IE6 Usage Falls to Under 1% in U.S.

More interesting in the latter case, less interesting if this is the internal wiki in some MegaCorp.

Not that it's an entirely bad thing, but since IE8 is becoming more standard, wouldn't updating to IE9 be easier?

Back when Google Search still supported IE6 as a first-class citizen, I found that very few lines of code were needed to make IE6 work. However, figuring out what those lines of code were could easily take more time than making it work in every other browser. Just the amount of time lost because I accidentally included a trailing comma made me want to throw my Windows laptop across the room.

An example: the "about page" for Google Music. You need to download the newest Chrome to view it. I don't call it progress if accessibility and backwards compatibility get the shaft.

>>This is a law, and being blind is rarely a choice.

Two things: I hope you make sites accessible for the blind, not because it is law, but simply because you want the blind to access your content. Put another way: If it wasn't for the law, we could forget about the blind too? Accessibility needs a law for front-end engineers to take note?

Being on IE6 is rarely a choice too, especially in a corporate environment.

>>Because they were built with two codebases, one for regular browsers, one for IE6. Double the work for that 1%.

You don't need exceptions to make sites render on IE6. You only need exceptions if you start implementation in a modern browser, and make IE6 a minute after-thought.

>> But IE6 required a lot of browser-specific code.

Only if _you_ required hacks to make a design work.

>>Is that progress? Yes.

I don't think that was the progress that Tim Berners Lee had in mind. A progress where HTML documents from the HTML5 era become inaccessible to later generations.

Disclaimer: I am able to build sites that render in IE6, without much hacks or troubles or extra work, but I don't like working around its quirks. I don't have a strong opinion on why and when IE6 should die, and I certainly don't want to play that judge with my clients websites. I want maximum accessibility, and that includes IE6 in my opinion.

This is the issue. Most people don't know this. I was (1) an avid firefox user from the alpha stage and even I didn't know about the compatibility reporter with out some serious Googling, they should advertise it better

Especially since plugins are far and away firefox's strong suit over other browsers and they want to go with the new update scheme and change the version numbers so much.

(1) Sadly no longer am, due to the memory issues the Chrome team figured out how to fix. I still use it occasionally because I miss its much better user experience but until they get the multi process model done Chrome just uses resouces so much better I can't justify it

That said, refusing to upgrade from 3.6 or 4 still seems crazy.

Switch to another browser if you don't like the new FF.

But FF isn't so bad. Without the backing of big corp (which is what kept IE6 in this game so long) there is no or almost no pressure to make sure new homepages still works.

In some areas, yes. In some areas, they're even ahead of the competition. Other areas still lack however, WebGL, as you mention is one of them.

Sadly, their slow update-cycle means that whatever they release will soon lack the latest features that other browsers support.

The best hope to get rid of IE 8 is the same thing that killed IE 6 for good: popularity for the recent version of Windows. If Vista didn't falter the way it did, we would have had less time on IE 6, due to adoption of Vista's preinstalled IE 7.

Perhaps the solution is to develop a flash replacement for the HTML5 elements that we can then force feed IE and all you have to do is include that script on a page to give your users a modern expericence, even if they have to be dragged into it.

Heck NSS supports it so Firefox and Chrome must be good for SEED (https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=478839)