The following table outlines current browser usage across several sites for which I have analytics access. This represents the trailing 30 days, ending yesterday, 2008-06-25. While not a full cross section of the Internet there's a reasonable spread between the sites in terms of age and technology experience, so this sample should be reasonably interesting to those of you who care about such things. It's interesting enough for me to post about

As you can see, while it's now third, Internet Explorer 6 is still hanging on with unfortunate tenacity. Which means we still have great pain to deal with when trying to develop cross-browser web sites in this rich, interactive era.

I also means there's demand for people like me who know how to handle the beast, so I guess I should look to that as a silver lining…

Still, die IE6 die.

Here's it is.

//height for IE6. Thankfully IE6 messes up height in a useful way
height:350px;
//height for everything else. IE6 looks at this and says "wha?"
height:auto;
//min-height for everything else. IE6 is baffled by this.
min-height:350px;

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So sayeth the IEblog:

IEBlog : IE Automatic Component Activation Now Available

The IE Automatic Component Activation (IE ACA) update is now available as part of the April 2008 Internet Explorer Cumulative Update. The "click to activate" behavior, formerly required for ActiveX controls embedded in some webpages, is now permanently removed from Internet Explorer. For detailed information on IE ACA, see our blog post from last November announcing this update.

This update replaces the IE ACA previews released in December 2007 and February 2008.

Which means I can stop using SWFObject and just dump Flash into the page like I used to way back when. SWFObject is really a nice piece of code, but I'm a lot happier when I'm not relying on JavaScript for something as basic as getting Flash embedded into a page. It's just an added layer of complexity and an extra download* that I don't need in my life and I'm damn glad to be rid of it.

Want an example of the complexity I'm talking about? check out this post I wrote a few months ago:

Belt and Suspenders- Flash Embed With SWFObject and Conditional Comments

While it works, it's WAY too complicated for anyone's good.

*although I do wrap all JS into a single file now, just appending SWFObject to the bottom of the file. Even doing that it adds a few KB to the download, so even in a single file situation it's overhead I'd rather be rid of…

As long as you're happy with 5 being the definition of an explosion

Craftsmanship

Markup & Style Society Talk – Bokardo

"For my talk, I picked something I’ve never talked about before: web craftsmanship. I chose this topic because I’ve been thinking a lot more about it since going out on my own last August. I also consider both Dan and Ethan craftsmen, obsessed with doing quality work vs. gaining notoriety or getting rich. So I thought it would be a good fit for the audience as well."

Not the greatest slideshare, but the very thought of it speaks to me as I'm trying to improve quality across the presentation layer at work and getting people to think in those terms is a key to getting the work I want to see produced on a consistent basis.

Wayback machine

jwz – Happy Run Some Old Web Browsers Day!

jwz has resurrected a ton of old Netscape/Mosaic history, including the old Mosaic Communications Corporation web site and some ancient versions of their software (with which to browse it.)

SEO

Free Firefox Rank Checker – Check Your Google, Yahoo!, and Microsoft Search Engine Rankings : SEO Book.com

Pretty self-explanatory, no? I took it for a test drive this morning and it's a fine tool.

A New Blog I Love

The Leila Texts

When you send a text message on the Verizon network, you can address your text by choosing a name out of your contact list, or you can address it by typing in a phone number. You can also type in a name. And if you type in L-E-I-L-A, then– bizarrely– your text will come to me.
This is a blog about the texts I have received. All of them are from strangers, intended for other Leilas, but obviously they missed their marks.

Just read it. It's not a big time investment and it's interesting/funny/weird/cool.

Creative Wins at PR

Message to Daniel_K – Sound Blaster – Creative Labs

Description cribbed from metafilter:

"A geek named daniel_k wanted to help his fellow Vista users. He created a set of drivers that would get their Creative sound cards working under Vista — something beyond the ken and expertise of Creative's engineering team. Creative VP Phil O'Shaughnessy, however, took umbrage. The results? A PR disaster with hundreds of users pledging to boycott. "

It made slashdot, digg, reddit, etc. Nice work Creative!

SaveTheDevelopers.org :: Making The Web A Better Place

Say no to IE 6! Our current campaign focuses on assisting users in upgrading their Internet Explorer 6 web browser. This campaign will result in former IE 6 users having a more enjoyable experience on the web while (hopefully) creating a less stressful and complicated environment for web developers by hastening the retirement of an outdated browser.

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