I’m in the process of tweaking my website for IE6, and its got me to thinking. How long will the Web have to support IE6? It’s 9th (!) birthday is coming up on August 27th. That’s an insane longevity for any technology, let alone software.
Fun pie chart! I don't use tables..
I’ve always designed client sites to play nice with IE6, and tediously implemented “hacks” where necessary to make them look the way they should. The real problem here is that the browser is so old, and so riddled with bugs that I literally have to spend more time worrying about IE6 than any other browser. Its brutal.
So when does the madness end? I guess it ends when clients stop caring about supporting it; when no one uses it anymore..
One day IE6 will die, and the world will rejoice!
I work for a public organisation in the UK and can tell you that we *still* use IE6.0. I couldn’t believe it when I started my first day at work.
Most information-based websites work just fine, perhaps because developers like yourself do spend a lot of time ironing out bugs.
However, when certain sites require Ajax (I think it’s Ajax – the seamless Javascript?) to function smoothly – that’s when IE6.0 collapses like a tonne of bricks.
e.g. the National Rail website does not seem to work well at all with IE6.0.