More on Browsers
Friday, July 18, 2003
Tim Bray, The Door Is Ajar, co-created XML 1.0 and he’s a respected voice in online tech circles. His analysis of the future of web browsers is based on 20 years of experience in the industry. He considers this a good time to try to start getting web surfers to switch to browsers other than Internet Explorer.
The main reason to switch away from IE is that it’s dead. There won’t be any more developments on the PC platform and the Mac version is now fee-based. The Mac people have already started switching to Safari simply because it’s so much faster than any of the alternatives. PC users are keeping a hold of IE though, despite the fact that it is already behind on supporting current technologies, much less new ones.
When talking about web technologies in browsers, I automatically think of flash, which so far contributes very little to the sites that use it and make them much slower and more difficult to use. But it also means things like the PNG image format where, with real transparency, web page designers can create beautiful roll-over effects with a single image and line in a style sheet instead of 2 or 3 images and an extra javascript. Mozilla, Safari, and Opera all support PNGs. IE doesn’t.
Web technologies also means Cascading Style Sheets. Without going into too much detail, CSS has been known to cut web page sizes in half without making them look any different. Along with page size are usability benefits. A simple style sheet switcher lets users choose how they want to see the site: more contrast, more muted colors, larger font; one click and you have a much easier time reading the content. IE does support many things but there are others it doesn’t and now never will. So instead of 2 lines in the CSS file, there’s a whole external javascript to do the same thing.
This doesn’t even mention the usefullness of tabbed browsing or built-in pop-up blocking. How many times have you gone to a public computer to find half size windows with porn ads 50 deep?
Many find the idea of having to use a new piece of software scary but the truth is that in general they work the same. There are forward, back, home, and reload buttons and an address bar. Favorites and bookmarks are the same thing and take you back to places you want to remember. The rest you can take your time discovering or look up when you want them. And for free, you don’t lose anything by trying.
Computing News — laura
