Is there any single framework with which I can build a css3, html5 website that is compatible for all browsers including IE7 and later? Can http://html5boilerplate.com/ boilerplate help me in this?
You will never get the IE7 or IE8 rendering engine to achieve full compatibility with HTML5, CSS3, and other modern technologies. They are simply not capable of it.
However there are some hacks, tools and plugins which can get you part of the way.
Tools like Modernizr will help you by allowing you to detect which features are supported, to give your site a chance to work around it.
jQuery is a great library anyway, but is particularly good in this context because it abstracts a lot of browser differences away from the developer. Some things are easy in most browsers but a real pain in IE; jQuery takes a lot of that kind of stuff and makes it easy regardless.
Dean Edwards' IE7.js and Selectivzr are both Javascript libraries that give IE support for lots of the CSS selectors which were missing in older versions. This allows you to write your stylesheets without worrying so much about what IE supports. (IE7.js also fixes a number of IE's other glitches and missing features too)
CSS3Pie is a hack for IE that adds support for CSS border-radius, gradients and box-shadow.
There are in fact a whole load of hacks along these lines, all aimed at adding features to older versions of IE which it is missing. Modernizr's website has a big list of them here: https://github.com/Modernizr/Modernizr/wiki/HTML5-Cross-Browser-Polyfills
However there is one big caveat to all of this. Speed. IE<=8 is a slow browser. It has a slow Javascript engine. Virtually all of these hacks are javascript based. You might get away with running a few of them on any given site, but trying to use enough of them to give IE anything like full support for HTML5 and CSS3 will slow the browser down to the point of being unusable.
There is one other angle to approach this question though, and that's Google's Frame plugin for IE. This basically installs the entire Google Chrome browser engine into IE. The user is still running the IE shell, but the web page is rendered as it would be in an up-to-date version of Chrome.
This sounds great, but of course it isn't perfect. The main down-side of it is that the end user has to install it manually onto their computer, which means that you as a web developer have no real control over whether it's there or not. So its not something you can just add to your site and expect everything to magically work.
Finally, you may also be interested in CanIUse.com, which gives browser support tables for various features, allowing you to see at a glance what is and what isn't supported in various versions of each browser.
HTML 5 is more an umbrella term for a variety of technologies than any one thing or framework. Really, any implementation you do should degrade gracefully-- and that is what makes the site browser compatible. Detect what the browser supports, and then have alternatives that are legacy friendly.
Check out: http://accessites.org/site/2007/02/graceful-degradation-progressive-enhancement/
And: http://diveintohtml5.ep.io/detect.html
Good luck.
Modernizr is an open-source JavaScript library that helps you build the next generation of HTML5 and CSS3-powered websites.
MS is including it in the ASP.net MVC template projects
html5boilerplate won't help you.
As others have said html5 and css3 are very broad terms, there's no framework that implements all of the features provided by both of these. In fact they are not equally supported in browsers that say that they support them. And more, even W3C guys (who write the specs for html5 and css3) are not yet established on what features they will include or what steps will be required to implement them. You get the idea...
But.. if you narrow your requirements to some specific features, like video, audio tags, canvas drawing, nifty css effects, File API, or others, you CAN find frameworks that implement (or try to mimic) them with available technologies in cross-browser manner (more or less).
Related
I know there are programs like dreamweaver but none of them has significant success when it comes to creating automatic cross browser compatible html and css codes.
I was wondering, is there a framework or program that i can use for creating more cross browser compatible HTML and CSS layout ?
Currently, i am using a virtual windows xp version running on vmware to check how web pages looks in IE6, and manually using Chrome, Firefox, Opera and Safari.
What you want doesn't really exist as many have said. I do try to safe myself most of the hassle you describe by consciously using only things that have proven to be widely supported and with which I have good experiences.
The perfect solution doesn't exist but here are a few things to consider that could make your life easier:
Use a css reset so all default browser styles are gone.
Force yourself to write HTML that validates against a doctype. Personally I use only
XHTML 1.1 (which is very strict) but gives high compatibility in most browsers.
Use only fonts that are common and widely supported.
Limit your use of javascript to the absolutely necessary, and use jQuery where you can, as it will "often iron out differences for you". (suggested by Andrew Barber)
This way you'll end up with web sites that have a very high chance to be cross browser compatible
There is no reliable, broadly applicable solution to this beyond testing, testing, testing. The issues are so complex that it's essentially impossible to build a tool that could do this for anything close to every possible difference between the browsers.
Incidentally; there is a tool called IETester that you can use to be able to run multiple, previous versions of IE.
EDIT: You (motto) and others have noted issues with IETester. While I have not experienced issues with it myself, that could very well be because I have simply not used it to help me with layouts that use things which happen to be buggy in IETester.
Comments below note that the Developer Toolbar in IE9 permits us to use the IE7/IE8 rendering engines. I would guess this to be a more reliable way to test layouts for those browsers, and I plan to begin using that instead, myself.
I will then likely keep using IETester just for assuring basic usability for IE6.
I currently work for a large company and I design for their high-traffic ecommerce website. We support tens-of-thousands of users across a variety of browsers. Our current browser stats point to most people using either Firefox 3+ and IE8. There are about 5% of users still on IE6.
Is it time to start coding for the future and impliment HTML5 across the site? Is it a responsible thing to do or should I wait a year for people to upgrade to better supporting browsers?
Thank you.
HTML5 isn't one specific thing. You can start using it even in browsers that have no idea what HTML5 is. If you just start using some of the extra tags or form types, they degrade perfectly into standard elements in older browsers. Video needs a Flash fallback anyway. The advanced scripting features all need fallbacks for non-supporting browsers anyway, or must only add non-essential functionality.
In short, sure, start using HTML5 techniques now to provide advantages for cutting-edge browsers, just make sure it all degrades nicely in older browsers.
IE8 doesnt support most of HTML5.
There are libraries you can use to make it more HTML5 aware; but for a large production site I think your better of waiting a year.
I would say that the 5% of users still on IE6 will probably remain on IE6. They either aren't interested in upgrading (perhaps they don't know about these things), or are restricted to IE6 by security policies in their workplace. In particular I've found that a number of our clients are not upgrading from IE6 because their IT teams consider it to be too big a change, or their existing software is not compatible with anything else.
Therefore, my advice is: go HTML5. With a bit of work you can work around IE6's deficiencies (look at Modernizr, CSS3PIE for ideas). And that way, the other 95% of customers get a better experience.
... what is "large"? Considering HTML5 is still considered work in progress, I'd vote no.
The name "HTML5" is tending to be used by most people at the moment to describe all the exciting new features in web browsers. Not all of these features are actually part of the HTML5 spec - for example, CSS and Javascript have new features which are being referred to under the HTML5 banner. I'm going to assume you mean all these features.
My answer would be to investigate which features you can implement, but remain backward-compatible. Many of the features of HTML5, CSS3, etc can be added to your site without making it un-usable for older browsers.
Some examples: (but do spend time researching for more)
New input types, such as <input type='date'> and <input type='number'>These give you new features in a modern browser, but old browsers will still show a normal input field.
More info: http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/201004/html5_input_types/
Semantic HTML5 tags, such as <section>, <footer>, etc.
These give you additional semantic meaning to your HTML tags, which is good for SEO and other automated systems that look at your site. They are broadly backward-compatible, though in order to support them in IE6/7/8, you will need to include an IE hack such as HTML5Shiv. However, I would suggest using Modernizr, which includes the HTML5Shiv plus a stack of other useful functionality.
Some CSS3 features such as border-radius. IE doesn't know about this, but the result is that IE will have square corners and other browsers will have rounded corners. So nothing that breaks the site for IE users.
But if you really want to, IE can be made to support a number of CSS3 features, including border-radius, using tools such as CSS3Pie.
Instead of using SVG graphics directly, use a Javascript graphics library such as Raphael, which will draw SVG in browsers that support it, and fall back to VML for IE (which will even work in IE6).
Obviously stuff like the <video> or <canvas> tags aren't going to work in older browsers, but frankly, it'll take you long enough just implementing the features you can use straight away; by the time you're ready to take a step further, things will have moved on anyway.
This is a story anyone developing web applications is surely aware of - You create a site, which is well coded and elegant in the browser of your choice - until you run it in a different browser, which a lot of the time required hacking and slashing to create a functioning site.
I wish to enquire the techniques used by developers to ensure their code works well the first time around in the plethora of web browsers with all aspects related - such as :xhtml, html5, javascript, css, etc..
As a side note, what developers do about IE progress - with the majority of the world still on IE7, and IE9 only including new css and html standards how long do you think standard practice will(if ever) take to achieve?
I am quite interested in your response, as I cringe at the thought of cross browser compatibly issues.
My advice: Use a decent CSS reset or framework. Good CSS frameworks are: 960, Blueprint, YAML and YUI grids.
For your javascript you should use a library like: JQuery, mootools or Dojo. You will still have a few browser incompatibilities, but using any of these tools should fix about 90% of them.
Good luck! (ps: I use Mootools and Blueprint)
If you really want to have some fun with the IE6 crowd, try this: http://ie6update.com/
All kiding aside, with a strong understanding of box-model tactics, a great framework, plus quirksmode.org, you should have no reason to have to do a bunch of exotic hacks to make your site work. Design intelligently for standards that are viable today and save the bleeding edge techniques for demo sites. High-value corporate sites don't HAVE to be exotic, they need to be good and reliable. Otherwise, be willing to design parallel sites so that those who refuse to update can at least get by. Most of all, stick to the standards...a few W3 errors is too many.
Understand your audience too. I can't tell you how many designers do dark on dark and small fonts for older crowds. Likewise for using exotic javascript or worse flash where it's not appropriate. Solicit feedback from others....in reality, even if we "get" this game, we really only really understand our own preferences.
Practice progressive enhancement. For example, Jquery UI will round corners, but will gracefully degrade to square for the IE (behind) crowd. Consider using HTML 4.01 strict as opposed to XHTML because it is closer in syntax to the future, HTML5. (XHTML is no longer being advanced anyway)
Finally, test everything you do in multiple browsers or in a tool like Adobe's browser labs. Turn off Javascript and CSS...is the result acceptable? Run without flash...does your site work? How does it look on a mobile browser?
It's not a fun game to play sometimes, but it's what makes us professionals. Good luck!
I am developing for all major browsers out there (IE 6+, Firefox 3+, current Safari, Chrome, Opera 9.5+). My main advice to keeping code clean and eliminating extreme hacking sessions is the following: Test your page simultaneously in all Browsers. It is a lot easier to fix multiple small Problems than fixing a complete page in a single pass. Style issues are really easy to fix when working this way. JavaScript is a bit more challenging, but still much easier when working like this. jQuery often helps with this kind of problems. I include the new standards here and there but i am making sure, that graceful degration takes place. Standards compliant browsers get the full experience. Older ones get less eye candy while still delivering a working page.
Learn the standards.
Write code according to the standards.
Test the code in popular browsers, and see where it breaks.
“The standards” are HTML, CSS, JavaScript and the DOM. jQuery does a lot to smooth out JavaScript and DOM inconsistencies between browsers, and is a bit of a nicer interface to the DOM in my opinion.
“Popular browsers” at the time of writing are IE 6–8, Firefox 3, and the latest versions of Safari, Chrome and Opera. Safari and Chrome have hardly any differences as they use the same rendering engine, and Safari, Chrome, Opera and Firefox have very few differences as they’re all about the standards.
I cringe at the thought of cross browser compatibly issues.
They‘re really not that bad. (When you ignore IE. And its issues are at least reasonably Googleable when you encounter them.)
I think it is important you start with a good set of defaults and follow best practices, it is not much of a hassle to work with deviating browsers. I worked on http://html5boilerplate.com so we have a list of links up there (along with the actual boilerplate) that make a web developer's job much easier.
I'd like to start using HTML5's basic features, but at the same time, keep my code backwards compatible with older browsers (graceful degradation). For instance, I'd like to use the cool CSS3 properties for making rounded corners. Is there any available tutorial for writing gracefully degradable HTML5 ?
Additionally, what browsers should I support so that my app. is functional for at least 95% of visitors? What are the ways to test those browsers painlessly ?
When talking about HTML5 or CSS3, you should head over to:
When can I use...
As can be seen, we are still far far away from using that.
Also, since old versions of the browsers won't support HTML5 or CSS3, however, you can do what is known as:
Progressive Enhancement and Graceful Degradation
Here are some resources also:
Gallery of HTML5 Sites (You can learn and get the idea from them)
Create modern Web sites using HTML5 and CSS3
Browsers that, collectively, cover 95% of the world: Firefox, Chrome, IE6/7/8.
The best way to test them is to install them on your computer.
You want to use html tags and css compatible with mobile browsers.
For anything CSS3 wrap it in conditional javascript. I always make sure the device width is atleast 240px, then anything below that is the old, crappy, mobile look.
You can use a small mobile boilerplate for CSS, to reset the basic tags you use (make them look them same in different browsers). As with any boilerplate, you should look at the css to see if it's WAY overkill.
For a comprehensive guide check out the W3 Mobile CSS2 guidelines: http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/WD-css-mobile-20001013
Another good resource is this compatibility table: http://www.quirksmode.org/m/css.html
Graceful Degradation is all about making compromises -- if you could do everything in the lower version, you probably would. To pick on the example of rounded corners you cite, it may acceptable to you (or your client) to live without them, where there don't exist renderer specific CSS extensions to support them (this is how http://www.ipswich-angle.com/ handles it, for example, I believe). Other options involving images are there, but it is largely dependant on what compromises you and your client are willing to make.
A service like browsershots.org is quite useful to check how your site renders on different browsers and operating systems. You have to wait in a queue for a while but it's worth doing that.
I was going to make this a comment, but then I got carried away..
w3schools has suggestions for using semantic web elements on your site. It suggests using a Javascript library called html5shiv.js to add styling support to IE8 and below so you can find javascript files which emulate specific functionality built into HTML5 like JSON2.js and Webforms2.js.
Finally this article gives a full example of emulating a HTML5 form with many of the new attributes/functionality.
As for building the site, I'd recommend building a HTML4 site first using semantic elements freely (with html5shiv) and testing with IE7. Then as you build parts of the site that require new features, research a Javascript file that will provide older browsers with the same functionality, e.g: when it's time to add your first rounded corner or gradient maybe add CSS3Pie. Always remember as well that your box-model; border-radius and gradients are supported in webkit as well as mozilla's API so many css3 attributes you'll need to add 3 times:
border-radius: 3px;
-moz-border-radius: 3px;
-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
Unfortunately I don't have a good resource for how the webkit/mozilla APIs compare with HTML5 functionality.
The only functionality I've struggled to find is support for CSS3 selectors in older browsers, often you can get away with this, I mean if you're not gonna upgrade your browser IMHO you can live with few double-thickness borders or missing alternate row styling in tables.
Maybe one day there will be a site that you can upload your code to that will tell you things like "chrome 20.xyz doesn't support rounded corners, add -webkit-border-radius to add support" but until then adding backwards compatibility after the fact will be near-impossible for complex sites.
If you had to choose a browser (just one) to be the primarily supported browser for a company jumping into HTML5 (CSS3).. Which one would be your safest bet on the middle-long term?
Chrome, FireFox, Safari, IE?
I'm looking for an objective recommendation based on standards driven/compliant, developer tools, fast & correct feature implementations, memory footprint, etc.
UserBase/MarketShare would not be an issue because it would be on a closed environment in which we control the clients (which are basically big machines with a Web interface).
Thanks!
I would say a webkit based browser. That would be the best balance of speed/stability and HTML5/CSS3 features.
However I believe that Opera has the most implemented features.
Opera has always been in the lead, but they've also always had weird bugs. Right now, Chrome is in an interesting position: Google just bought an internet video protocol company (On2), and so they have the power to end the H.264 vs. Ogg Theora battle by releasing this great new codec they've bought as open source.
HTML5 itself isn't anything new: it's just new elements that display differently. Think of it like this: if HTML5 was the first to introduce the <blink> tag, developers would be a little iffy about it because you can just use CSS to set text-decoration:blink or use some Javascript to make the blinking happen.
With HTML5, things aren't that different. Most of the new elements are just extensions of <div>. For the ones that aren't (<video>, <audio>, <canvas>, etc.), there are either already strong implementations (pretty much across the board) or the implementations as complete as the HTML5 spec is.
Will there be a best browser for HTML5? Probably not. It's all just a matter of how the browsers position themselves (like I mentioned with Chrome above).
If you control the environment I would say pick one based on that has features your app can exploit to make your job easier. Otherwise, lower-common-denominator is a widely used approach for a small team.
I would say Gecko (firefox and friends) or webkit (safari, chrome and friends). I wouldn't go with IE nor Opera. Here is a HTML5/CSS3 comparison table that pretty much supports my views.
Safari’s pushing CSS animations and transitions, if they’re a big draw for you.
If you want to make a HTML5 app/site that focuses on one browser, then you might as well use HTML 4 and JavaScript. For the next many many years most HTML5 sites will have to function in non-HTML5 mode.
See HTML5 features as glacing on the cake, to add benefits to the browsers that can take advantage of it.
All the modern versions of browser support HTML 5. But recently launched internet explorer 9 specifically designed by keeping in mind future web technology needs and incorporated latest features that give rich and interactive web experience. Latest browser Internet explorer 9 has more support for Cascading Style Sheet than previous versions of Microsoft browser. It supports CSS3 and more emerging SVG2 markup standards. IE 9 includes new java script engine that designed to take advantage of multi core processor and give maximum performance.