Just read an interesting article by yahoo's Nicholas C. Zakas: What’s a web browser?
How do you best balance implementing new technologies like HTML5 and CSS3 while keeping support for browsers like i.e 6, is it a practical approach to day to day web development where deadlines must be met?
I think it really depends on the type of site you are building as well as the type of intended end users. If you are building a site for a band, they tend to use a lot of flash/silverlight to make the interactions "cool" and more fluid. This would be an example of when to go all out with HTML5 and using canvas to accomplish some of the same effects. Obviously IE6 wouldn't work, but with more and more major companies dropping support for IE6 (Google included for gmail) it is becoming less and less of an issue as time passes.
If you need to develop a site where people will still heavily use IE6 then you might want to stay away from using the latest technologies. The pain you would go through to get things to work might not be worth it in the end especially if deadlines are tight and if you are not an expert.
Then there are the cases in the middle and here I think you need to think long and hard if you want to keep supporting IE6. I know a bunch of people who have dropped support and have found it much easier to strike the balance between CSS3 and HTML5 with the other browsers. It's still not perfect, but much easier to work with in the end.
It depends on your traffic and who is spending money on your site. For us, it's necessary to continue supporting IE6 because a not-insignificant amount of money is spent by those users, and we're not in a position to compel them to upgrade. (If they're spending time upgrading, they're not spending time spending.)
If your site is not commercial then you should have a lot more freedom in determining minimum browser requirements.
On one hand, the market isn't ready for HTML5 and CSS3-only sites. However, on the other hand, if at least a bit possible, one should avoid support for IE6 and older (see the IE6-no-more movement for inspiration) because it's good for the industry and the average internet population to get rid of obsolete and problematic technologies.
If you wish to create a modern website I.E. HTML5 then I would recommend you take a look at http://html5boilerplate.com/ If you look at this boilerplate you will notice they take advantage of the modernizr JavaScript file to bring HTML5 support to older browsers.
I also strongly recommend you read Aaron Gustafson's Understanding Progressive Enhancement The idea behind progressive enhancements is that your site will look the best if viewed in a browser that supports modern CSS and HTML5 selectors/features while still providing a baseline for legacy browsers. There is a follow up article to Progressive Enhancements that is also worth a read http://www.alistapart.com/articles/progressiveenhancementwithcss
It depends on you audience, doing HTML5 and CSS3 heavily is acceptable only when you are sure your users will use only modern browsers. ( never been so lucky yet )
For now, you can consider them only for progressive enhancements. That is, you make a site working fine in IE6, and then you add features like round borders/shadows , the <video> tag or speeding up the site using local storage just as a bonus for the wiser users.
I'm starting a big project in few weeks, and all I can do is to make it HTML5 ready using the right doctype, the new tags and the few lines of javascript that will make it compatible with the old browsers, but will not use any cool feature for now.
Related
I'm going to develop a theme for a WordPress blog but I'm not sure if I should do it using XHTML/CSS2 or if I already can do it using HTML5/CSS3.
Usually, I use 960.gs framework but it isn't available with HTML5/CSS3. I've heard that the 52framework works fine as well and I'm thinking about adopt it for my project, but I'm really insecure about HTML5's early adoption (?).
Someone, please, can help me to decide which technology adopt on my project.
Thanks a lot.
HTML5 and CSS3 are "ready to use" - you need to learn a little about the concept of "Polyfilling", but you can make the user experience very similar in all browsers, even if you lose a few transition effects and rounded corners along the way.
My website has been HTML5 since 2009 and I tested it across many, many browsers.
So the bottom line is, HTML5 is designed to be highly backwards compatible with HTML4.01 and there are lots of techniques for making content available to older browsers that don't support the more funky elements in HTML5.
The 960 grid system will work with HTML5 and CSS3 because it's just a list of classes. CSS3 doesn't really give you any grid layout features yet that are widely adopted enough to be helpful.
I would use CSS3 and HTML5 as much as you can but don't forget about progressive enhancement. Don't blindly ignore a browser because it doesn't support CSS3. You should use HTML5 and CSS3 appropriately and not because it's cool.
What audience are you designing it for? Do you need to be bleeding edge?
I would say use XHTML/CSS2 as that will be supported for years unless you need the functionality in the others.
Being an early adopter can be quite painful, so only do that if you have good reasons to.
Html5 and css3 for sure!
The only thing you might want to ask yourself is wether or not you want to use the new elements (article, aside, nav etc.) Because if you do, you need to depend on Javascript in order for IE to render your page correctly.
Every new page should be written with the new doctype imo:
<!DOCTYPE html>
If you want a starting template that works well in all major browsers you might want to check this out: http://html5boilerplate.com/
Whole-heartedly agree with Bravax.
It's all really based on who your audience is. If you want your site to be on the bleeding edge, regardless of audience, go for it.
I have heard great things about 52framework! I am about to implement it into a full-on 100+ page site redesign. The good thing about it, is that it plays nice with IE (even 6!).
It is entirely related to the markets you are aiming at. You will be able to have more interactive content and easier to maintain styles with CSS3. This said, many of the html5 and css3 elements are not yet standardized. Even among the modern, cutting-edge, browsers there can be major differences.
If you are making a theme for experimental purposes or to play around with, I would go with the newer technologies.
If you are making this for consumption on a wide sale, and potential sale, you really should avoid technologies not supported by older browers, IE 7 and 8 especially.
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Possible Duplicate:
Should i be using HTML5 and CSS3?
How do you decide if you need to use html5 and css3? and what will be the pros and cons in choosing that approach.
Pros and cons I can think of:
Pros:
cleaner codes
support for #font-face
shadows and rounded corner
animations
Cons:
not all browsers supports
Can you help me decide? How do you decide if you're in my situation?
Thanks!
It won't be time to switch to "HTML5 and CSS3" for a very long time indeed.
It is time to look carefully at the features added by HTML 5 and CSS 3 and decide, on a case by case basis based on:
Browser support
Consequences of using them in browsers that don't support them
Benefits gained
Fallback options available
… which specific features it is worth using today.
A well designed site should always degrade gracefully and both HTML and CSS support this. The goal should not be to make your look fantastic in older browsers - only to make your site USEABLE in older browsers. A well designed site should be useable with CSS turned off.
I think a clear YES can come only after the target browsers are compatible. However, if my target browser supports the specific features of HTML5 and my development is limited to these supported features, HTML5 can be used.
Some people still use browsers once used by the ancient egyptians, like IE6, and they will not be able to view your pages (and specifically new styles/tags).
If you have a public website, accessable to virtually anybody, I suggest waiting for at least a couple of years before the big convert.
If, on the other hand, you have a controllable group of users, like the intranet site I'm working on, you can easily enforce the use of more modern browsers that support this, like Google Chrome, Apple Safari, Mozilla Firefox, of Internet Explorer 9 (just released).
I believe it is entirely down to who you are targeting. If you are targeting developers, Stack Overflow for example, then I think you can use the new technologies. If you really need to display a message to upgrade then I am sure developers would understand.
You should not use it for general sites for something such as a shop which has a very wide audience. This is because a lot of them would be using IE 6 - 8. The fact that no one on XP (my whole office + pretty much everyone else I know) can upgrade to IE9 which supports some features is frustrating too.
So I don't think there will be a definitive day where everyone can use it. It is just a case of looking at the market share of browsers and your target audience and deciding if it is worth giving 99% of people a better experience and ignoring the other 1%. Although I am sure those figures are completely off, it is probably a lot worse.
In conclusion, it depends on your audience and if you are willing to not support a varying number of users.
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.
Is it safe now to develop web application with HTML 5 specifications? or should we wait longer for final standards?
I want to start developing a new project. I want it to be up to date in every aspects. should I wait more for html 5 or I can start programming based on it?
It all depends on your audience.
If most of your audience is going to be fairly hip web developers that know to use a decent browser, you are probably going to be fine using HTML5.
However, if your audience is any government institution (school, etc), business place, etc, you might not want to use it yet. My school currently runs on Internet Explorer 6/7, and one of my teacher constantly complains about that "Your browser is not supported" message at the top of Youtube. These people probably don't have any control over the browser they use, and might be a bit behind due to the IT guys.
Find your audience, and use what you are comfortable using with them.
It depends what you which features you want to implement. HTML 5 is a very broad standard covering video, dynamic bitmaps, geolocation, more semantic tags etc.
No browser has implemented all HTML5 features, all have implemented some
This will tell you most of what you need to know about and which browsers support it.
http://diveintohtml5.ep.io/
Which part were you particularly interested in? Many people want to use canvas which is the dynamic graphics tag (simulates svg in an element). Canvas works on all major browsers except IE, though support for canvas is predicted in IE9
It depends on your audience. If they have the latest browsers then you can start using parts of HTML 5. If you don't have a good understanding of your user base then you might want to use web analytics to understand the capabilities of their browsers. Developers tend to have newer browsers but corporations or schools may not. You should also do some research on HTML 5 and understand if you can get up to speed with it quickly if deployment time is a concern.
Use progressive enhancement. A lot of the HTML5 features (application cache, the custom form fields, the extra semantic tags) will do no harm in unsupported browsers (though you might need the HTML5 shiv from Remy Sharp), but give a bonus to users and spiders who can use them. Other features (video tag, database storage, web workers, geolocation) can use workarounds for compatibility with older browsers - the Modernizer library linked by Mark Pilgrim makes this very easy. If your app is usese Geodata, for example, you could use the browser-based geolocation where available and fallback to something IP-based.