There are times where IE 11's behaviours both in Windows 8 RTM and Windows 8.1 make no sense at all.
Bitly.com is a site we use _a lot_ to manage our links throughout our communications.
Here is what the site looks like in IE 11 on Windows 8 RTM today:
Now top that off with the Compatibility option having completely disappeared from any menu option and we have one frustrated user.
Oh, wait, no, the option has disappeared under the Gear but hit the ALT on the keyboard and:
There it is.
No Joy:
Okay, one last step before throwing the browser right out the window. Add the site to the Trusted Sites list.
Voila:
Jiminy Cricket, this process was frustrating enough for us, imagine what it must be like for users that may not know about Trusted Sites and Compatibility Mode.
What a complete waste of time and productivity to business users that need to jump through these hopes just to go about their daily business.
Yes, Firefox and Chrome (we won't run with Google product. Period.) are "options" but the business world runs on Microsoft products. Once would hope to believe that somehow things could be done in such a way that users are not impacted in such a way as to lose their productivity to this kind of thing. :(
Philip Elder
Microsoft Cluster MVP
MPECS Inc.
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book
Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
Third Tier: Enterprise Solutions for Small Business
I do have to comment on this "IE Only" mentality. I see it all too often, companies developing custom web applications that only run on IE browsers. This COMPLETELY missed the point of using web technologies which were designed from day one to be vendor neutral. In the early days of the web however web technology wasn't as advanced as people were looking for, and - against all good expert advice, some businesses chose to use MS specific extensions and plugins on a proprietary platform. By doing this, they placed a loaded gun pointed at their heads.
ReplyDeleteNow we are in an era of mobile devices that don't run MS web browsers or any of those custom extensions. Microsoft, in the name of "progress" has changed how their own browser works. Pow. Gun just went off. Now all these apps have to be re-written. In the current era of the internet, you HAVE to ensure that everything you do is cross platform and uses OPEN standards and technologies.
All I can do is continue to urge people to support open standards and avoid the sugar coated proprietary technology Microsoft and others keep dangling in front of us.
Problem is that the WaSP test was won and forgotten.
ReplyDeleteAnother problem is the constant state of change that the protocols are in for the Web.
ActiveX is here to stay and very useful. RDWeb is _the_ killer app for businesses that iDevices can connect to no problem via iTap with RDGateway.
The issue with IE IMNSHO is with the product and its coding. Not with the standards.
Firefox and Chrome can be used without issue in a SharePoint environment. So, no loss of productivity there. IE11 not so much. :(
Philip
I'm more frustrated that Microsoft continually break their own products with new Internet Explorer revisions.
ReplyDeleteExchange 2007 OWA? Exchange 2011 OWA? Exchange 2013 OWA? SBS 2008 RWW? SBS 2011 RWW? All of them have had issues rendering with IE9/10/11 at some point in the past and most of them now need to be added to Compatibility View or Trusted Sites just to avoid the 'light version' where it used to "Just Work." Sure, MS released hotfixes for some versions of Exchange but it's an on-going problem.. the latest RU for Exchange 2010 didn't fix all the issues with IE11.
When Microsoft can't make their own products play nice together without the end-user jumping through hoops (or the Admin jumping through hoops creating GPO's so the end-user doesn't have to) it just makes Microsoft look stupid.