Monday
Nov152010
About That Browser Not Supported Page
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 4:05PM
Hi, folks. Kent Brewster here, new Web guy at Vurve.
As an encouragingly small number of you may have noticed--yes, we were watching the logs very closely on launch day--Vurve doesn't support versions of Internet Explorer less than 8. If you try to visit us with IE6, IE7, or a browser that's pretending to be IE6 or IE7 and is good enough at it to follow instructions in conditional comments, you'll see our AIEE (Ancient Internet Explorer Exit) page, which looks something like this:
This doesn't mean we don't love you, or that you shouldn't try Vurve. All it means is that we can't safely do business with you if you're using Internet Explorer 6 or 7, which were released in 2001 and 2006 and have a long, well-documented history of security problems.
If you're running a machine that absolutely will not support anything past IE6, we urge you to try Google's Chrome Frame, which is a safe, speedy, standards-compliant plug-in that will increase your enjoyment and safety while browsing the entire Web, not just Vurve.
Excellent. You're performing a public service, and we salute you. In each page you want to restrict, put this at the very top of your
This plus the source of our AIEE page is available for your copy-and-pasting pleasure. Feel free to build on it; that's why it's on GitHub. Have fun, and please let us know how it goes!
As an encouragingly small number of you may have noticed--yes, we were watching the logs very closely on launch day--Vurve doesn't support versions of Internet Explorer less than 8. If you try to visit us with IE6, IE7, or a browser that's pretending to be IE6 or IE7 and is good enough at it to follow instructions in conditional comments, you'll see our AIEE (Ancient Internet Explorer Exit) page, which looks something like this:
This doesn't mean we don't love you, or that you shouldn't try Vurve. All it means is that we can't safely do business with you if you're using Internet Explorer 6 or 7, which were released in 2001 and 2006 and have a long, well-documented history of security problems.
If you're running a machine that absolutely will not support anything past IE6, we urge you to try Google's Chrome Frame, which is a safe, speedy, standards-compliant plug-in that will increase your enjoyment and safety while browsing the entire Web, not just Vurve.
Doing Something Like This On Your Site?
Excellent. You're performing a public service, and we salute you. In each page you want to restrict, put this at the very top of your
<HEAD> tag:<!--[if lte IE 7]>
<style>html{display:none!important;}</style>
<META http-equiv="refresh" content="0;URL=http://yoursite.com/aiee.html">
<![endif]-->
- The first line is the start of a "conditional comment," which only IE should react to. This particular one will fire if the browser version is less than or equal to IE 7.
- The second line hides the body of the page in case there are rendering delays. (The last thing you want is a big flash of weirdly-styled content.)
- The third line redirects the browser to your landing page.
- The fourth line closes the conditional comment.
This plus the source of our AIEE page is available for your copy-and-pasting pleasure. Feel free to build on it; that's why it's on GitHub. Have fun, and please let us know how it goes!
in company-stuff, webdev
company-stuff, webdev
Reader Comments (6)
I think it's good to inform users that they're using an out of date browser and should consider upgrading. I also think it's fine, having given that warning, for your site to work incorrectly in places or to withhold CSS and JS if necessary but I'm not convinced about the merits of physically blocking them from viewing the site at all. I'm not suggesting that one should be pampering to users that still use IE 6 but I still find that in most cases it's only a few minor things that don't work correctly if I don't specifically code for IE 6, certainly not enough to turn them away completely.
I also think the styling of the of the page - white text on blue using a font like Courier New is a bit to tekkie/geeky looking for your average user. For me it's a bit too much like the Windows blue screen of death which fills users with complete fear.
Hey, great to hear from you, Ed!
I would agree with part of what you have to say if we were putting up a news or social networking site. [For other readers who are not in the business of making Web sites: conventional wisdom says that to attract the largest reader base, we should show a lightly-styled, not-so-interactive version with enough content to encourage readers to upgrade their browsers, and then gently nag at them in the forlorn hope that someday this will occur.]
Vurve, however, is a site for merchants who are conducting commerce, including viewing and billing their customers' credit cards and other sensitive information. Older versions of Internet Explorer are notoriously malware-prone and absolutely must not be used by anyone who intends to protect customer information. (And yes, I'd be looking into filtering older versions of other browsers, if the user base was significant and/or they had serious security problems.)
The style of the page is intentional. Anyone conducting business on a five-year-old browser needs to get the point on a visceral level, and there's no better way than the Blue Screen of Death. :)
For what it's worth, I helped install an AIEE page for one of our merchants minutes after this went live. The right people are listening.
Thanks Kent. I hadn't realised you'd moved, until yesterday that is. I hope it's going well at Vurve.
Fair points on the commerce front. I guess the tricky thing is that most people still running IE 6 probably don't have the power to change the situation - people in corporates, government organisations etc. I suppose there's an argument that if enough people are blocked and complain it might cause a shift but I'm not hopeful. This makes pretty depressing reading - http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/08/despite-petition-uk-government-to-keep-ie6.ars.
Do you know if Google Chrome frame installs without admin rights? I haven't tried but if so that's a pretty good way out and perhaps one that should be pushed and explained further.
Sorry, you will need admin rights to install Chrome Frame. Google is working on it, per http://bit.ly/duhbUS, but I'm not sure how they're going to do this without cooperation from Microsoft (or perhaps exploiting a buffer overflow or two), but it's encouraging to hear.
Things are going very well at Vurve; the startup life suits me just fine.
[...] on a modern browser. Bonus: Chrome Frame works all the way down to IE6, and won’t get you our Blue Screen of Impending Doom if you’re using [...]
So does this mean you guys aren't going to support Windows Phone 7? God knows why Nokia made that decision, but it's one we all have to live with...