[cosmo-dev] Unsupported browser message, was Safari 2

[Matthew Eernisse]

Mimi,

Bobby's right, there's no way to know "how broken" a particular browser 
is, so there is likely to be cases where the UI simply doesn't load at all.

So unless we were to check the UI continuously in our known broken 
browsers (which is tantamount to support), the only feasible approach is 
to identify the supported browsers, and either (a) lock everyone else 
out or (b) let everyone else try to log in, but warn them their browser 
may not work.

Regarding the "no longer supported" versus "not supported" message -- 
it's simpler to lump together all known non-good browsers, rather than 
separating legacy ones from exotic/minor ones. Some people may try to 
log in to the app with Opera, iCab, Konqueror, Flock, etc., and they 
need to see that caveat as well.

We could weed out our known legacy browsers and give them a specific 
message, but that's another piece of code to remember to update whenever 
our supported browser list changes. Not impossible, but more work.

You have a great point though, about giving the users who can't get into 
the app at all (or can only get limited use of it) a taste of what 
they're missing.

At my old job, we had some of 5.x+-browser only areas of the app, and 
when people in old browsers tried to access them, they'd get a pop-up 
screenshot of the feature that showed them what'd they were missing out 
on, and gave them some links saying "Click here to update to 
standards-compliant browser." I don't know if we want to maintain 
screenshots of the Web UI just for that, but if we have them somewhere 
on the chandlerproject.org Web site, it would be easy to link there.


Matthew


Mimi Yin wrote:
> I would let people get as far as loading the UI so they can get a peak 
> (assuming it will continue to load nicely). It would be a shame to lose 
> people by scaring them too much. We should at least try to get a hook in 
> - "Look at how cool this could be. Don't you want to upgrade your 
> browser so you can try it out?"
> 
> We can load the UI (logged in or ticket view). Pop-up a dialog. And make 
> sure the user understands that if the experience isn't so great, it's 
> the browsers fault.
> 
> Is Safari 2 the only browser we're going to do this for? If yes, I think 
> we should say 'no longer supported'. It sounds nicer than just plain ole 
> 'not supported'. Plus it's the truth!
> 
> ===
> Your browser Safari version 2.x is no longer supported.
> Try one of these instead: Safari 3 | Firefox
> 
>                                             [Close]
> ===
> _______________________________________________
> cosmo-dev mailing list
> cosmo-dev at lists.osafoundation.org
> http://lists.osafoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/cosmo-dev
>