I’ll come right out and say it…IE6 is a dirty word around the office. I don’t want to bash Microsoft or any IE6 fans out there, but as web developers, there’s nothing more frustrating than having to comply with a nearly 10 year old browser. It’s been estimated that a staggering 20% of total web development time is spent catering to Internet Explorer 6. On top of that, there are a lot of amazing design and functionality ideas that are shot down because the potential for catastrophic failure in IE6 is imminent.
I could go on all day about the limitations of IE6, but the fact that it still holds 15% of the browser market share is interesting. I’m guessing the majority of this statistic is made up of corporations with legacy intranet applications that they feel will cease to function if they switch to a modern browser.
It seems that the success of IE6 (when it was released) has become the “ball and chain” of web development evolution. So many applications and web services have been devoted to standards set by IE6 from 2002 until recently. This is due to the fact that it had always accounted for 50 -80% of the browser market.
The good news is, I doubt this scenario will be repeated any time soon. The combination of a variety of available web browsers and new web standards could prevent a phenomenon like this from happening again.
However, who’s to say that another widely accepted application or software solution won’t tie us down for another 10 years due to the sheer volume of applications developed during its prime. Only time will tell.
5 comments »
Jeremy, you’re too nice. I’ll bash IE6 fans out there.. switch to Mozilla already!
I imagine a lot of the non-corporate people that are still using IE6 simply don’t realize that they are using ancient software and don’t realize that there are other options available.
I think you guys should program a virus to install updates for people who are still in IE6!
[...] it is the IT departments who can end this huge problem. How huge is this problem really? As Jeremy pointed out in an earlier blog; 20% of development time is spent on IE6 issues and IE6 still owns 15% of the browser market [...]
[...] mentioned both the dogged efforts of IE 6 to stick around, along with the equally persistent campaigns of those attempting to rid the world [...]