Hi Bill,

If it's a web site that anyone could potentially visit, I'd design it for IE6. Whilst we moan and gripe about it as a browser, there's still around 20% of users using IE6.

If it's a web application that's specific to something, you may be able to not support IE6 - but it depends on your audience. An audience who aren't tech-savvy may not be able to upgrade their browser; likewise a large company using your software may be on older PC's and have security policies enforced meaning an IE upgrade or software install requires a system administrator (so there's then the time / hassle to go through).

On the issue of transparent PNG's, I've either used 24 ways: Transparent PNGs in Internet Explorer 6, which has worked where most others haven't - or (if possible), changed the PNG's into GIFs (but I understand this may not be viable for you).

Tim.

I don't design for IE6 anymore. I just threw up my hands one day and said, "Enough! I boycott you IE6!" I just don't have the time in the day to cater for three different IE's that render code completely differently. Especially when I also check compatibility in Firefox, Chrome and Flock. Enough is enough I say.

For me it comes down to effort vs reward now. I understand that there are people out there who are still using IE6, but I ask myself how much benefit it will bring my business to cater for that browser, vs the amount of time I have to spend. The answer, for me at least, is that it really isn't viable to spend so much time. The reward just isn't there.

Besides, if you're still using IE6 you're probably used to things always being broken, right?

IE transparency for PNG can be solved by using PNG 8 format, PNG 24 is where the problem's at.

For the most part, I think it is a very bad idea to just completely ignore IE6. Some estimates put it at about 25% of all worldwide internet traffic (still!). That said, if you have an extremely tech-savvy audience, the chances they are browsing your site with IE6 become much slimmer. My website has an extreme majority of its audience in the Firefox browser, because most of the people who surf my site are looking for my jQuery plugin. They are all programmers and developers.

I think many people just don't realize how many in the corporate world and the big-business world are locked into using IE6. IT people keep everyone inside a company on one system, and don't upgrade until they are willing to do a lot of work. This is one of the reasons IE6 is still so prevalent: Huge networks of computers inside of major corporations have been locked out of upgrading.

Also, at the time of IE7's release, there were whole countries who's banking industry relied on IE6 Active-X controls, which don't work in IE7. Active-X has been officially deprecated, but it's not like a country can just let their banking sector die just because there happens to be a browser which renders CSS better.

Is IE6 a pain to develop for? Sure, but it's not as bad as the old Netscape and IE4 by a long-shot.

Don't believe IE6 could be 25% of all worldwide internet traffic? Take a look at this: http://www.w3counter.com/globalstats.php

If you're working on an existing site, check the stats to see how many visitors are using IE6. If the number is low, scrap it. If the number is relatively significant, you've just got to expect to do the extra work (assuming they're buyers).

On the other hand, if it's a new site, I think the best you can do is try to size up your audience to determine what browser they're using. If your market is older people, you're likely to have a larger percentage using older browsers.

Another thing to consider is how valuable are those people as customers? If any particular group is extra picky, or needy, or likely to ask for refunds, do you really want them as customers? What if there's a correlation between the browser they use & the amount of service they demand? To use the older demographic as an example; if you're selling something technology-related, you're more likely to have to spend much more time servicing an older customer base than a younger one. Is that something you want to do? Personally, my time is more important to me than keeping a picky (or uneducated/untrainable) customer happy. I'd rather focus on the better customers.

Sorry. Didn't mean to go so far off on that tangent, but I do think it's relevant.

hey there!

I see to it that my website is compatible to IE 6.

Wow - I was buried in my work for a day and just saw all the replies. Many thanks to everyone who responded - a lot of great points raised here.

Up until now I have always designed for IE6, in fact it was only recently that I stopped designing fro IE 5 as well. I have several computers in my office with various operating system and browser combos and still have machines with both these versions of IE.

Currently the application works in IE6 but some display elements are "degraded". It's an application that is very important to me, I've been working on it for almost 5 years and I'm just about finished so it needs to be perfect! I really don't want to stop support for IE6, in fact I've already made several compromises specifically for IE6 in the design.

The target market for the application is actually Internet Marketers, however as we all know IM people span a wide range from tech geeks who wouldn't be caught dead using Internet Explorer to the technically challenged who may think that Explorer is the only way to view the Internet. So if 25% of people still use IE6 I can probably assume that some Internet Marketers still do as well. As this is a new site (in fact it currently exists only on a local LINUX server) I have no traffic statistics to verify this against yet.

Again, thank you all very much for your responses.

Aloha!

Bill

Try explaining to your client why you're alienating around 20% of your visitors; or better still, why your client (who uses IE6) isn't an "included site visitor" for the web site they're paying you to create.

Of course, not everyone here's creating sites for clients. But if you needed reason enough (as painful as it may be) to continue IE6 compatibility, you've just got one.

There are surprisingly many people using IE6. They don't even know there are other browsers.

If I can fix the IE6 bugs I do. If I can't fix them, I don't break my bum trying. I'm more concerned with learning how to make my sites work well with mobile phones than IE6.

So you have to do everything to the lowest common denominator? Sort of like putting caution labels on hot coffee, and having bilingual signs all over the place?

Keep putting up those signs and they won't learn the 'other' language, keep designing for IE6 and they won't upgrade.

What is broken? The browser or the website?

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of course, it's important to design site to view in any browser. most visitor arrive from ie6.example: in my office and other too. they are use ie6+, because their OS is windows. so management decided to use ie6 rather than firefox....

I'm actually surprised that IE6 is still used to the extent it is, especially as Microsoft is always trying to push an update to the next version. I have a machine that I specifically keep at IE7 and I constantly have to decline the offer to update it to IE8. But I hadn't thought about the corporate world where IT staff may keep users at IE6 to simplify their work and to keep consistency with what they need to support.

As IE6 is still so prevalent I can't see having any choice but to design for it, or at the very least to have pages "degrade gracefully" for IE6 users.

I found an interesting take on the issue here:

Universal Internet Explorer 6 CSS | For A Beautiful Web

It's about creating a "universal" style sheet for IE6. Not sure I completely agree but it does have its merits.

Bill

i thinks many users going to use IE8..
cause it has great performance...

well really great points here, but many clients still believe that IE6 has large user base, which has to be covered. Although IE6 has lots of bugs and always you will face problem when you are using form or javascript in it.

so, our designers and coders have to keep IE6 in mind.. we're presently working on 15k project and client insists that we check on IE6

yes i still but i used to do my best so that it fix with IE 6 and FF

no I don't care about IE6 anymore. I focous about IE7 and FF

I feel your pain. Recently, I helped build an interface for a private web application for a large hospital and medical center. We spend a huge amount of time making sure it worked in all the main browsers, only to find out near the end that the ENTIRE hospital was using IE6 only. It is one of the largest medical centers of its kind in the US. What a bummer...

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I used WP too, the themes look good

No , i dont..wordpress is better..

Hello! :-) Looking at the data given to me by Google Analytics
for a small side project website (that I was looking at in another
browser window when I read your post) reveals that of the
54,425 unique visitors that have come to the site using "some"
version of Internet Explorer, 18,087 (or 33.23%) were using IE6.

That's hard to believe because IE6 just seems so old. But unless
the data is flawed, that's reality.

Not anymore as IE seem something for the bin these days for me.

Hi Bill,

As far as it is client's website or blog we make sure we have IE6 support.
But for web applications we are going to build as we want and launch,
i think it is not worthy to support IE6... Here is a post Matt posted few months ago
that many other developers are/have said Bye BYE to IE6
IE6 Independence? — Matt Mullenweg

may this help,
Mohsin

Hi,

I think you should create your website(s) to look the same in all browsers. The simple solution is to do your own coding, stick to jpegs and gifs and limit flash to one area or not at all.

Dawn.

If it's a web application that's particular to something, you may be capable to not support IE6 - but it calculates on your audience.

there are better things in life to do rather spending time on IE6.

I still do. It does take a lot of time making it work in IE6 in some cases but I usually have a separate stylesheet geared specifically towards IE6 bugs. Most clients still prefer having their site working/displaying properly in IE6 so that doesn't really give me much choice.

If I'm doing it for personal use here's the way I look at it: People are willing to pay me $85/hour for freelance work, so if it takes me five extra hours to be IE6 complaint I need to make $425 from IE6 users to break even. Not in the infinite long tail, but in the short term since I could've spent those five work hours much more wisely.

I wouldn't bother with IE6.. just look at your analytics stats and figure out if your bulk is coming from ie6 which i doubt it..

I go for IE latest and 1 or 2 back.. Firefox usually i just worry about the latest as the older ones get taken care off automatically..