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I started my career 2008 building real estate and stock news websites. Back then, sooooo much of my days were spent making things "IE compatible" using techniqu

I started my career 2008 building real estate and stock news websites. Back then, sooooo much of my days were spent making things "IE compatible" using techniques like: - creating sprite sheets of transparent png corners and sides that one could arrange in a table around an element to create drop-shadows and rounded corners - putting single pixel, transparent gifs at the end of floated containers because clearfix used a "before" CSS selector that earlier IEs didn't know about. - writing CSS rules like -ms-filter: "progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.Alpha(Opacity=75)"; to make something semi-transparent... And so much more. Back then, we were certain we'd open a bottle of champagne once IE is not a requirement anymore. Today, fortunately, I have a different Job and Microsoft makes different browsers. But looking back, I wouldn't have believed this day to arrive.

space_ghost 4y ago
I strongly remember using Firebug in Firefox (mind-blowing tools, for the time) in ~2008 and having to debug issues in IE, which had the equivalent of a Check Engine Light for debugging.
- microSnowball 4y ago
  Lol I remember that little yellow triangle. The source of so much pain.
  - z3t4 4y ago
    undefined is not a function
- samwillis 4y ago
  So true, debugging with alert()… There was Firebug Light, which from memory was a bookmarklet that injected a cut down firebug into the page, but even that didn’t help much.
  - DrSiemer 4y ago
    Not owning any Apple products myself, my only option was a free online emulator to try and fix a bug on older iOS systems. It did not support console logs, so I was trying to debug using alert() as far back as yesterday. It didn't help, I only managed to find the issue through xCode on a random Mac.
- amichal 4y ago
  Firebug and firebug lite were amazing but to keep the record clear it was possible to debug client-side JavaScript (and other script types) using Visual Studio since very early on in IE. It was granted a major pain to setup properly for breakpoints and code highlighting but it was a full fledged debugger and IDE. I remember doing it often. I don’t remember if there was a debugger for IE for mac and early Safari. For me those where where “alert” and “document.write” were my only options.
  - zeven7 4y ago
    I had forgotten about those days. The VS debugger slowed down my computer so much though that I often just used alert anyway. Firebug was a huge improvement.
dheerajvs 4y ago
I won't be able to celebrate for a long time to come. I have to support running an Outlook add-in in Outlook 2016 on Windows, which uses the IE11 rendering engine.
- ratww 4y ago
  Just in case you haven’t heard: Microsoft recently announced that they won’t hold it against you if you drop support for IE11 in add-ins. Your customers might still complain, though. https://docs.microsoft.com/en-US/office/dev/add-ins/develop/support-ie-11 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-US/office/dev/add-ins/develop/...
  - Bilal_io 4y ago
    I am sure Microsoft wouldn't have held it against you to drop support for IE back in 2010. It's always been about the customer.
    - ratww 4y ago
      Incorrect. For those add-ins, IE11 support was required until recently, and there was a real review process, and it was actually pretty good. They even reported very subtle IE11 visual bugs to us.
skittleson 4y ago
I remembered these days as well. There wasn't a lot of resources out their either. Getting everything pixel perfect was the goal. HTML emails were extra tricky since they displayed differently in each client.
- z3t4 4y ago
  Pixel perfect existed in an era where almost everyone had 800x600 screens. Today it's about adapting to many different screen sizes and devices. So when people say pixel perfect today they're 20+ years too late. :P
xhrpost 4y ago
Imagine having a piece of software where you have 95% global market dominance, a near complete monopoly. And then decide not to update said software in the slightest (other than security fixes) for 6 straight years. Kind of mind blowing.
- wongarsu 4y ago
  Exactly what happened to Netscape, just that Netscape wasn't nearly as entrenched (their market share fell from 70-90% in 1996 to about 0 in 2002).
- benoketamad 4y ago
  And people flock to vsCode and other offerings from MS like IE never happened. People really need long term memory...
  - Someone1234 4y ago
    I think IE's monopoly is an important component that cannot be ignored when doing comparisons. If Microsoft stopped updating VSCode, 90% is Open Source, and there are multiple good competitors already on the market. So there's minimal captive-ness with VSCode, whereas IE held the browser market captive in outmoded web tech for years, with no real escape for web developers and competitive browsers struggling to make headway.
    - xxpor 4y ago
      And of course, remember that the base of VSCode is Chromium. Pretty hilarious in the scheme of things.
  - yaseer 4y ago
    Microsoft's leadership and strategy has evolved under Nadella, at least enough to produce quality products like VSCode, and 'good enough' products like WSL. I say this as someone who has historically been very anti-Microsoft, that used to do all my work in Linux. Modern Windows with VSCode, running WSL, is something the Microsoft of the IE6 era would never have produced.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
vermaden 4y ago
> (...) Microsoft makes different browsers. They are not. They just took Chrome and added their logo and theme around.
- hackerman123469 4y ago
  They didn't take Chrome, they took the engine that powers Chrome, Chromium. Just like Apple's Safari is built on WebKit. You wouldn't say that other vendors like Sony just took Safari and put their logo on the browser for the browser on PlayStation. It's the same engine, not the same browser.

space_ghost 4y ago

I strongly remember using Firebug in Firefox (mind-blowing tools, for the time) in ~2008 and having to debug issues in IE, which had the equivalent of a Check Engine Light for debugging.

microSnowball 4y ago
Lol I remember that little yellow triangle. The source of so much pain.
- z3t4 4y ago
  undefined is not a function
samwillis 4y ago
So true, debugging with alert()… There was Firebug Light, which from memory was a bookmarklet that injected a cut down firebug into the page, but even that didn’t help much.
- DrSiemer 4y ago
  Not owning any Apple products myself, my only option was a free online emulator to try and fix a bug on older iOS systems. It did not support console logs, so I was trying to debug using alert() as far back as yesterday. It didn't help, I only managed to find the issue through xCode on a random Mac.
amichal 4y ago
Firebug and firebug lite were amazing but to keep the record clear it was possible to debug client-side JavaScript (and other script types) using Visual Studio since very early on in IE. It was granted a major pain to setup properly for breakpoints and code highlighting but it was a full fledged debugger and IDE. I remember doing it often. I don’t remember if there was a debugger for IE for mac and early Safari. For me those where where “alert” and “document.write” were my only options.
- zeven7 4y ago
  I had forgotten about those days. The VS debugger slowed down my computer so much though that I often just used alert anyway. Firebug was a huge improvement.

dheerajvs 4y ago

I won't be able to celebrate for a long time to come. I have to support running an Outlook add-in in Outlook 2016 on Windows, which uses the IE11 rendering engine.

ratww 4y ago
Just in case you haven’t heard: Microsoft recently announced that they won’t hold it against you if you drop support for IE11 in add-ins. Your customers might still complain, though. https://docs.microsoft.com/en-US/office/dev/add-ins/develop/support-ie-11 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-US/office/dev/add-ins/develop/...
- Bilal_io 4y ago
  I am sure Microsoft wouldn't have held it against you to drop support for IE back in 2010. It's always been about the customer.
  - ratww 4y ago
    Incorrect. For those add-ins, IE11 support was required until recently, and there was a real review process, and it was actually pretty good. They even reported very subtle IE11 visual bugs to us.

skittleson 4y ago

I remembered these days as well. There wasn't a lot of resources out their either. Getting everything pixel perfect was the goal. HTML emails were extra tricky since they displayed differently in each client.

z3t4 4y ago
Pixel perfect existed in an era where almost everyone had 800x600 screens. Today it's about adapting to many different screen sizes and devices. So when people say pixel perfect today they're 20+ years too late. :P

xhrpost 4y ago

Imagine having a piece of software where you have 95% global market dominance, a near complete monopoly. And then decide not to update said software in the slightest (other than security fixes) for 6 straight years. Kind of mind blowing.

wongarsu 4y ago
Exactly what happened to Netscape, just that Netscape wasn't nearly as entrenched (their market share fell from 70-90% in 1996 to about 0 in 2002).
benoketamad 4y ago
And people flock to vsCode and other offerings from MS like IE never happened. People really need long term memory...
- Someone1234 4y ago
  I think IE's monopoly is an important component that cannot be ignored when doing comparisons. If Microsoft stopped updating VSCode, 90% is Open Source, and there are multiple good competitors already on the market. So there's minimal captive-ness with VSCode, whereas IE held the browser market captive in outmoded web tech for years, with no real escape for web developers and competitive browsers struggling to make headway.
  - xxpor 4y ago
    And of course, remember that the base of VSCode is Chromium. Pretty hilarious in the scheme of things.
- yaseer 4y ago
  Microsoft's leadership and strategy has evolved under Nadella, at least enough to produce quality products like VSCode, and 'good enough' products like WSL. I say this as someone who has historically been very anti-Microsoft, that used to do all my work in Linux. Modern Windows with VSCode, running WSL, is something the Microsoft of the IE6 era would never have produced.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

vermaden 4y ago

> (...) Microsoft makes different browsers. They are not. They just took Chrome and added their logo and theme around.

hackerman123469 4y ago
They didn't take Chrome, they took the engine that powers Chrome, Chromium. Just like Apple's Safari is built on WebKit. You wouldn't say that other vendors like Sony just took Safari and put their logo on the browser for the browser on PlayStation. It's the same engine, not the same browser.