Is it better to have a different CSS file for each user-agent or is it better to use CSS Hacks that only certain browsers can see?
Neither.
The best is to write code that works in all browsers without the need of browser specific code or css hacks. It's of course not quite as easy to accomplish, which is why many people use the other methods.
The key is to avoid things that some browsers (very often Internet Explorer) has problems with. One such thing is to use padding rather than margin, because IE doesn't handle margin collapsing correctly.
Some methods that is in the border line of being hacks is using code that doesn't affect browsers that work correctly, but fixes problems for a specific browser. That could be things like specifying a height for an element that normally shouldn't need one, or specifying display:inline on a floating element.
The page Position is everything has examples of some bugs and suggested fixes. (Often the fix is some kind of hack, so you should of course also consider if you can avoid the problem altogether.)
It's better to do neither.
A good css-reset and css that works the same cross-browser is a much better solution.
If your design absolutely precludes that, then (and only then) would I try hacks or IE conditional comments.
I haven't yet seen the need for mutliple css files (beyond a few IE6 corrections addressed via a conditional comment).
Neither if possible. Now that the old Netscape, IE <= 6 etc. are not longer really that much in use, I try to use features which work in all those browsers (e.g. FF >= 2, IE >= 7, Chrome, Opera).
Conditional comments for issues with Internet Explorer appear to be the norm. Combined with a little bit of JavaScript, like Dean Edward's ie7.js you can mitigate most cross browser issues without resorting to hacks within your CSS files.
its better to use a different css files for Internet Explorer 6-7 (include them via conditional comments), and a hacks for other browsers.
A sort of follow up is how to develop the single file that works.
The best approach that I've seen work is to start from nothing, slowly building it up and checking change by change that it's still compatible across your core browsers (especially the problematic ones).
When you get it fully working with one browser and then say "time to convert it" is when the pain really starts and where you have to start hacking.
My approach using a PHP class to detect os, browser and browser version. You can target any version of almost any browser on any operating system.
Related
One of my development teams have written a couple CSS files that work flawlessly with IE. However, the UI is all messed up when rendered on other browsers.
Is there a tool that can take these CSS files and convert them into cross browser version? Unfortunately, these CSS files are too large and the expertise desirable to cook cross browser CSS and test it is lacking in the team at present.
The most recent versions of all prominent browsers need to be supported.
No, because that would require a tool to understand your design intent and then fix it. If it was so easy to create cross browser compatible css by just using a magic tool we would all be using it.
Usually I see this done the other way around. Get it to work in all browsers and then hack in fixes to IE. My guess is that a few simple simple things are grossly affecting the layout. I would fix it for a more standards compliant browser like Firefox and then hack in fixes to old versions of IE as necessary.
You might want to try Prefixr. It did help me with some CrossBrowser issues, but I programmed for Chrome. Don't know how great the compatibility is the other way around.
I have a website that I've developed and tested using Firefox 9 exclusively. I'm pretty happy with the layout/styles when viewed in this version of Firefox. I'm now facing the unenviable task of making it display equally well (or as close as possible) in IE7+ (I'm not supporting IE6). Naturally, I'd also like it to display well in Chrome & Safari, but I think they implement the standards reasonably well, so I'm not so worried about them.
I'm using JQuery for JavaScript, which hopefully means I don't have too many differences in JavaScript behaviour, so my chief concern is the CSS. I imagine many others have been down this path, so I'm hoping there's a stylesheet available which when (conditionally) included will fix most common CSS problems seen when viewing a website in IE that has only been tested with Firefox. Does such a thing exist?
A catch-all miracle.css file which cures all IE-related ills? If only! The solution will probably boil down to a selection of some or all of the following:
Normalize (http://necolas.github.com/normalize.css/)
Brings most browser default settings to a more consistent baseline (think of this as an alternative to the popular Eric Meyer reset.css)
Modernizr (http://www.modernizr.com)
Seeing as you're already using javascript, including modernizr will give you additional methods of detecting browser capabilities. Also auto-injects .ie7 / .ie8 etc classes into your markup where necessary, allowing you to target IE in your styling, e.g.
.standard { ... }
.ie7 .standard, .ie8 .standard { ... }
CSS3PIE (http://www.css3pie.com/)
Progressive Internet Explorer - allows for styling which typically fails on IE (e.g. linear gradients, radiused corners, etc.)
IE7.JS (http://code.google.com/p/ie7-js/)
Probably the closest to what you were after, as an alternative to CSS fixes (which no doubt will still be necessary). Should help get you closer to the desired end result though.
I don't think there is any sort of stylesheet that does this for you.
You may look into a js script that look at solving IE issues. Or You can always do it the old fashion way using IETab and targeting the areas where you know there is going to be issues.
Most of them are described here: http://net.tutsplus.com/tutorials/html-css-techniques/9-most-common-ie-bugs-and-how-to-fix-them/.
Hope it helps :)
Can anyone tell me the best way to ensure asp.net sites look the same when view in IE, Chrome or Firefox?
I've just finished one which in testing seems fine in IE but not the other 2.
I have not used CSS on this site as its not that big, I just formatted the masterpage as I wanted it.
Could that be the problem?
I usually code for Firefox first. That makes things match almost 100% in Chrome, Safari and IE9 usually. Then I go through and test in IE 8 and 7. Minor adjustments are typically made within the same CSS file. For example, IE7 usually needs to have dimensions of a container explicitly set, where most modern day browsers don't require it and render things properly.
In those rare cases that you do need to style something specifically for one or more versions of IE, use conditional comments. Here are some good links on conditional comments and how to target specific browsers and versions:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms537512%28v=vs.85%29.aspx
http://www.quirksmode.org/css/condcom.html
Unfortunately you will need to use CSS to get this to look similar in all browsers. I say similar as it is unlikely you will ever get it looking exactly the same.
Basically you will need to use the conditional CSS tags http://www.javascriptkit.com/dhtmltutors/csshacks.shtml
I would recommend spliting out the style to the a CSS and getting that working in Chrome and Firefox. Then use the tutorial linked and add in IE hacks to make it look better.
There isn't an easy way of making a site look the same in all the browsers. As caveman_dick said, maybe it's even impossible. You have to use CSS and sometimes javascript...
But to help you, you can use some programs that simulate different browsers engines, so that you could see how your site behaves. Just google browser simulator. :)
I know this could boil down to a philosophical issue, so I don't mean to start a discussion on the topic. But I'm looking for the (or a couple of them) best way to resolve most issues of CSS styling in Internet Explorer 6.
I'm aware of this article on forabeautifulweb.com, and it's recommendation to just feed IE6 users a universal plain IE6 stylesheet with just some basic styling better than the browser defaults. For my application this is not the best.
I'm also aware of the concept of "fixing" IE6's CSS support via Javascript, and I'm sort of a fan of this idea. But I don't know what (if any) the best one is - I know there's several floating around in the wild. This article by Eric Meyer mentions one, but this was written almost 2 years ago, so is there a more standard script to use for this purpose now?
Can anybody point me to one or two such scripts that have been proven to be effective for updating some of IE6's handling of CSS to behave more like a modern browser?
UPDATE: to all the people answering who are trying to convince me not to use JS to fix the problem - I am plugging my ears and humming. :)
Seriously, I'm not asking whether or not to use JS for this. We've already decided we don't need to support IE6 and it is not worth the time for us to try to "debug" our stylesheets just for IE6. This decision is based on our audience and on our site stats for IE6 usage.
As far as all the comments about "what if the user doesn't have JS enabled?" Well in that case a lot of stuff on our site is not going to look right anyway, so that is somewhat of a mute point.
I've already implemented the IE7.js that Gordon suggested, and that is quite sufficient for us to get by in IE6, with very little drawback.
Thank you all just the same for your input.
You can use this library if you want to do it with JavaScript:
IE7.js is a JavaScript library to make Microsoft Internet Explorer behave like a standards-compliant browser. It fixes many HTML and CSS issues and makes transparent PNG work correctly under IE5 and IE6.
There is also CSS3Pie, which adds CSS3 support to browsers:
PIE makes Internet Explorer 6-8 capable of rendering several of the most useful CSS3 decoration features.
Also have a look at Progressive Enhancement and Graceful Degradation for a design philosophy.
Please don't use JavaScript to fix the problem, just add some rules to a stylesheet to fix them...
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="normal.css" />
<!--[if IE 6]>
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="ie6.css" />
<![endif]-->
In the ie6.css, you just have rules that fudge the styles to work in IE6, you still use your normal stylesheet alongside it, so your site looks the same in IE6 and normal world.
From personal experiance, ie6 can be fixed within a few lines of CSS and a fair bit of inspecting with firebug/developers toolbar.. without the need for conditional comments.
majority of the problems I come accross are padding / margin based and it is down to me not using the best method first time round.
I also find that overflow:hidden fixes its fair share of ie6 bugs too.
i suggest, get ie6 open with the developers toolbar and try and find where the problem lies, and think of a better way to code that section.
Thats just me personally, I use conditional comments as a LAST resort.
Dean Edwards’ ie7.js script (linked by Gordon) is still the state of the art in this area.
As to what’s the best approach, it depends. Dean Edwards’ script fixes a lot of IE CSS bugs, and allows you to use selectors like the multiple class selector and the child selector that aren’t supported at all in IE 6.
If you’re happy that the IE 6 users in your target audience tend to have JavaScript turned on, a library like Dean’s can save you a bunch of time, and allow you to trim down your code by using the selectors that IE 6 doesn’t support.
However, you’ll likely still need an IE 6 stylesheet to deal with issues that Dean’s library doesn’t fix.
The best solution may be to wait for Microsoft to stop supporting IE 6 (like they did with Mac IE 5), because if Microsoft don’t support it, it’s hardly fair for people to expect you to. We‘re currently hoping for 2014 on that score.
Generally, you don't need javascript. You can use plain old CSS. It helps to have a good knowledge of hasLayout though.
More often than not, you can fix IE6 and 7's issues by giving the problem element layout. To do that, give it a fixed height or width, or use the proprietary zoom.
My favoured method of targeting specific versions of IE browser is to use conditional comments to add a <div> as a direct child of <body> which lets me know which version of IE I'm in (like so). That way, I can target IE6 directly:
.IE6 div.fubar {
zoom: 1;
}
The other thing to remember is that it's almost impossible to achieve pixel parity across IE6/7/8/Firefox/Safari/Chrome/Opera, so if some things don't look quite right in a browser that's nearly ten years old, you don't always need to worry about it.
Position is everything has some useful tips on IE bugs, too.
Don't use javascript if you can avoid it - you are not guaranteed that your users have JS activated (as already mentioned) and you actually don't need it.
To get rid of many problems of different interpretations from browsers (not just IE) user a css-reset stylesheet. There are many floating around.
Even better yet, use a CSS framework which will remove many many problems between different browsers and will come with many helpful classes to solve standard issues.
I for one love YAML (http://www.yaml.de/en/home.html), then there's Blueprint (http://www.blueprintcss.org/) and probably a few others. Believe me - once you used a CSS Framework you will never want to go back.
jQuery and its plugins work best for IE6 issues. Give it a try!
I am trying to figure out the most efficient way to ensure cross-browser compatibility. I have done a bit of research and learned a few interesting things such as the fact that Mozilla/Firefox can't handle a class that has a name starting with a number. Is there a way to make a CSS work for any browser or is it better to just develop multiple CSS and add code to choose which to use based on the browser being used?
You might consider using a CSS Framework such as Blueprint. It includes a CSS reset that should help.
Also, you might want to look at Yahoo's CSS reset
An aside to clarify a point:
... I have done a bit of research and learned a few interesting things such as the fact that Mozilla/Firefox can't handle a class that has a name starting with a number....
Sorry, but that's not a Mozilla limitation, it's in the CSS spec: class names must not start with a number. Any browser that allows them to isn't enforcing the rules properly.
Answered here on StackOverFlow. The relevant part of the spec is at http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/syndata.html#characters (see the 2nd paragraph).
To answer your question: There is no way to make a page using just one universal css and have it displayed equally in all browsers, unless you only use an extremely small sub-set of all available css (selectors, values, etc.).
The way I work is:
Use a css reset
Develop for a browser that adheres to the standards pretty well (Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera)
Patch things up for IE using conditional comments (because you'll probably need things that don't validate)
A good starting point would be to use CSS reset such as: http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/reset/
Your goal should be CSS that works on all browsers. If you start out with a CSS file per browser, where do you stop? Mobile Safari? Flock? Konqueror? Every version of every supported browser?
Eventually, you might need to compromise, but you can cross that road when you get there.
Regardless of your infrastructure/framework/etc you should test your code on all major browsers. If possible avoid using style sheets for browser specific problems. Browsers will change and adapt which means you might get stuck having to update a bunch of websites when new browsers come out.
CSS is a fickle beast and I haven't found any solution that covers all the quirks except for a lot of due-diligence and testing.
You might use a framework that does this for you, such as GWT, but keep in mind that you will still have some issues.