Is the 4th generation era over??? [Archive]

View Full Version : Is the 4th generation era over???

Royan

15.05.2001, 06:33

How do you think when we gonna forget the 4x IEs and 4.0x NNs like we did about 3x? Most of my friends (who are not programmers) has already been using 5th versions for about a year or even more. Does anyone know the statistics?

bratta

15.05.2001, 06:50

My statitics from bratta.com:

Microsoft Internet Explorer 85.14%
- 4.x: 2.52%
- 5.x: 93.01%
- 6.x: 4.45%

Netscape 8.51%
- 4.x: 88.38%
- 5.x*: 11.44%
- 6.x: 0.16%

*I guess a lot of the mozilla versions says 5.x

This is of course a little special, since parts of the site is still not supported by IE6 and NS6.

Personally I think this is pretty correct though. And I assume that not long from now most ppl will start making their sites 5.x+ only. I look forward to it though I kind of like coding for NS4, it's a good challenge :)

I guess I should start making some cool scripts that really uses the possibilities of the new browsers soon.

-Thomas Brattli-
http://www.bratta.com/
http://www.dhtmlcentral.com/

anders

15.05.2001, 06:58

hi royan,

doubt that the time to forget 4x will come anytime soon...many schools and universities still use them...especially in 3rd world/underdeveloped countries....
however here's a site that has some stats regarding teh usage of browsers..
http://www.thecounter.com/stats/2001/April/browser.html

there are also stats on usage of OS, etc...
all the way to last year...
not sure how accurate counter.com is though...

anders
http://dzygn.com

Dan

15.05.2001, 08:13

I actually found that in China and Vietnam, because the systems were so new (within the last 2 years or so in Vietnam, because of red tap ... yada yada) that they mostly used top of the range browsers. The problems are schools and offices from the public sector where they can't afford a proper IT guy, and if they've got 50 odd PCs its a nightmare to update all the software in one go. Plus, the staff don't have time to learn a new program (because IE5 is SO much different from IE4 <img src=icon_smile_tongue.gif border=0 align=middle> *sarcasm*)

But as I've said before, you can cater your dynamic needs towards your prospective audience, as long as you give an alternative!

======================
Dan
www.pupius.net
======================

anders

15.05.2001, 08:33

china and vietnam? really? wow...wouldn't have expected that...

royan: dan's right...
the most important thing to consider is not making a site that's ALL browsers compat...though that would be nice : )
the goal should be a site targeted to ur intended audience...like if u r a designer looking for work and ur site is used as a show of what u can do..well, most likely the ppl getting on ur site should have 5+ by now...on the other hand, if ur site is for the local orphanage foundation, then u want as many ppl to be able to see ur site as u can...

anders
http://dzygn.com

Shane

16.05.2001, 17:58

I emailed Netscape support about two weeks ago and they sent me an email back saying that as of April they were dropping support of any Netscape browser previous to 4.74. So, if it makes any difference, they are slowly weeding them out too.

ShAnE

Syedur

16.05.2001, 18:25

Huh?
What?

<center>[url="http://e-syed.net/"]e-syed.net[/url:pm3185rlhz]
||| Part of syedsoft.com |||
webmaster@e-syed.net
...Coming Soon...
In a browser near you.</center>

Syedur

16.05.2001, 18:29

Yeah...
The war is over now...
You can go to sleep.

<center>[url="http://e-syed.net/"]e-syed.net[/url:wwbb9i6h3l]
||| Part of syedsoft.com |||
webmaster@e-syed.net
...Coming Soon...
In a browser near you.</center>

dayve

17.05.2001, 01:43

well, since bratta posted his browser stats, I thought I'd post mine which is collected from a service called Urchin

Internet Explorer
6.x 1%
5.x 74.1%
4.x 5.2%
3.x 0.2%
2.x 0.2%

Netscape Navigator
5.x 0.2%
4.x 5.3%
3.x 2.5%
2.x 0.2%

Now you say, hey that doesn't add up to 100%, well I did not count other browsers NOR any bots that are hitting my site.

If you are interested in seeing what Urchin can do, feel free to visit:

http://www.hafresno.org/logs

It provides many other stats.

and the winner is....ANYONE SUPRISED...Internet Explorer...

dayve

<center>
Nine Inch Nails Forum
http://www.nineinchnailz.com/forum
</center>

Dan

17.05.2001, 06:57

That's pretty cool Davye... but how funny is it that 9 people found your site with this keyword search:
<pre id=code>"migrant farm workers"</pre id=code>

======================
Dan
www.pupius.net
======================

Dan

17.05.2001, 08:23

I agree, but if you are making a dynamic site for a client then you want as much of the prospective audience to see all the bells and whistles as possible. A cooperate site should NEVER have "sorry your browser is too old, please come back when you have upgraded".

This topic is beoming circlular... prepare for lock <img src=icon_smile_wink.gif border=0 align=middle>

======================
Dan
www.pupius.net
======================


Edited by - Dan on 05/17/2001 07:25:01

Icestorm

17.05.2001, 09:00

I've thought of this some more, and I think I'm really just waiting for NS6 to pull it's act together and then I'll try to stop supporting ns4 where ever it's appropriate.

The new Internet Explorers really are very good browsers, and a good alternative for version 4 browsers.

Even though it's possible to make pages that are downwards compatible with ie4 and ns4, they are likely to look (slightly) ugly. This is because of all the little quirks in their support for css and html. And good looking is quite important if the site is not only for information, and if you wish to leave a good impression of quality on your visitors.

Also, I think that bratta.com is the last big dhtml site that supports NS4 really well, together with the old [url="http://www.dansteinman.com/dynduo/"]DynDuo[/url:yk4qfoi8tj] pages. But the DynDuo scripts are not very compatible with 5+ browsers.

So, if Thomas really is the last person supporting ns4 with a good library of scripts, it will have a big impact if he stops doing that! When people cannot easily get their hands on ns4 compatible scripts anymore, they are more likely to stop supporting that browser.

Right now, with the launch of dhtmlcentral, may be a good time to stop supporting ns4. But let's keep ie4 support alive for a while, it's not all that bad.

The idea is, like Anders said "if the site is not for your local orphanage" then having a dynamic and good looking site may be more important than supporting old browsers with a tiny user base.

Edited by - icestorm on 05/17/2001 08:38:49

dayve

17.05.2001, 11:45

<BLOCKQUOTE id=quote>quote:<hr height=1 noshade id=quote>
That's pretty cool Davye... but how funny is it that 9 people found your site with this keyword search:
<pre id=code>"migrant farm workers"</pre id=code>

======================
Dan
www.pupius.net
======================

<hr height=1 noshade id=quote></BLOCKQUOTE id=quote>

this is because I work for the Housing Authorities in California and Migrant Farmers require housing while they migrate from city to city during certain ag seasons. did you look at the referrals? bratta.com was up there :)

dayve

<center>
Nine Inch Nails Forum
http://www.nineinchnailz.com/forum
</center>

Dan

17.05.2001, 12:25

Ah... I was thinking "imigrant farmers" - never mind.

======================
Dan
www.pupius.net
======================

Shane

17.05.2001, 12:43

Actually Dan, I was thinking that too. lol <img src=icon_smile_big.gif border=0 align=middle> I guess because there are so many here in Colorado.

//ShAnE

Brian Nickel

17.05.2001, 23:37

I've said it once, I've said it a million times:
As long as people use school computers, there will be a need for NS4.08 compatability.
Unless you are doing something increadably huge or slow or DOM oriented, NS4 is just as good as some other browsers. I can find attributes superior to other browsers, and it is a lot more stable with JavaScript than NS6 when it comes to dynamic layer generation.
It will never be as good as IE5, but it is still good to support it.

=========================

Bratta,
I've noticed that the Preview window for posting removed HTML after it does Forum Code, this causes previews to come back as a bunch of tags rather than formated text, if you want to look at it, I'm sure it will just require the moving of a line of code, it will make previewing that much easier.

ScriptGuru={
name:'Brian Nickel',
email:'[url:mggwf7xskg]scriptguru@f2s.com[/url:mggwf7xskg]',
url:'[url:mggwf7xskg]http://www.scriptguru.f2s.com[/url:mggwf7xskg]'
};

Brian Nickel

18.05.2001, 18:28

<BLOCKQUOTE id=quote>quote:<hr height=1 noshade id=quote>
btw. school computers almost always use MSIE, its business networks that use NS4 (even then there is no comparison to ie)
<hr height=1 noshade id=quote></BLOCKQUOTE id=quote>

I am in an Arizona town in the most ghetto school district. It is NS4 all the way. With the level of interaction between IE and WE, it would be a security risk.

ScriptGuru={
getName:function(){return 'Brian Nickel';},
getEmail:function(){return '[url:72hgkcybjt]scriptguru@f2s.com[/url:72hgkcybjt]';},
getURL:function(){return '[url:72hgkcybjt]http://www.scriptguru.f2s.com[/url:72hgkcybjt];)'
};

Dan

20.05.2001, 10:50

I think the 4th generation discussion has concluded and the posts have drifted off-topic.

Topic .... closed

-------------------------
Dan
www.pupius.net
-------------------------