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Fighting for Browser Compliance: Litmus V’s PushUp
July 30th, 2008
The Browser battles are back in the spotlight this week. But this is not a fight for supremecy; it’s the fight for compliance.
In the blue corner, defending old browsers, is Litmus. They have a vested interest in the fight, as their business generates income from testing websites in old versions of browsers. So they’re fighting for money. In fairness, Paul’s article is only questioning the non-support of IE6; I’d like to know who he’s really fighting for (which could be difficult considering Litmus pay his wage).
In the red corner, attacking old browsers with a free webtool is PushUp. They’ve released a free scipt that detects when outdated browsers view your website, and advise the viewer (in a subtle, clean manner) that a newer, safer, up-to-date version is available.
Refereeing this fight is Profy who seem to be scoring towards the blue corner..?
I’m cheering the red corner all the way. PushUp are the underdogs, and they’re fighting this battle for love not money.
I’ve left comments on both stories, so you can more there. Interestingly everyone seems to be cheering for PushUp according to the comments on Profy.
15 Comments so far
Ha-ha, I like the metaphor here a lot. Let me be an honest referee and state that I’d gladly leave any sympathies aside if PishUp in the red corner followed the rules: was not intrusive and allowed visitors to choose if they really want to see that subtle reminder again and again if they just have their reasons (I know, stubbornness is not a good reason but still) to stick to their non-compliant browsers.
By the way, why no one of those reasons for the fight are present at all? Maybe it is up to them at least to a certain extent to push the web up?
Thanks Referee Svetlana..! And I totally agree with you: PushUp would be better with an opt-out “don’t remind me again” option for viewers. I hope they do implement it asap.
However, I also believe there is good in this service simply for the fact that it advises users that they are vulnerable in not using current browsers, and that they should update to the latest stable release.
PushUp could’ve followed everyone else’s lead and labed their scritp with a “Beta” tag. Then the entire “web 2.0 World” would’ve been totally forgiving and not critisised them. Their opt-out could’ve been the stable release..! (laughing to myself).
Nice post
Although Litmus in theory makes money indirectly from IE6, I’d personally still like to see IE6 entirely replaced by IE7. We’ve got a whole list of ideas for additional tools to assist web designers that we’d like to build. Onwards and upwards eh!
Thanks for clarifying the Litmus stance Paul. And great to see yous are pushing for current browser adoption.
I’ve been a Litmus fan for years (hope my post didn’t suggest otherwise..?) having used your awesome service alot. Can’t wait to see what’s in store once IE6 has been KO’d for the final time.
Knowing Litmus, it’ll be a very, very worthy tool.
And congrats on the site redesign. Great job.
I’ve added Pushup to some of my sites, but I don’t think anyone in the usability and browser testing world has anything to fear about a loss of income for a loooooooong time.
How long have you been using PushUp Gil..? Have you had any positive or negative feedback from readers about it..?
@dawnprofies: I understand your appreciation of PushUp for trying to do something good and probably a beta tag would have really made me less harsh on them (stupid me) but my major concern is here: why don’t we demand the the developers of browsers don’t push their users to upgrade to stable versions (with some exceptions, I mean) instead of relying on sites owners to do their job?
Yes I agree Svetlana. Everyone knows it, in the case of IE6 it’s the designers and developers who pay in time and labour, to “work around” a poor product. Bad on you Microsoft.
PS – I love your colon use: the World has become so ungrammatical in these times of screen writing.
Exactly, this is why I don’t understand why I should make my readers look at constant reminders that they should upgrade while this should be the job done by Microsoft actually.
As for the colon, I am a complete idiot when it comes to punctuation in English so I guess I will now have to study a few manuals finally.
But that’s partly my point Svetlana – the browsers are not force-updating, so I see PushUp’s script as an immediate, albeit temporary “patch” to the problem. If we wait for Microsoft to act, we’ll all be old and computers will be a “thing of the past”.
You colon use was perfect. I was complimenting you.
Ok, let’s try some compromise: PushUp serves a good cause but has some flaws and should not do it at all if Microsoft did its job right. Will that be fine?
And sorry, I thought it was an irony, not a compliment. When you don’t know the rules and often follow your intuition, it is hard to determine if you are actually right or wrong, after all
Absolutely. Agreed. On all fronts; grammar, privacy, Betas, browser wars, IE6’s hopelessness, etc. etc.
Great, really glad we have achieved this
[...] week I wrote about an IE6 battle featuring Litmus and PushUp. It’s a war that divides the web with very valid arguments on both sides. Should we continue [...]
Litmus is nice, but if you need faster screenshot application (and not so expensive) – take a look at BrowserSeal cross browser testing utility
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