I am trying to find out if there is a summary for all the css fixes for the classes added (such as lt-ie9, lt-ie8, lt-ie7 etc) in the IE statements as in the code shown in Paul Irish's website: http://www.paulirish.com/2008/conditional-stylesheets-vs-css-hacks-answer-neither/
if there is no such summary, do I fix the css issues (and add those fixes I come across in books/online) after actually testing the browsers ?
<!--[if lt IE 7]> <html class="lt-ie9 lt-ie8 lt-ie7"> <![endif]-->
<!--[if lt IE 7]> <html class="lt-ie9 lt-ie8 lt-ie7"> <![endif]-->
<!--[if lt IE 7]> <html class="lt-ie9 lt-ie8 lt-ie7"> <![endif]-->
<!--[if gt IE 8]><!--> <html class=""> <!--<![endif]-->
A lot of the time, you won't (or shouldn't) need the IE-specific classes. Writing code specific to a particular browser or version is considered bad practice in today's web; in most cases it is better to detect whether the feature you need is supported, rather than checking the browser itself.
This has a number of advantages; the main one is that it frees you from having to learn about all the browser features out there and which browsers support them. It also means that if someone visits your site using another old browser that doesn't have a given feature, your code will continue to work. But it also has advantages for making your code cleaner and easier to work with in the future. There is a library called Modernizr that does a similar thing to the code you quoted, but adds classes according to features supported by the browser. In fact, the same Paul Irish who wrote the code you quoted is also lead developer for Modernizr.
You can check IE's support for various features in various versions in either http://CanIUse.com or http://QuirksMode.org/css/. CanIUse is better for checking newer browser features, but Quirksmode is better for checking the basic CSS features as it has finer grained details.
Many features that are missing from old IE versions can be implemented via "polyfill" scripts. For example, http://CSS3Pie.com/ is a script that adds support for border-radius, CSS gradients and other features to old IE versions. A lot of the time it's better to simply let the browser do its thing and ignore the missing features (eg rounded corners are nice, but the site won't stop working if they're missing), but if you find yourself needing certain features and you absolutely have to support them in all browsers, there's a good list of polyfill scripts here you can try (that list is provided by Modernizr, by the way, so they should all work well with it).
So for the missing features in old IE versions, you shouldn't need the IE-specific classes.
The only time you are likely to need the IE-specific classes is for dealing with browser bugs.
There isn't a definitive list of all known IE bugs (not that I know of anyway), but there are plenty of sites on the web that give details of them and how to deal with them.
First, make sure that IE renders the page in standards mode. If you're in quirks mode or compatibility mode, you may get issues. Avoiding quirks mode in particular will get rid of the worst of the layout weirdness that historically gave IE a bad name.
If you're in the unfortunate position of needing to support IE6, you will need to know about the various bugs it has and how to work around them. There are quite a lot of them, and being able to segregate those bug fixes so they only apply to affected IE versions is important so your IE classes will come in handy.
Later versions of IE have fewer bugs; IE8 is relatively well behaved and frankly doesn't generally require much in the way of browser-specific bug fixes. IE7 can still be problematic though, and IE6 is just horrible. The key here is knowing when you're being hit by a specific bug, and issuing the CSS fix accordingly.
For this, the answer to your second question is: Yes, you just need to test, test, test, and when you see something in whatever version of IE that is weird, you need to investigate it, work out the cause, and if it's a bug, deal with it as appropriate.
Yep, test in each browser, add any thing required afterwards.
There is a service, which may help you to see css features support.
http://caniuse.com/
So you can see which code will make a difficulties in lower browser versions.
I designed a web page using HTML, and when I try to open my website using Google Chrome it works fine and everything is good.
but when I try to open the same web page on internet explorer its corrupted, the styles aren't the way they are ?
can anyone tell me a way to make my website appear on internet explorer the same way it does on Google chrome !!!
is there a script to write or some tag to add to my header ?
Best Regards.
Entire books could be (and probably have been) written on this subject. Your styles are not "corrupted", they are just being interpreted differently by IE than Chrome (and most other browsers).
In terms of how to fix it, adding an IE-specific stylesheet is a common solution, and probably one of the most practical. You can use conditional comments to include it, like:
<!-- Everyone gets the default stylesheet -->
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/css/styles.css" />
<!-- Anyone using IE7 and above gets the IE styles too -->
<!--[if gte IE 7]>
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/css/ie-overrides.css" />
<![endif]-->
Then it's up to you to implement the styles that you put in ie-overrides.css so that they make your site look the same in IE as in other browsers. Depending upon just how broken your IE layout is, this can be a relatively quick job, or it may drag on and on for what feels like an eternity. And then you'll understand why so many web developers dislike IE.
I never start a site without the http://html5boilerplate.com/ project.
It resets a ton of idiosyncratic browser behaviour and allows you to target styles just for IE or its versions without needing specific style sheets.
Try to use CSS Reset Sheets
http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/css/reset/
First off check your page with http://validator.w3.org/ and the css-validator at the bottom to make sure your code is standards compliant, also read this page about what can trigger ie into quirks mode http://www.quirksmode.org/css/quirksmode.html . Another thing is to look into ie7-js(and ie8-js, it also supports previous versions) which is "A JavaScript library to make MSIE behave like a standards-compliant browser."
I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get this aligned correctly in IE7/8..
If you look at the site in Firefox 4+ it works fine! Not sure if that is the right thing or not..
At the top where the "Sign In" link is; in firefox is exactly how I want it but in IE it is displayed all weird.
If anyone could help, that'd be great. (the site isn't fully functional yet.. still working on it.. thanks!)
First, before any attempt to debug CSS is made, you must always validate your page.
You have 23 Errors at this time, and they are pretty important (but easy to fix) ones. You have unclosed divs, paragraphs, etc. It may be just a couple of errors that are causing a cascade.
My advice: Fix those errors. Start at the first one and work your way down until they all are gone. You are likely to see IE problems disappear. The other browsers are just being more forgiving.
Conditional comments are an option for when you're really stuck, but 99% of the time you don't truly need it. Often IE errors are caused by mistakes that other browsers are nice enough to deal with in a graceful manner.
Once upon a time I used to design IN Internet Explorer, and found that checking my work in FF or Chrome was almost always in line with IE's rendering. Sometimes the newer browsers are too forgiving of errors so you don't catch them.
In your html you can use special css just for ie so other browsers just ignore:
<!--[if lt IE 9]>
<style type="text/css">
your css here
</style>
<![endif]-->
you could just create another styling section for IE using *+ hack. IE:
*+.signin{
.....
}
I have made my site in html5 and added the following to the head section:
<!--[if lt IE 9]>
<script src="http://html5shiv.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/html5.js"></script>
<![endif]-->
<script src="modernizr-1.7.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
for some reason when I view my site in IE 6, 7 and early versions of mozilla and safari it only displays the html and the style sheet is not being accessed (there are no styles applied). I don't know what to do, someone please help!
IE6 barely supports HTML4, never mind HTML 5 :P Seriously though. IE6 is 10 years old, it's never going to properly support HTML5. You may find a JavaScript based workaround but it'll be flakey. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_layout_engines_%28HTML5%29
I wonder if the problem is your slightly complicated media attribute.
Quoting here,
Since legacy browsers (e.g., Netscape
4.x) only support screen, you can hide all CSS from them by adding a
non-supported media type such as:
screen, projection or simply all
Maybe IE6, 7 and the others don't have full support either and so just fail to load the CSS.
I am aware that there are probably other questions regarding this topic. I guess that every web developer goes through this with IE.
My problem:
I am developing a web-based application fully based on Javascript. I am a Mac user. I was really happy that everything worked great in Safari, Firefox and Opera. I then asked a friend with Windows to check it with Internet Explorer, and things don't work as well. My application is very sensitive to the HTML standards.
The main problem is the CSS layout. The JavaScript itself seems to be working properly thanks to jQuery for portability.
My question:
How do you deal with Internet Explorer? Should I create a new CSS that is only loaded on Internet Explorer? Should I create a new version of the application only for Internet Explorer? How do you normally handle this? The application is pretty big both in feature design and in layout design.
Edit:
Using the CSS reset as suggested by Nosredna, already removed almost half of the problems. I guess it really is a good practice. I noticed that SO also uses it.
Do you specify a valid doctype? You can get Internet Explorer to be a bit more compliant by switching it into standards mode. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb250395.aspx#cssenhancements_topic2
Do you use a browser reset CSS file? That can help bring the versions together. http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/css/reset/
Be aware of IE's CSS bugs: http://www.positioniseverything.net/explorer.html
For the skeleton of your layout, consider using markup that is known to work, such as http://matthewjamestaylor.com/blog/perfect-multi-column-liquid-layouts or http://960.gs/ for liquid or fixed layouts, respectively.
Keep up with JavaScript differences between browsers. jQuery handles some of them, but not all of them. http://www.impressivewebs.com/7-javascript-differences-between-firefox-ie/
Yeah, IE is a pain. If you want it to work in IE, you really want to test in IE every couple days. You don't want to save the pain for the end--you want to handle the nightmares one at a time.
By the way, if you think IE is a pain, try looking at your page with a mobile phone. The other day I went to REI.com with an iPhone and the middle fifth or more of the screen was taken up by a bunch of garbled markup that rendered as text.
Conditional comments.
<!--[if IE 6]>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="ie6.css">
<![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 7]>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="ie7.css">
<![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 8]>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="ie8.css">
<![endif]-->
<!--[if !IE]-->
<link rel="stylesheet" href="normal.css">
<!--[endif]-->
In the IE files, you can use #import to import normal.css, and then override the styles as necessary.
First and foremost, I don't wait until the project is done to consider browser compatibility.
Most of the time for CSS issues there are ways to do things that don't require browser-specific stylesheets to be loaded, so I try to use those solutions wherever possible. For example - if most of your issues are related to box model problems, things like using nested divs in place of padding can help to make sure everything looks correct without the need for separate stylesheets and templates for different browsers.
Browser reset to start. Level the playing field as much as possible and do away with browser defaults. Build your CSS from the ground up. (See: http://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2007/04/12/reset-styles/)
Test early and often across all major browsers during development.
Try to accomplish as much as possible without browser specific hacks. Sometimes you'll need to work in some browser-specific CSS but it should validate (use the W3C Validation tool). Sometimes though there's just nothing for it but a conditional (and maybe even some JavaScript), e.g. fix for transparent PNGs in IE6 (See: http://nettuts.com/videos/screencasts/5-easy-ways-to-tackle-ie6s-transparency-issues/).
If you cannot run IE on one of your development machines, try http://browsershots.org. At least you can get some feedback this way.
Use a debug.css that highlights or outlines divs and other elements. Toss this into your HTML head if needed during development. This can be a huge help.
Use "developer toolbars" where available (IE, Firefox).
EXPECT THAT IE IS GOING TO BE A PAIN, and TEST IN 6, 7 and 8.
Have fun!
Here is how I try to reduce the pain of dealing with IE:
Use a reset.css - Yahoo! YUI Reset or Eric Meyer's Reset CSS
Be careful with floats, clears - they typically cause a lot of cursing.
Be aware of hasLayout bugs in IE, typically adding a zoom: 1 or height attributes helps fix this. Read On Having Layout.
Get the layout working in Firefox, Safari, Chrome, etc while keeping IE about 80% of the way there.
Implement a IE6.css style and an IE7.css style if needed using conditional comments.
Beer, Liquor or other adult beverages.
First, read On Having Layout, which explains how the IE rendering engine works internally. IE's rendering engine is from before CSS. It doesn't properly distinguish between inline and block elements like you'd expect. Instead, in IE an element hasLayout. Or not. This is the source of 99% of IE CSS bugs. So, read that article a couple of times.
As for fixes, I usually use conditional comments. Several reasons:
They are future proof, as opposed to CSS hacks. What if IE9 fixes the hack but not the bug you're using it to solve?
It's valid (X)HTML (conditional comments are just plain comments to everyone else)
It doesn't require javascript. You'd be amazed how many people have javascript turned off.
One remark about conditional comments: Never use an open ended match. That is, never do something like:
<!--[if IE]> <load css> <![endif]-->
<!--[if gte IE 7]> <load css> <![endif]-->
The reason is the same as hacks: make it future proof. What if the next version of IE fixes the bug and you don't need the fixes anymore? Or worse, the "fix" now actually messes up your layout in the new IE version? It's usually best to assume that the next version of IE has fixed the bug that you are working around. I have written a little bit about that back when IE 8 was on the horizon.
I think it would be okay to write a specific css file for IE. I know it is a pain, but because of some possitioning issues, IE6 looks different than all other browswers.
Use this line for your newly created css file:
<!--[if ie6]><link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="screen" href="ie6_style.css" /><![endif]-->
With IE getting around 65% of the traffic, I don't think you can think of it as an after-thought.
Overall, I try to do as much as I can without making a separate CSS file for IE. I'll use come conditional formatting to target it specifically if needed. Overall though, at most you might need to do an IE only stylesheet to get it to work.
Just be sure that you are testing with the proper versions of IE for your audience, as IE 6, 7, and 8 are quite sommon.
As a last resort, when tweaking the CSS just won't fix things, I like to use Rafael Lima's CSS selector script. While it depends on JavaScript (most sites I build do anyway), it provides a convenient way to tweak CSS for different browsers and versions without separate stylesheets.
You can have :
.someClass {
margin-left:1px
}
.ie6.someclass {
margin-left:2px
}
<script>
if (internetExplorer) {
window.location = "http://getfirefox.com";
}
</script>
Keep the markup as simple as possible. Make small changes. Test every change.
I delete it
I would think that developing a new CSS File for use in IE would be considerably easier then re-writing your application, but I don't know what scale and scope your application has that would even render doing that a considerable option. I guess it can depend on what versions of IE you're looking to support.
We're at a point now that most users should have completely migrated away from IE6. IE7 is still a hassle, but nowhere near as bad as 6 was. With my projects, the default setup I sell is IE7 compatibility with code to direct users of IE6 and below to upgrade. If a client wants me to incorporate IE6 compatibility into a site, I typically increase the quoted price by 50% because of how awful of a headache is is to support the browser and how much extra visual code has to be written to make it work.
I know that this may fall into the 'too little, too late' category. That said, I would investing in VMWare or Parallels and create a Windows VM w/ IE6.
As you are developing, you should incrementally check your progress in the browsers that you care about.
That said, with an existing application, I would first make sure that my HTML was valid (there are a variety of validation services at your disposal) then, depending on the layout, I was section-by-section try to get the layout right, using comments to 'hide' the sections that you are not actively working on.
I usually do everything I can to avoid having to create a separate CSS file. There are a lot of CSS & HTML tricks & tips out there that should allow you to make it work in IE6 & up, as well as every other common browser. It just takes time to figure it all out. Unfortunately, sometimes with complicated layouts it can take a lot of time especially when you don't test it as you go.
I let others solve the problems for me. I use Yahoo's excellent CSS files included in their YUI library. They have one file to remove existing formatting for existing labels (e.g. H1 in IE does not look like H1 in Firefox), they have another to give me a default set of formatting that does look the same across browsers, they have yet another to standardize font sizes, and most important of all of them is their grid file. It gives me the ability to build hierarchical formatting of regions and sub-regions on the page very quickly and easily and I know it will work on any major modern browser (Yahoo tests the heck out of it to make sure it does).
It may not be the perfect solution, but it has been more than sufficient for my needs.
I had the same issue in my dev: IE6, FFetc + LAMP + custom MVC, based on Rasmus Lerdorf's article way back when he suggested noMVC-kind of like handle it using includes for headers, footers and the sort. I coded CSS, got stuck with FF not rendering it nicely. I had to go revise my CSS knowledge - I found that a single CSS implementation can render correctly in std. compliant mode(FF) and IE6. I liked that. I was happy with handling any changes using a single CSS file. My advice:
I know you have a Mac, go garage sale-ing (newspapers will tell you where they are), get an old PC for $10 (so far I've found plenty). This'll give you an opportunity to test out IE6 early, while you're at it get a KVM switch as well to access the machine when you need to.
One of the things I've gotten addicted to is IE6's setting - Disable all ActiveX scripts - makes browsing the web without ads a blast, anyways - test out your app with & without activeX settings, and see how well your site does. This has literally saved me hours of 'painful' moments folks above me have mentioned prior.
You prolly know how to test out FF/Opera/Safari with&without scripting
Finally - regardless of how heavy Javascripting your site uses, make sure without scripting the core features (which I'm sure you have lot's of) load properly.
I'm no expert, but sure hope my comments help you out a bit.
Cheery-O
I make sure my websites work natively and perfectly in ie9 , and work in ie8(possibly with features missing).
I prompt everyone that uses an older version to get chrome frame.
I never waste my time for ie7 and older, because using a 6 year old browser is pathetic, and should not be encouraged.
As nosredna said, use a valid doctype (see http://www.alistapart.com/articles/doctype/)
Then check your web site in the w3c validator (http://validator.w3.org/). If it shows no errors (or just a few), then IE should render it correctly.
I wouldn't put much effort in making it compatible with IE6, and just accept the fact that a website can look different in various browsers.