8 ms·

WordPress Discontinues Support for Internet Explorer 6

146 points by ssclafani 15y ago

steve19 15y ago
They are only discontinuing support for the admin part of the package which is very javascript heavy. The default frontend theme will, I am sure, continue to support IE6 for a long time.
- francescolaffi 15y ago
  Actually the default frontend theme (twentyten) has already dropped ie6 support for the dropdown navigation (can be solved installing a plugin for those who need to support it)
- dave1010uk 15y ago
  The new Twenty Eleven theme [1] doesn't fully support IE6 (there's comments on that bug) but I believe it works OK in it. As WordPress is completely themeable, there will probably be themes that support IE6 for years to come. More interesting (for me at least) is that WordPress 3.2 will require PHP5.2 [2]. WordPress had lots of legacy code for PHP4 that made coding plugins for it a pain. [1] http://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/17198 http://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/17198 [2] http://wordpress.org/news/2011/05/wordpress-3-2-beta-1/ http://wordpress.org/news/2011/05/wordpress-3-2-beta-1/
ck2 15y ago
There they go trying to be "hip" again, thinking they are important enough to cause trends. They also stopped supporting PHP 4.4 which means hundreds of thousands of legacy installs no longer do automatic updates because their update code (purposely? lazily?) has a few lines that don't work under PHP 4. IE6 is one thing to go "meh" about but WordPress installs that do not do fast easy updates are time bombs.
- code_duck 15y ago
  I can think of several large sites or organizations who have dropped IE6 support in the past year. There's nothing lazy about not supporting PHP 4. It is outdated and flawed, and the last release was in 2008. PHP 5 has been out for over 5 years. The fact that those sites are timebombs is not WordPress's fault or their problem.
  - ck2 15y ago
    For modern code that starts off with PHP5 it's fine and understandable to restrict versions. But WordPress is an "ancient" legacy mess and does not have any advanced code that benefits from PHP5 - you actually have to go out of your way to break it for PHP4. There is nothing in it that cannot be fixed for PHP4 without one extra line or two. Note that 99.9% of WordPress3 works on PHP4 - only the security updating fails - and it fails in an uncontrolled way, not because it checks for the PHP version and stops - it actually fails silently (which is also typical WP style). There are hundreds of thousands of shared servers that are still running PHP 4.4.9 just fine and WordPress has a responsibility to make sure security updates keep working if it's easy enough to maintain (and it is).
    - rojoca 15y ago
      I imagine the main reason they moved to PHP5 was not for features but simply because the PHP development team ended support for PHP 4. That means no more security fixes for version 4. This point was mentioned explicitly by WordPress. WordPress didn't end support until 3 years after PHP 4's end of life. I think that's a more than reasonable amount of time to wait before enforcing an upgrade. The fact that WordPress does not have any code that benefits from PHP 5 is undoubtedly, in part, due to its extended support for PHP 4.
    - ceejayoz 15y ago
      The best thing WP can do, security-wise, is ditch PHP4.
      - uriel 15y ago
        The best thing it could do security-wise is ditching PHP.
hxf148 15y ago
It's funny, I have been around so long in this game that I remember never really liking Netscape, ever. IE3 in some ways made web dev fun and interesting again. Then IE4 took over and I was pretty happy using it as Netscape grew fat and slow. Netscape 4 was ok and that was the short lived first era of decent browser consistency. I don't remember much about IE5, head down developing and skipping classes but I do remember when MS broke all our hearts with IE6. It started out all so well then it turned to mush and our faces melted as we glimpsed the future carved in exceptions and special handling. Web dev from then until very recently has been haunted and stunted and repeatedly annoyed by efforts to include IE6 "Support". Out of a perverse loyalty to doing things well in all browsers and an employer's choices have meant that I have been one of those making an effort all these long dark years. Ten years with a corporate network that I believe is still running IE7 in compatibility mode today taught me lots of useless IE skills and.. creative thinking. Thanks WP for joining the kill IE6..7..8 effort. 9 isn't bad but they will probably screw it up. http://infostripe.com/harold http://infostripe.com/harold
- cubicle67 15y ago
  Not sure if you're aware of it, but the reason you're being down voted is not because of your comment (which is fine), but because you've included a link to your blog which adds nothing to the discussion and is generally not viewed as a positive thing [edit: 1 - I upvoted you because I thought your comment was good. 2 - at the time of writing your comment looked to be at about -2 but now it's back in the +ve]
  - hxf148 15y ago
    Ahh sorry about that I sign my link as a sig all the time out of habit. I guess in a way it could be related as that link is a project I work on that has minimal intentional IE6 support. :) I'll remember that tip regardless.
    - yuhong 15y ago
      You can put it in your about in Hacker News.
barnaby 15y ago
Cool! Wordpress are becoming part of the solution.
grandalf 15y ago
This is fantastic news. Now if only Google would release Chrome for Win2K to un-obsolete many valuable Win2K licenses.
- bzbarsky 15y ago
  For what it's worth, Firefox 4 runs fine on Win2K last I checked.
  - grandalf 15y ago
    Only with FF 4 has the browser been speedy enough to run on the typical kind of hardware sold with a Win2K license. Chrome is extremely fast and would un-obsolete so much more hardware even than FF4.
    - bzbarsky 15y ago
      Chrome uses way more memory than Firefox 4. So it may in fact not run all that well on some of the lower-end hardware....

146 points by ssclafani 15y ago

They are only discontinuing support for the admin part of the package which is very javascript heavy. The default frontend theme will, I am sure, continue to support IE6 for a long time.

francescolaffi 15y ago
Actually the default frontend theme (twentyten) has already dropped ie6 support for the dropdown navigation (can be solved installing a plugin for those who need to support it)
dave1010uk 15y ago
The new Twenty Eleven theme [1] doesn't fully support IE6 (there's comments on that bug) but I believe it works OK in it. As WordPress is completely themeable, there will probably be themes that support IE6 for years to come. More interesting (for me at least) is that WordPress 3.2 will require PHP5.2 [2]. WordPress had lots of legacy code for PHP4 that made coding plugins for it a pain. [1] http://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/17198 http://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/17198 [2] http://wordpress.org/news/2011/05/wordpress-3-2-beta-1/ http://wordpress.org/news/2011/05/wordpress-3-2-beta-1/

ck2 15y ago

There they go trying to be "hip" again, thinking they are important enough to cause trends. They also stopped supporting PHP 4.4 which means hundreds of thousands of legacy installs no longer do automatic updates because their update code (purposely? lazily?) has a few lines that don't work under PHP 4. IE6 is one thing to go "meh" about but WordPress installs that do not do fast easy updates are time bombs.

code_duck 15y ago
I can think of several large sites or organizations who have dropped IE6 support in the past year. There's nothing lazy about not supporting PHP 4. It is outdated and flawed, and the last release was in 2008. PHP 5 has been out for over 5 years. The fact that those sites are timebombs is not WordPress's fault or their problem.
- ck2 15y ago
  For modern code that starts off with PHP5 it's fine and understandable to restrict versions. But WordPress is an "ancient" legacy mess and does not have any advanced code that benefits from PHP5 - you actually have to go out of your way to break it for PHP4. There is nothing in it that cannot be fixed for PHP4 without one extra line or two. Note that 99.9% of WordPress3 works on PHP4 - only the security updating fails - and it fails in an uncontrolled way, not because it checks for the PHP version and stops - it actually fails silently (which is also typical WP style). There are hundreds of thousands of shared servers that are still running PHP 4.4.9 just fine and WordPress has a responsibility to make sure security updates keep working if it's easy enough to maintain (and it is).
  - rojoca 15y ago
    I imagine the main reason they moved to PHP5 was not for features but simply because the PHP development team ended support for PHP 4. That means no more security fixes for version 4. This point was mentioned explicitly by WordPress. WordPress didn't end support until 3 years after PHP 4's end of life. I think that's a more than reasonable amount of time to wait before enforcing an upgrade. The fact that WordPress does not have any code that benefits from PHP 5 is undoubtedly, in part, due to its extended support for PHP 4.
  - ceejayoz 15y ago
    The best thing WP can do, security-wise, is ditch PHP4.
    - uriel 15y ago
      The best thing it could do security-wise is ditching PHP.

hxf148 15y ago

It's funny, I have been around so long in this game that I remember never really liking Netscape, ever. IE3 in some ways made web dev fun and interesting again. Then IE4 took over and I was pretty happy using it as Netscape grew fat and slow. Netscape 4 was ok and that was the short lived first era of decent browser consistency. I don't remember much about IE5, head down developing and skipping classes but I do remember when MS broke all our hearts with IE6. It started out all so well then it turned to mush and our faces melted as we glimpsed the future carved in exceptions and special handling. Web dev from then until very recently has been haunted and stunted and repeatedly annoyed by efforts to include IE6 "Support". Out of a perverse loyalty to doing things well in all browsers and an employer's choices have meant that I have been one of those making an effort all these long dark years. Ten years with a corporate network that I believe is still running IE7 in compatibility mode today taught me lots of useless IE skills and.. creative thinking. Thanks WP for joining the kill IE6..7..8 effort. 9 isn't bad but they will probably screw it up. http://infostripe.com/harold http://infostripe.com/harold

cubicle67 15y ago
Not sure if you're aware of it, but the reason you're being down voted is not because of your comment (which is fine), but because you've included a link to your blog which adds nothing to the discussion and is generally not viewed as a positive thing [edit: 1 - I upvoted you because I thought your comment was good. 2 - at the time of writing your comment looked to be at about -2 but now it's back in the +ve]
- hxf148 15y ago
  Ahh sorry about that I sign my link as a sig all the time out of habit. I guess in a way it could be related as that link is a project I work on that has minimal intentional IE6 support. :) I'll remember that tip regardless.
  - yuhong 15y ago
    You can put it in your about in Hacker News.

barnaby 15y ago

Cool! Wordpress are becoming part of the solution.

grandalf 15y ago

This is fantastic news. Now if only Google would release Chrome for Win2K to un-obsolete many valuable Win2K licenses.

bzbarsky 15y ago
For what it's worth, Firefox 4 runs fine on Win2K last I checked.
- grandalf 15y ago
  Only with FF 4 has the browser been speedy enough to run on the typical kind of hardware sold with a Win2K license. Chrome is extremely fast and would un-obsolete so much more hardware even than FF4.
  - bzbarsky 15y ago
    Chrome uses way more memory than Firefox 4. So it may in fact not run all that well on some of the lower-end hardware....