Firefox Struggling to Compete as Corporate Browser

**joder** · 01-11-2008, 10:01 PM

"Now nearly three-and-a-half years old and nearing the release of Version 3, Firefox no longer can be accused of being callow. And while many IE-only apps remain, plenty of others have been overhauled to support Firefox as well. However, other obstacles to broader adoption have emerged. Mozilla thus far has neglected to develop tools to help IT departments deploy and manage Firefox, and it doesn't offer paid technical support services to risk-averse corporate users. Janco Associates Inc. in Park City, Utah, currently gives Firefox a 16% usage share among visitors to 17 business-to-business Web sites that it monitors. Janco puts IE's share at 67% while giving 9% to Netscape and 3% to Google Desktop."

More at:
http://it.slashdot.org/it/08/01/11/0913207.shtml

**LadynRed** · 01-11-2008, 10:08 PM

The other fly in the ointment here is that many corporations are in bed with MS via contracts for MS products like Office and Windows Servers etc. My corporation is one of those, so they are not really open to switching to Firefox - even though using IE just keeps eating up IT support hours to chase viruses and other nasties that IE is so vulnerable to on a daily basis.

In fact, our company uses an MS Proxy Server, and unless you know the 'trick' you cant' use any browser BUT IE ! Since I build websites and HAVE to test in other browsers, our dept knows how to get around this ludicrous limitation. It's ironic given that so many of the IT guys know IE is risky.

**joder** · 10:15 PM

The company I work at for the internal servers are mostly Windows, use Active Directory, Exchange, ASP, etc. They put too many applications on one server and as you can surmise, they run slow. The Windows Admins complain more about Windows than anyone else.

Most of the customers servers in the data center run Red Hat or Solaris.

EDIT:

I use Firefox for most everything except those internal sites where they put in the code telling you that you have to use IE only. The ones that don't have that code work perfectly well in Firefox.

**dotservant.com** · 01-11-2008, 11:02 PM

With strong hold of MS in the corporate side and desktop, it is not an easy task to convince a corporate switching to something new, unless there is an added value for making the switch, so far firefox remain as an alternate browser and does pretty much everything IE or other browsers can do, firefox needs to create additional value for corporate users in order to enter the market.

**Dairyman** · 01-15-2008, 03:01 AM

The firefox creates a lot of problems in displaying the exact lay out of a web page and sometimes stops responding altogether when confronted. I have to restart the PC often. Further, the security features of IE is good when compared to firefox. But I use firefox for routine browsing since it is faster than the IE.

**ImageLeet** · 01-15-2008, 07:56 PM

Firefox is kinda slow for me at times and freezes alot, now i have switched back to opera which i was using before the time firefox came.

**thwebguy** · 01-24-2008, 01:38 PM

Firefox it kind of slow for me sometimes but i still prefer it thank IE

**freshvision** · 02-22-2008, 05:20 PM

Interesting... I work in an office with about 20 employees and EVERYONE uses Firefox religiously.

And we're not even a tech company!

**vangogh** · 02-22-2008, 07:05 PM

Dairyman the problem with the layouts probably isn't Firefox. The problem is that for years people have been writing IE specific hacks that only work in IE. A layout developed to standards will work fine in Firefox.

For everyone who has a slow Firefox check your extensions. When FF misbehaves I usually find it's an extension that's causing the problem.

Supposedly FF3 is going to fix the memory leak problem which is another cause of it being slow at times.

**Learning Newbie** · 02-22-2008, 08:05 PM

FireFox would be great if it didn't hang all the time.

**joder** · 02-22-2008, 08:36 PM

It's hanging for me in Gmail

**LadynRed** · 02-22-2008, 09:15 PM

Yes, the 'new' Gmail does cause problems with Firefox and Google doesn't seem to care. I even contacted Google support -- HaH - fat waste of time that was !

Other than that, I don't use IE unless I'm forced to or I'm testing my sites while I'm coding. I have quite a few extensions in my FF at home and at work, and other that Gmail have very, very few problems with it crashing.

**ADAM Web Design** · 02-23-2008, 01:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vangogh

Dairyman the problem with the layouts probably isn't Firefox. The problem is that for years people have been writing IE specific hacks that only work in IE. A layout developed to standards will work fine in Firefox.

This isn't necessarily true. I've seen cases where IE6 has handled standards-compliant code in a manner that it should and newer cases "correct in flight" and create situations where the unsuspecting webmaster thinks he/she has coded his/her page correctly, when in fact the opposite is true. For example, there are cases where, if the sum of the widths + padding (in the example I'm thinking of, no margins) of floated elements is greater than that of the containing element, IE6 will create a "float drop" situation whereby the last column is dropped a level, whereas IE7, and so-called "standards-compliant" browsers automatically attempt to adjust the padding/widths accordingly. To be fair, this usually works, but a webmaster who is new to CSS might not know how to handle this particular situation and will be led to believe that it's IE6's fault, when all IE6 was doing was pointing out a mathematical error on the part of the webmaster.

There are, of course, issues with IE6. And 7. And all the IEs that came before (especially IE for the Mac). However, there are also issues with FF, Safari, Opera, and every other browser. No browser has it "right", nor is this possible due to the myriad of ways in which people code and interpret CSS and HTML syntax.

The problem is that most webmasters are led down the garden path of "IE is flawed, so code for a standards-compliant browser first and then fix it for IE after." This is a complete and utter pantload, and always has been. The correct thing to do is to code for as many browsers as you can have open at one time (I usually do IE6, IE7, FF, and Safari/Win on my boxes). That way, you can fix issues as they happen, rather than code a whole page or site for X browser, go back through it, hack your code, fix something for Y browser, mess up something in X browser, not know about it, go back and fix X browser, mess up Y browser again, etc. and so on until they hopefully get the problem fixed. It's always easier to fix a problem early than late.

Note: this isn't an "IE is better" rant. This is an "all browsers have their own idiosyncracies and no one browser can truly claim superiority" rant.

**vangogh** · 02-23-2008, 05:39 PM

Adam it's true that sometimes IE gets it right where FF gets it wrong, but let's face it the reverse is much more often true.

I think the reason for the advice about designing for standards compliant first is that it's just easier that way. Some people develop solely for IE and then try to get it working on other browsers, which often means they have to restructure their entire code. If you develop to the standards first and then tweak for all browsers, not just IE it's usually much easier.

I agree with you that we should all be developing for as many browsers as realistically possible. I usually don't have them all open at the same time. My style is to get things working in FF, simply because it's the browser I use most and then as I complete a section of code I check the other browsers. I do check often while developing.

I guess I develop a chunk of a page, then test across browsers, then develop another chunk and test, and so on until I'm done. I do find that the more I write standards to compliant code the less problems there are when testing other browsers.

I agree that checking all browsers as you go is much better than developing solely to one and then only checking the others when you're finished.

And I'm not trying to make the FF is better rant. IE is a lot better than many want to give it credit for. You're exactly right that all browsers have their idiosyncrasies and as web developers it's in our best interest to know as many of them as we can despite our personal preference for browsing.

**davemies** · 02-23-2008, 06:14 PM

"IE is a lot better than many want to give it credit for." really?

**vangogh** · 02-23-2008, 06:58 PM

It's not my preferred browser and I only open it to check how sites look in it, but it's not nearly as bad as a lot of people want to say it is. Some people act like it doesn't work at all.

IE7 isn't too bad. It's much more standards compliant, though it's still playing catch up. Sometimes when I listen to people talk about it you'd think opening IE results in hard drive failure or something. It's a browser. It works. A lot of people happily use it to surf the web. It gets some things wrong and needs to do better, but it does work.

**davemies** · 02-24-2008, 03:40 AM

when you consider how many things it gets wrong i'm surprised it does 'work'

also look at the mess we're in after successive crap versions of IE (and older versions of netscape in the browser wars) even with IE8 we're facing have to actually place a browser switch in there so we don't break the web thanks to MS ( http://www.zeldman.com/2008/02/19/al...keith-zeldman/ these 2 articles are quite interesting)

IE may not be a joke directly for users but when you think of the problems caused for developers and the transmitted development costs it's farcical.

sure Firefox, Opera etc have bugs but do they have anything as major as the flaws and lack of css and other support that IE has? no.

i see no promising way forward unless IE disappeared overnight for everyone

the mess is too big now even if IE do the right thing.

**vangogh** · 02-24-2008, 08:27 PM

I've seen some of the articles about IE8, but I haven't digested yet what it's going to mean for developers.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not an IE user. If I didn't have to check sites in it I might not even have it installed. However I don't think it causes nearly all the problems developers like to claim.

I develop sites using standards compliant code. When I'm done I found the site works pretty well on most browsers. For IE6 I might need half dozen lines of code. I seem to need even less for IE7.

IE should get those few things right and we shouldn't need to write even the half dozen extra lines of code, but a few lines of code isn't a major problem.

Some of the responsibility lies with developers who don't learn the standards in the first place. A lot of the problems some developers think IE has would go away if they wrote decent code. I think people fall back on the IE sucks mantra when their code doesn't work. Sometimes it is the code.

Again I don't think IE is great by any means. I wish it were more compliant with standards and I wish it had better support for CSS 2 and 3. I just think it gets criticized more than it really deserves.

**joder** · 02-24-2008, 10:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vangogh

I develop sites using standards compliant code. When I'm done I found the site works pretty well on most browsers. For IE6 I might need half dozen lines of code. I seem to need even less for IE7.

Sometimes I write standards compliant code, open it in FF and it looks great. Then open in IE and OMG! things are out of place. It usually just involves moving around some code or changing something in the CSS. A little debugging and it works great in all browsers. I don't use very much IE specific code either. When people learn to write the code, they can think of a different way to do it which works better.

**vangogh** · 02-25-2008, 08:45 PM

Same for me James and each site you build it gets a little easier. You generally don't have to debug the same thing the next time around. That's all I've been saying about IE's reputation. If you know what you're doing it's not as bad as some people make it out to seem. I'm still using Firefox, though.