Apple gets extra cool points form me for pushing the open, world agreed HTML5 standard, while ignoring Flash, a dated, proprietry standard which is inefficient and buggy. The sooner that dies the better although I'd rather live in a world where flash lives and IE is dead than the other way around...
Apologise for the soap box, please return to your discussion about the purchase of other sub standard Microsoft products that exist only as everyone has been using them for so long that no-one dares to "think different".
