Bait-and-switch approach to force Internet Explorer update
Posted on 17th May 2009 in Browsers | 3 Comments »
Somewhat an interesting discussion took off on Twitter between me (@tekkie) and Jason Young of award-winning Virion (@virion_ca) about the IE6 Update technique. While the goal of such a technique looks decent, it’s mainly of benefit to developers.
What IE6 Update basically does, is to fake the Microsoft-like notification bar on top of the body of the page:
Firstly it may seem like a nice way to convert people from Internet Explorer 6 to whatever there is that is recent from Microsoft, but as Jason quite rightly put it, how transparent is the whole thing? So we end up asking:
Is IE6 Update safe?
It is. By clicking on the bar, user will be taken to the home page of Internet Explorer. That’s all it does. Its JavaScript code is transparent and human-readable, it’s GPL-licenced software as originally coded by Jakob Westhoff for Activebar2.
Is it right to force people to new platforms over the dev effort?
IE6 means no support for 24-bit PNG and for many CSS directives that come in handy on other platforms. It’s a terrible browser and you’d spend hours on workarounds for IE6 that you could otherwise spend on providing better content to the well-equipped audiences. And it’s insecure, open to flaws, worms and all sorts of baddies out there.
Even so, user retains the right to deny the bar. It’s not forced directly.
Is it ethical to throw a bait to unaware users to convert them?
Probably not. Users will have no idea it’s a fake bar. A good fake though, maybe even something that Microsoft should trigger themselves? Actually they have, in a way, because IE8 is available through Automatic Update.
All in all developers make the web and interact with their users, recommending stuff, leading them to directions. It’s really up to every developer to consider what’s best for their audience, but progress through technology is still inevitable. Vorsprung durch Technik.
Related articles:
- Microsoft to push IE8 into Automatic Update
- Internet Explorer dumping CSS hacks to comply with standards
- First browser to pass Acid3 web standards test
- Internet Explorer 8 to pass Acid2
- Testing standards compliance of Microsoft Outlook 2007
- WebKit is leading the run for CSS3
3 Responses
If you want me to give up on IE6, you’ll have to pry it out from my dead, cold hands!
Whether to use a particular browser platform or not is everyone’s own concern and liberty. I’m just advising people to upgrade the obsolete platforms to something, that creates more synergy and provides greater user experience, be it Firefox, Opera, Safari or even the latest version 8 of Internet Explorer itself.
It’s not a secret that IE6 has plenty of security threats, lacks support of open standards and is the worst platform to target in terms of development. Even Microsoft acknowledges this and it was not by chance that they pushed IE8 out as high priority update.
lol @Pepe . . . I am going to have me ie notification bar recommend firefox!