Serendipity Forums

[yellowled]

Answering a question Don posted in another thread:

how browser compatible is 2k11? We made sure bp was VERY browser compatible, back to at least IE6 I think... did you do the same with 2k11?

2k11 is tested (and, as now, working properly) in current and recent versions of Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Opera. "Recent" means "anything that was current since I started developing it", but old versions tend not to be an issue with these browsers anyway since they have been very standards-compliant for quite some time now. Also, users of these browsers tend to update very rapidly, especially with Firefox and Chrome now featuring "rolling" releases which are being updated automagically. (So, no, it has not been tested in FF 2.x or even 3.x. That doesn't make sense anymore.)

As for our favourite browser, 2k11 is tested (and, again, working properly) in IE 7, 8 and 9. It does not support IE 6, and it never will. I flat-out refuse to do so, period. IE 6 is dead. If anyone is still using it, too bad.

However, 2k11 does not "look the same" in IE 8 and especially 7. It is usable and accessable, but does not make an effort to replicate every feature it has in modern browsers. Don't worry, that's okay. Polyfills have been included to replicate the most important new HTML5/CSS3 features, but it really doesn't make sense to blow it up in terms of CSS/JS just for eye-candy.

This is especially important because being a responsive template, 2k11 is supposed to be light-weight to make blogs using it fun to use on mobile devices (and, more importantly, mobile connections) as far as possible. Of course, a template can never reach that goal on it's own – if your blog uses plugins which pull in further JS, has 20 posts per page and/or uses a lot of images, chances are it will not be very usable on a mobile connection. There's really not much I can do about that template-wise.

Which brings us to mobile browsers. Unfortunately, my personal testing options are fairly limited in that area. I have an Android smartphone with a rather small display, so I can only test it on that myself. Emulators are not really much of help here, but thanks to a rather solid user base and a lot of help from the community, 2k11 is also rather well tested on various mobile devices, including iPhone, iPad, various Android smartphones and even some weird Blackberry device. Oh, and on a Kindle. Can't really remember anyone reporting testing it on an Android tablet or a Windows Mobile phone.

You still think BP was "very browser compatible"?

YL

[Don Chambers]

Thanks for the response. yes, I think bp was very browser compatible AT THE TIME... we all spent countless hours tracking down fixes, most notably in IE and FF. Glad those days are behind us! I am happy to hear that 2k11 supports IE versions back to 7. I too do not care about IE6 - that browser was a beast!

[yellowled]

I too do not care about IE6 - that browser was a beast!

Let me just state for fellow readers of this thread that 2k11 does not not support IE 6 because it is too hard or I am too lazy. It just doesn't make sense any more. Apart from countries behind the great Asian firewall, IE 6 is down to less than a few percents usage all over the world (below 1% in most western countries). Most of the "big players" (Google, YouTube, et. al.) have dropped IE 6 support. It would be absolutely insane to still support IE6.

YL

[Don Chambers]

Didn't mean to imply that it was too hard or you were to lazy either! I have not seen IE6 show up in any access log of the sites I check on a regular basis in a very long time.

[yellowled]

I have not seen IE6 show up in any access log of the sites I check on a regular basis in a very long time.

Oh, I still do. I just don't care anymore. BTW, on my blog, IE7 is quickly catching up with that. Unfortunately, my blog has webdev content only, so it's not very representative in that area.

YL