Why Wait Webs

With this article, I am going to attempt to convince you to stop using Internet Explorer for web browsing on a day-to-day basis. I will start with a brief history of the Internet, just to get you familiarized with the subject if you aren’t already. Then I will move on to the 5 reasons you should switch away from the most popular web browser, Internet Explorer. After that, I will introduce you to my favorite alternatives to Internet Explorer and show you how easy it is to switch (you won’t lose all your favorites!). Well, let’s get going!

A Brief History

I will try to keep this as brief as I know how, since I could easily go into A LOT of detail about it! If you’re interested in reading more in-depth, you should definitely check out this great article: History of the Web Standards Project at WebStandards.org.

The two most popular web browsers at the beginning of the world wide web.

A web browser is what you use to view the world wide web. In the early days of the web, there were two vastly different web browsers duking it out for supremacy: Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator (logos pictured to the right). Each browser was developed completely independently of the other, and as such, the technologies were complex and wildly varying. Pages rarely, if ever, looked the same in both browsers, and as a result the web as a whole was made a less compatible, less accessible, and generally less fun place to be.

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With Safari now hovering around 8% of browser market share, it is important that web developers and designers test it almost as thoroughly as they would Firefox. Although the numbers don’t lie, plenty of developers/designers still don’t test Safari at all. Even those who do are easily prone to missing this one, as it’s rather difficult to see on lackluster monitors. There is a little-known issue in Safari where color in images mismatches with the CSS background colors. I won’t pretend to know the nitty-gritty details of how this works, but essentially Webkit renders CSS hex codes slightly different than it renders image colors.

Safari Background Image-Color Mismatch

Normally this background image/color mismatch is not noticeable enough to be a problem. However, if you are trying to fake transparency, and part of your image is meant to look like the background, the image/css color profile difference becomes immediately visible on modern monitors, since the background image intended to blend with the CSS solid color does not quite match up. This is shown in the image to the left, but again, you have to have a nice and bright monitor to see it. In case you’re having trouble seeing it, I highlighted the edges of the image, where the gray varies slightly, in the second image below and to the right.

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In the web industry today, search engine optimization is widely regarded as very important, but it surprises me how frequently I see other opportunities for free web traffic passed up. Here are some techniques to advertise your website for free. You can easily incorporate these into your business strategy to often yield a dramatic improvement in your traffic.

1. On ALL of Your Advertisements

It should go without saying that any advertising you do, be it a billboard, a newspaper ad, a yellow pages ad, or a tattoo on some guy’s arm, should have your web address displayed somewhere on it.  I know this sounds obvious to some, but I have seen too many businesses with websites let them go to waste because they don’t even bother to put the URL on their own advertisements.

2. On Your Product

If you sell a product, then hopefully you have your website somewhere on your packaging and/or the product itself. For example, CDs and DVDs should include your site somewhere on the case, and possibly the disc itself. Likewise, books should have the address printed somewhere clearly visible. It’s a great way to advertise your website for free.

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Thank you for visiting the brand new Why Wait Webs Blog.  This blog will be aimed at two distinct audiences: the web designer, and the business owner.

For business owners, I will be covering various techniques that will help your website do a better job for you.  Examples of some topics I might cover include general search engine optimization techniques, things you can include on your website to keep your visitors glued to your page, and easy marketing techniques.  I will also be covering some general Internet and computing principles that will help the less technically inclined to get along in a very high-tech world.  This section will not go into the technical side of things much at all.

For my fellow graphic and website designers, I will be offering articles ranging from the basics of web design and development to intermediate design and coding techniques that you can implement right away.  Many of the principals in these posts will be universally applicable, while others will focus more directly on certain software or languages.  Most frequently I will be covering Photoshop, Flash, Dreamweaver, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

I sure hope that at least some of the information in this blog is useful to you, whether you are a fellow designer, a client of mine, or a business owner who happened on my site.  If you would like to see a particular topic covered, I’d love to hear your ideas.  Shoot me an email using my contact form, or make a comment on any of my blog posts.

Hope to see you soon!