What to do with Internet Explorer 6

IE6 has taken a lot of heat (for good reason). Now the griping has gone to the next level, sites like Facebook, You Tube and Digg have either dropped browser support or warned about dropping support by suggesting new alternatives (Firefox, Chrome, Opera, even Internet Explorer 8).

Development Issues

Geeks like me realize why IE6 is such a burden to deal with. From a development point of view, it is not W3C standards compliant, which means often times it requires more hours to complete development for cross browser compatibility. There are evident security issues with world-readable cookies, compatible software vulnerabilities among other issues.

Web Design Issues

As a designer, I like to use transparent PNG images for opaque image backgrounds. There is virtually no support for such image extensions without hacking up a style-sheet.

Internet Enthusiast issues

As an internet enthusiast, there are browsers with more useful addons/widgets/updates. Does IE6 have a TwitterBar, Gmail Notifier or ColorPicker ? No… the only relatively useful tool I have used from this browser is a very buggy developer toolbar.

It is interesting to see the younger communities and even some smaller corporations petition about the aches and pains of poor support and vulnerabilities with this browser. What does this say about how decisions are made about software support and the internet community? Users are in charge, not the corporations pumping out mediocre software with an occasional update that doesn’t address major problems.

Are you using IE6 and missing out on content from some of your favorite websites?

Not totally sure?

  1. Open Internet Explorer
  2. Click on Help
  3. Click on About Internet Explorer
  4. Look at the Version… does it say 6? If so, it’s time to upgrade!
    Mozilla Firefox

    • Firefox has a ludicrous amount of add-ons for developers, designers and just about any other tech industry you could imagine.  Not to mention, it has tabular browsing!  What a luxury!

    Google Chrome

    • Chrome is quick and secure and uses a super fast JavaScript engine, something that IE6 is severely lacking.

    Apple Safari

    • Very reminiscent of Chrome, quick Webkit rendering engine and visually attractive.

    Opera

    • Customizable, interesting widgets, speed dial browsing and a very nice looking browser.

    What you should/can upgrade to

    What can you do to not drown in the cold murky waters after the IE6 ship tanks? Update to something worth your while!

    As age old software is taken over by more productive and efficient competition, users should work this change to their advantage. Consider ditching IE6, and save yourself some valuable time!

See how Hall can help increase your demand.