Phasing Out Support For IE6
Not a week goes by that I don’t wish Internet Explorer 6 would just disappear from the world’s computers. It’s incorrect interpretation of the box model, lack of support for png transparency, and countless bugs transform the task of designing for the web into an obstacle course. This 7 year old brick of a browser has frozen the potential for innovation in our industry. But what can we do about it?
According to the W3Schools Browser Statistics, IE6 users still make up over 26% of web traffic. For that reason, most of us are stuck dumbing our code down to this lowest common denominator browser. Not 37Signals though; they’ve decided to phase out support for IE6 in no less than a month and a half. I agree with their reasoning and would love to slap a “We’re Sorry. Your browser sucks.” sign up for IE6 on every site I create from here on out. Unfortunately that won’t be practical for quite a while in the real world. So what do you think? If not now, when will it be time to turn the lights out on IE6 users?
37 Signals: Phasing out support for IE 6 across all 37signals products on August 15, 2008
Comments
Interesting. It's great that high profile sites like 37signals and Apple's MobileMe are dropping support for IE6. We need their help to make it happen. That being said, I think we can all do our part. We'll continue to be dealing with this ie6 struggle unless we stand tall.. plant our css3.. and drop support for ie6. IE6 users will never realize there's a problem with their browser if the people who make websites don't let them know. Unfortunately this is not a reality for every site you may build. But, by introducing this to the more progressive sites with more progressive audiences we can get the ball in motion.
IE 6 will only phase out when windows forces people to upgrade operating systems. That being said, I think we could get a larger percentage of firefox users or at least ie7 users if the majority of people’s websites (yahoo, aol, etc) didn’t work in ie6. Until large corporations such as yahoo and aol (the ill-informed’s portals) change, I think we’ll have to deal with people who are 10 years behind the times.
@Mike IE7 is already a mandatory upgrade if you actually bother to run windows update. Beyond that, what are they going to do? Force everyone to Vista? Somehow, I just don't see that happening.
@Justin, true. But I wouldn't put it past them to try.
I guess my problem is, If I can't view a site in FireFox, I'm lazy and 75% of the time I'm probable not going to bother opening up another browser unless I really need that site. So, I don't really expect my parents gen to download and install a new version of their browser when a site tells them there's a problem. They'll just go back to e-Bay and forget all about it.
I kind of figure this 26% has to have been prompted to update at some point, ether by windows or by a site they tried to view. So far they haven't and it's going to take a lot to make them. Yes, eventually a large enough group of sites will not support ie6 and it will die the slow painful death it deserves. And maybe ya'll are right and we should all be part of that push. But 1/4 of all Web traffic!, how can any company afford to turn away 1/4 of its potential revenue source? How can I tell a client that 1/4 of their Web traffic will be prompted to upgraded their browser, but it's cool because it will be better for them in the long run. I feel you on this one 37 Signals, I really do. But that's a whole lot of users.
Mike: I'm almost certain that IE7 is a mandatory update for those on Windows XP and beyond. The bigger issue is people don't do their updates.
@justin Sorry, if I got off track, but that's just my point. If they haven't updated yet, it will take a major inconvenience to make them. I guess I'm just concerned that in the meantime it will lead to 1/4 of visitors hitting the back button instead of updating.
I just upgraded, from scratch, my windows xp VM in VMWare. After running all the critical updates, including SP3, windows update did NOT list IE 7 as a critical update. It was an OPTIONAL update along with WMP11. I had to actually click on the "optional" tab to find IE 7. Maybe there is another way it gets pushed out, but simply using Windows update and only installing critical updates, will not update IE 6 to IE 7.
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I agree. While IE6 is a pain in everyones ass, 26% is far to large of a group to simply cut off.
The truth is a lot of the people who would have this problem don't even know that they are behind the curve. Their proud that they finally ditched their dial-up for a DSL. And while they may be 10 years behind the curve, they excited to be able to surf around. I say cater to them a few more years, eventually Microsoft will push everyone to update, but I would rather be one of the last supporting IE6 than one of the first to abandon it.