A Bat-fellow, Shane R. Monroe, wrote on Thursday, 16th May 2002 at 00:37:36 (GMT -0700), which was 9:37 a.m. in Bratislava --
SRM> I wasn't actually planning on getting into this thread, but I feel the SRM> need to do so to defend and extrapolate on a few things mentioned in SRM> this thread. SRM> I'd like to state some things about the concept that "IE is 100% SRM> standards compliant". SRM> I develop web sites and web applications for a living. This is what I SRM> do. I use Opera as my test browser because, believe it or not, its SRM> much more compliant with the standards it DOES support than IE ever SRM> has been or ever likely WILL be. If you bring up a page using SRM> extensive CSS, layers, table-positioned elements - you will OFTEN find SRM> that you get the EXACT and EXPECTED results in Opera. You place SRM> something somewhere - and it appears correctly. More times than not, SRM> IE will be 'off' and you'll find yourself "fixing" the page for IE. SRM> IE likes to play by their own rules. Compliance standards are SRM> completely ignored by IE. Should a form element show up if there are SRM> no form tags? In IE, the form will happily show up. What about SRM> failing to close tags? Writing COMPLETELY invalid HTML will render SRM> (in some fashion) in IE without penalty (normally not showing up what SRM> you planned, but oh well). IE encourages sloppy, badly written web SRM> sites, and I cannot subscribe to this being a 'good thing'. SRM> 100% Standards Compliance doesn't mean adding your own NON-COMPLIANT SRM> functionality to counter the functionality that is SUPPOSED to be SRM> compliant. This is what IE loves to do; mostly to try and get their SRM> OWN standards as approved instead of playing nice with the other SRM> children (remember MARQUEE?). Mozilla is more standards compliant than SRM> IE is. Opera just happens to be a helluva lot faster and more robust SRM> than Mozilla is. SRM> [...] A well-written page, following exacting, RATIFIED standards SRM> renders well everywhere. That's what standards were DESIGNED to SRM> do - level the playing field. SRM> Opera is an excellent tool. And the only thing standing in the way of SRM> it being useful to all (aside from the blatant product dumping that SRM> keeps Microsoft in the lead) is the fact that people aren't writing SRM> "web pages"; they are writing "IE pages" - and that doesn't benefit SRM> anyone trying to be standards compliant. Popular doesn't mean better. SRM> That's my stand on things, folks. I won't dredge it up anymore. SRM> Thanks for listening. Bravo, bravo, bravo! What a speech! In this form (excluding the unjustified slam of Marck's beloved unsupported standard DOM) I'll be passing it on to people who look disbelievingly at anyone such as myself who claim that Opera is a far more useful tool than IE. Not to mention likability and appearance. Gosh, I now couldn't live without a browser that can open links in background via a keyboard shortcut! -- Yours, Alex. of Slovakia www.avenarius.sk [flying with The Bat! 1.60 under Windows 98 4.10 Build 2222 A amd k6-2 500 mhz processor with 128 mb ram] ________________________________________________________ Current Ver: 1.60k FAQ : http://faq.thebat.dutaint.com Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archives : http://tbudl.thebat.dutaint.com Moderators : mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] TBTech List: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Bug Reports: https://bt.ritlabs.com
