Check out this link (pay close attention to the domain name).
Then come back and let’s talk about it. What do you think? And let us know why you think the way you do.
Thanks to Dan Cederholm for helping me find this little ditty.
Check out this link (pay close attention to the domain name).
Then come back and let’s talk about it. What do you think? And let us know why you think the way you do.
Thanks to Dan Cederholm for helping me find this little ditty.
Before switching to a WordPress, I experienced my share (and then some) of browser-related rendering differences. It was sooo frustrating.
With WordPress, aside from the minor differences IE can impart, my blog sites look pretty much the same across browser platforms.
What a relief. 🙂
I think a site should look substantially the same in every browser. You don’t need pixel for pixel exactness, but it should be very close. Not everyone who looks at your website will be using the same browser all of the time. They may user Firefox at home but be stuck with IE at the office. If you want to provide a stable experience for your users, you should try to make sure your site looks the same for everyone.
I used to get bent out of shape when things didn’t look purty in IE the way I made ’em to look. Then I remembered that the internet is not print. And finally I learned that sometimes, not being 100% in control is a good thing.
I’m slow, but eventually, I seem to get it.
They are right that is a silly goal. Even if a site did render the same for every browser (which other than like a blank page it won’t) it won’t look the same. People have different sized monitors, different default text sizes… People that want there content to look the same should be writing books. The nature of providing content through a browser is that the look is defined both by the user and the creator. Those sites that don’t know this basic concept are the same ones that do idiotic things like fixed font sizes, etc…
That was funny 🙂
i’m a part time web designer. The other day i got to my client and decided to show him a demo and since i obviously use ff, and he was completely tech-disabled, he had IE 6 and the contact form was all over the place.
So my suggestion , would be to maybe put a link to download/support ff in the footer 🙂
I’m with Quint on this as well, and the others mostly make valid, good points. As a past (and sometimes current!) developer (not, designer, but an implementer of great, artistic design) my pride has always been been in letting the artist know to just worry about creating the look they wanted, I’ll make it “happen” cross browser, cross platform.
Yes, this is much easier today than when I started focusing on it in 1998/99. Interesting that no one mentioned any of the other browsers like Opera or Safari (actually I don’t even consider Opera, accept my apologies!) but now that Apple has released the Win Safari, that helps the homogeneous process.
And no one mentioned that there are still a lot of IE 6 browsers out there as well. So, when I look at this site in question in FF, it looks fine, no problems. Same in Safari. But when I look at it in IE 6 it is ugly!
Why??
Because the person that coded the page decided that they would use a transparent png for that “flourish” under the NO!, and that’s groovy.
They decided they would use a background tiling image to get that tanish (on my poorly calibrated!) monitor, and that’s cool.
But they decided to give the background of the page the a medium gray color (#dfd5c5 for the geekier readers 😉 )
And that’s fine too…except that in IE 6, transparent pings don’t work the same as they do in other newer browsers. In IE 6, the transparency of the flourish.png file “cuts” through to the background color, showing a nice little gray rectangle with the flourish on top of it.
Now, it’s not unattractive mind you, however by simply choosing one of the colors from that background tile (like #e3d9c9) you still would have been able to “see” a difference in the rectangle behind the flourish, but not as dramatic as the gray box. If I had been the client, and was still using IE 6, I would be calling up asking what the heck that gray box was all about! And if my designer/developer was Dawud, he’d be scratching his head wishing I’d get a new monitor (or being the smart guy I know DM is, he’d know it was an IE 6.0 transparent png problem and tell me to upgrade!)
Ironically, in this very simple example all the designer would have had to do to have complete cross browser compatibility would have been to build the flourish as a gif with the same background as the “tile.gif” image.
Now was that so hard?! (for answer, see This site 😉
Barry,
IE is sure a pain in the a55. I’ve been dealing with it for years. But at least what we’ve got today is better than years ago when we were writing two separate websites – one for IE and the other for Netscape.
Communicatrix,
Personally, I’d love it if more people understood that a website isn’t a piece of paper and that we really don’t have ultra control over every pixel like you do with every point of print. It would make everyone’s life that much easier.
Or, Microsoft could just get on the page with everyone else and there’s be no need for worry.
Quint,
I’m with you. I think it’s about getting close enough that sites looks substantially the same across browsers and platforms. Not to mention, font size is different between a PC and a Mac so how could a designer ever account for that?
John,
Yes, yes and yes! If we just take color for a moment, the possible variance is extraordinarily wide. I’ve had instances when I’ve designed something purple on my 23″ Cinema Displays which are highly calibrated that clients tell me looks gray or even red. What in the hell are they seeing? We could never account for such variance.
Vinay,
Let me guess, you’re using CSS layout, huh? Don’t worry I only code in web standards. But I know what you mean. Similarly, I had a client who I showed a design just a few days ago that looked great in every browser, except IE. I’d forgotten about a little bug that didn’t allow the footer to show up at the bottom of the design. Looked great on every browser but when she looked at it, lo-and-behold, the footer was just under the header…in IE. Don’t you just love it?
Heh this made me smile :). John pretty much summed it up web design ain’t same as writing books and no developer has control of what other people do so there will always be differences.
It’s not so much that I want a site to look the same in all browsers, but that I want them to look good in all browsers. That doesn’t seem to happen unless they look the same. Usually the difference is that IE mangled something.
It would sure be nice it it was that simple. I have about a half dozen different browsers on my desktop because things don’t always appear the same.
I agree with most of the people above. As long as it’s roughly the same, I say it’s good enough. I’d rather spend my time working on content.
James,
Great example. I’ve seen similar ones. And it’s only the beginning.
Zaharije
Yeah, and it’s amazing how few people understand that we just don’t have the same layout control with the web as we do print.
Terry Reeves
I know. And as I’ve suggested, maybe they don’t need to be. As long as the client understands the disparity, there’s no rule that sites have to look the same. It’s just not necessary.
Douglas T
That’s really the key – not that they look the same, but that they look good. If only more people understood that.
Ginger
Oh, like music to my ears. As a business developer, I think way too much attention is spent on the look of a site anyhow. I’m not suggesting we go back to putting up horrific looking sites (there’s still plenty around). It’s just that there’s no need to get neurotic about the look of a website. Focus on content…that’s what makes money.
IE is broken. M$ is struggling to fix pending issues and only creating more holes in it. Firefox on the other hand is far better than IE.
Wow apart from the browser difference, I think that is the longest domain name I’ve ever seen. As others said, you can never get things 100% the same between browsers, and even if you can do it today you don’t know how tomorrow’s browser version will change things. So its best to stick to content and quality design overall.
IE has horrible xperience rendering my earlier blog
i was using 3 templates earlier, but IE showed only 2 columns nd that totaly messed up
footer below the headerlike a man with only head and feet 🙂 and that was a lengthy domain name…does it make the guiness books?
it should be same in every browser,because we dont know what browser is the end user is using sometimes a good web design loose its value if we open in some others PC as we dont know what browser they were using.
Nice site name. Very different. But will some one tell me the reason for making this site.
Living Room,
Yeah, you hear about the IE difference all the time. And there’s others…like the difference in how pixels are handled between a PC and a Mac.
DeepFreeze
Firefox, without a doubt, is better. Spread the word…
Stunna,
So true. That’s the biggest reason I decided to use semantic code and css layout for all my designs beginning a few years ago. I’m not one of those web standards fanatics, though I see great value in keeping style and markup separate.
Simple Saving ideas,
I hear you. I had a similar experience with a client’s site just the other day.
Techblissonline,
Not sure. Is it measured?
Seo,
I couldn’t agree more.
Well Mr. LHR, why did you make your site?
Brilliant. Reminds me of “Isitchristmas.com”.
I agree that as long as both look good it doesn’t matter if they are the same. However when they have not been checked in different browsers and one has graphics out of shape or position, then it does matter.
Steve
Need to? No. Should it? Preferably yes.
And investing in that domain seems like such a waste of money.
Laser,
I would think to make the point that sites don’t need to look the same in all browsers.
Terry Reeves,
I would hope to make a statement of some sort.
Pest Control,
Huh? Haven’t seen it.
software,
That’s my position as well.
Dining Room,
But is it really? Domains are so cheap and this page probably took an hour to build. Yet, look at all the traffic it’s getting.
I really wonder how long the traffic flow will last. Just till the initial buzz I guess. Plus the domain isn’t really getting monetized. And if the owner was to try to earn something out of it, I really wonder how many viable options he’d have with that domain.
But then again, may be my thoughts are restricted and there is something I am missing.
I stand corrected. The owner has managed to create quite a buzz around it. Thousands of search results in Google. But then again – I’d love to know what alternatives he has to monetize this in future. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.
I completely with you agree, but very much not many do not make it. After it we need to discuss not simply similar themes and to try to correct a situation
Dining Room,
Maybe monetizing isn’t the point. Some people, especially those involved in web standards, just seem to want to get the message out about semantic code and css design. Maybe there’s no other reason than sharing the idea with more people. I don’t know. I only know it’s a good thing that people understand that their site doesn’t need to look the same in all browsers.
John,
Certainly. And, in my opinion, we need to pressure the browser developers to render the same. Let the differences in browsers be about load speed, features and user experience. It’s easily possible. Microsoft, for instance, would just need to work a bit harder to have their authoring software and Word not create such wacky code.
As far as the design of a website is concerned it is but obvious to make it look as similar as possible in most of the browsers… thought all browser’s except for IE follow the standards so design for one browser will eventually cover up most of the browser’s but for IE all it takes is to remake a whole new design just for people loving IE… and more over if the consistency in design is maintained … i dont know about other but it feels satisfied to have them same over all the browsers
Nadim,
I remember the days of creating two different sites – one for IE and one for Netscape. Personally, I’m not going back there. I think it’s a huge waste of time – mine, AND a huge waste of money – the client’s.
For me, getting close is a better choice.
In my case, I think it illogical to desire that Websites must look exactly the same in every browser because each browser is different from the other. I do not have problems with browser as long as they display my pages clearly.
I think like most everyone that your site should look good in browsers but it does not have to be the same.
But there are some things that are very difficult to deal with.:
It’s not just monitors, text sizes, browsers etc that are different – it’s also different versions of all of the browsers. I cannot make a site the same in all browsers and browser versions – can I? Thoughts?
The clients – they are the one’s in my world where they almost ALL use IE and IE is the only browser that matters. Should I be asking up front what browser thy want the site design for?
Arrgggghhhh!
Clement,
I feel the same way.
Brooke,
Yeah, the difference in IE and other browsers is so often discussed. But I see far less on the the visual graphics side. Monitor resolution and size, graphics cards and color calibration all play such an important role in how sites are displayed. You can’t believe the color difference I have with clients sometimes. I design a site in green that they see in gray. My monitors are calibrated monthly, so I have a really good idea what I’m seeing. So odd…
My company would save thousands of dollars of man hours if the dang browsers were all the same. It’s so frustrating. IE6 can go to…..
I think a site should look the same (as the designer intended) on every browser.
Michael,
I hear you. I’m a one-man shop and could have taken on more projects with the time I’ve wasted chasing IE bugs.
Rob,
That would be nice. But it’s just not possible. Even resorting to table layouts (bad idea, in my opinion), you still have the differences in monitor resolution, color, font-sizing and how font faces are displayed. We can get close, but never exact.