Rails - Jul 2007 - I feel like I'm missing something...browser incompatibility

There''s an aspect of Rails development that I have found quite painful.
Like many of you, I do my development on a Mac.  Things go together
quickly and easily for the most part.

Then I look at what I''ve done on a Windows machine (or even Mac FF) and
two thirds of it is broken in some way.  Sometimes minor placement
issues, sometimes stuff just not showing up or buttons that don''t do
anything.  Endless refactoring of the CSS and googling for hacks and all
manner of painful machinations ensue.

I hear so little mention of this here that I suspect I must be doing
something wrong or I''m missing some important reference or something.

Have the rest of you developed some process or "rules of thumb" or
something that help you to avoid these issues?  Is there another forum
somewhere that I ought to be on to get help with this sort of thing?
Are my pages just more complex than they should be?  (sorry, site is
still  under wraps - can''t show you).

thanks,
jp

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On Jul 2, 2007, at 9:51 , Jeff Pritchard wrote:
> Then I look at what I''ve done on a Windows machine (or even Mac
FF)
> and
> two thirds of it is broken in some way.  Sometimes minor placement
> issues, sometimes stuff just not showing up or buttons that don''t
do
> anything.  Endless refactoring of the CSS and googling for hacks  
> and all
> manner of painful machinations ensue.
>
> I hear so little mention of this here that I suspect I must be doing
> something wrong or I''m missing some important reference or
something.
You probably haven''t heard people talking about this on on the Ruby  
on Rails mailing list because these are not Ruby on Rails-specific  
issues. It sounds like you should take some time to study up on these  
areas. Though they''re getting a bit old, I recommend Jeffrey  
Zeldman''s "Designing with Web Standards" and Eric
Meyer''s "Eric Meyer
on CSS".

Online references include A List Apart[1] and the css-discuss mailing  
list and wiki[2]. There are plenty of other resources online as well.

Michael Glaesemann
grzm seespotcode net



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On Jul 2, 2007, at 10:27 , Michael Glaesemann wrote:
> Online references include A List Apart[1] and the css-discuss  
> mailing list and wiki[2]. There are plenty of other resources  
> online as well.
And the links I intended to include:

[1](http://www.alistapart.com/)
[2](http://css-discuss.incutio.com/)

Michael Glaesemann
grzm seespotcode net



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I believe that''s not a rails issue, it''s a browser issue.  ie
in particular does not comply to W3 rules, that makes it challenging to write
pages that display correctly across all browsers.  I had a lot of success in
doing this using css for all positioning and using "float: left" a
lot.
   
  Good luck!
   
  

Jeff Pritchard
<rails-mailing-list-ARtvInVfO7ksV2N9l4h3zg@public.gmane.org> wrote:
  
There''s an aspect of Rails development that I have found quite painful.
Like many of you, I do my development on a Mac. Things go together
quickly and easily for the most part.

Then I look at what I''ve done on a Windows machine (or even Mac FF) and
two thirds of it is broken in some way. Sometimes minor placement
issues, sometimes stuff just not showing up or buttons that don''t do
anything. Endless refactoring of the CSS and googling for hacks and all
manner of painful machinations ensue.

I hear so little mention of this here that I suspect I must be doing
something wrong or I''m missing some important reference or something.

Have the rest of you developed some process or "rules of thumb" or
something that help you to avoid these issues? Is there another forum
somewhere that I ought to be on to get help with this sort of thing?
Are my pages just more complex than they should be? (sorry, site is
still under wraps - can''t show you).

thanks,
jp

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I''ve been doing web design since 1995, and this has *always* been an
issue,
always compounded by the wide array of browsers out there  One thing
that''s
really been helpful for me is to do all development with Firefox as the
target browser. It then makes it extremely easy to fix problems with IE
(using conditional comments) or Safari (using browser hacks).  I''ve
found
that if I develop using IE, I spend considerably much more time making it
look right on other browsers.

You should strive for usability and readability. Your site should *work* on
all browsers. It doesn''t have to look THE SAME across all browsers and
platforms, but it should be easy to read and should have the same
functionality. Most of your users will not be comparing your site on
multiple browsers! :)


Good luck!

On 7/2/07, David Garton <dg2nz-/E1597aS9LQAvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
>
> I believe that''s not a rails issue, it''s a browser issue.
ie in
> particular does not comply to W3 rules, that makes it challenging to write
> pages that display correctly across all browsers.  I had a lot of success
in
> doing this using css for all positioning and using "float: left"
a lot.
>
> Good luck!
>
>
>
> *Jeff Pritchard
<rails-mailing-list-ARtvInVfO7ksV2N9l4h3zg@public.gmane.org>* wrote:
>
>
> There''s an aspect of Rails development that I have found quite
painful.
> Like many of you, I do my development on a Mac. Things go together
> quickly and easily for the most part.
>
> Then I look at what I''ve done on a Windows machine (or even Mac
FF) and
> two thirds of it is broken in some way. Sometimes minor placement
> issues, sometimes stuff just not showing up or buttons that don''t
do
> anything. Endless refactoring of the CSS and googling for hacks and all
> manner of painful machinations ensue.
>
> I hear so little mention of this here that I suspect I must be doing
> something wrong or I''m missing some important reference or
something.
>
> Have the rest of you developed some process or "rules of thumb"
or
> something that help you to avoid these issues? Is there another forum
> somewhere that I ought to be on to get help with this sort of thing?
> Are my pages just more complex than they should be? (sorry, site is
> still under wraps - can''t show you).
>
> thanks,
> jp
>
> --
> Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
>
> ------------------------------
> Got a little couch potato?
> Check out fun summer activities for
kids.<http://us.rd.yahoo.com/evt=48248/*http://search.yahoo.com/search?fr=oni_on_mail&p=summer+activities+for+kids&cs=bz>>
>
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Michael Glaesemann wrote:
> On Jul 2, 2007, at 10:27 , Michael Glaesemann wrote:
> 
>> Online references include A List Apart[1] and the css-discuss  
>> mailing list and wiki[2]. There are plenty of other resources  
>> online as well.
> 
> And the links I intended to include:
> 
> [1](http://www.alistapart.com/)
> [2](http://css-discuss.incutio.com/)
> 
> Michael Glaesemann
> grzm seespotcode net
Thanks for the links.  I''m sure this will help.

I''ll look for the Zeldman book.  I have "Eric Meyer
on CSS".  Different strokes for different folks.  I found it to be about 
the worst attempt at technical writing I''ve ever seen.  I suppose he is
a luminary in the CSS world.  I think he should stick to writing CSS and 
not write any more books.

Anyway, I''ll continue to try to hone my CSS skills.  I was sorta hoping
someone would chime in and say "Didn''t you know about the 
"Act_as_functional_browser" plugin or something.  I guess if it was
easy
anyone could do it.

FWIW, IE7 seems to be much friendlier.  Maybe in a few more months we 
can forget about the dreaded IE6 forever.

thanks for the help,
jp

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Actually I have found IE7 to be my worst problem. Most CSS hacks have
been well explored on IE6 and IE5, but
IE7 includes a whole lot more incompatibilities. I have spent more
time on futzing with CSS to get it to work on IE7, than it took me to
write the rails app in the first place!

I even started using tables for layout again (I know gasp!!), because
IE7 broke all my nice CSS formatting.

The biggest problem which I never solved was a nice thumbnail layout
using CSS which worked on everything but IE7, on IE7 the thumbnails
were no longer clickable. That was the last straw that took me back to
using a table.

This is the gallery CSS as you can see works great except on IE7 you
can''t click the thumbails!

http://accessat.c-net.us/test/gallery2.html

Just one example of the pain I have been through! Why can''t everyone
use Firefox ;)


On Jul 2, 8:32 pm, Jeff Pritchard
<rails-mailing-l...-ARtvInVfO7ksV2N9l4h3zg@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> Michael Glaesemann wrote:
> > On Jul 2, 2007, at 10:27 , Michael Glaesemann wrote:
>
> >> Online references include A List Apart[1] and the css-discuss
> >> mailing list and wiki[2]. There are plenty of other resources
> >> online as well.
>
> > And the links I intended to include:
>
> > [1](http://www.alistapart.com/)
> > [2](http://css-discuss.incutio.com/)
>
> > Michael Glaesemann
> > grzm seespotcode net
>
> Thanks for the links.  I''m sure this will help.
>
> I''ll look for the Zeldman book.  I have "Eric Meyer
> on CSS".  Different strokes for different folks.  I found it to be
about
> the worst attempt at technical writing I''ve ever seen.  I suppose
he is
> a luminary in the CSS world.  I think he should stick to writing CSS and
> not write any more books.
>
> Anyway, I''ll continue to try to hone my CSS skills.  I was sorta
hoping
> someone would chime in and say "Didn''t you know about the
> "Act_as_functional_browser" plugin or something.  I guess if it
was easy
> anyone could do it.
>
> FWIW, IE7 seems to be much friendlier.  Maybe in a few more months we
> can forget about the dreaded IE6 forever.
>
> thanks for the help,
> jp
>
> --
> Posted viahttp://www.ruby-forum.com/.

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wolfmanjm wrote:
> Actually I have found IE7 to be my worst problem. Most CSS hacks have
> been well explored on IE6 and IE5, but
> IE7 includes a whole lot more incompatibilities. I have spent more
> time on futzing with CSS to get it to work on IE7, than it took me to
> write the rails app in the first place!
> 
...

Now see, that''s what I''m talking about in my original post. 
As luck
would have it, the "way" I do CSS (just a haphazard mashup of stuff I 
figured out on my own and things I''ve seen in blogs and such), just 
happens to be OK in IE7 (for this project), but was a nightmare to get 
working in IE6.

It just seems like there is a need for some "rules of thumb" boiler 
plate CSS templates.  If Rails had a generator for "drop-down menu",
or
"horizontal menu bar", and "liquid layout with two dynamic
columns and a
footer" -- man, that would make life grand.

I''ve seen sites with gobs of "CSS templates".  Maybe those
are tested
cross-browser?  Maybe an enterprising generator-builder could repurpose 
some public domain templates into a way to describe a page with some 
special-purpose XML and have the generator spit out the main stylesheet 
for a site and an rhtml file with all the "div''s" already
arranged in
there with their id''s and classes set up.

I know, I''m dreaming...

jp

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be sure you aren''t allowing IE to operate in quirks mode (see
http://www.quirksmode.org/css/quirksmode.html for a discussion)

set doctype

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
	"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

-Ryan

On Jul 3, 11:24 am, Jeff Pritchard
<rails-mailing-l...-ARtvInVfO7ksV2N9l4h3zg@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> wolfmanjm wrote:
> > Actually I have found IE7 to be my worst problem. Most CSS hacks have
> > been well explored on IE6 and IE5, but
> > IE7 includes a whole lot more incompatibilities. I have spent more
> > time on futzing with CSS to get it to work on IE7, than it took me to
> > write the rails app in the first place!
>
> ...
>
> Now see, that''s what I''m talking about in my original
post.  As luck
> would have it, the "way" I do CSS (just a haphazard mashup of
stuff I
> figured out on my own and things I''ve seen in blogs and such),
just
> happens to be OK in IE7 (for this project), but was a nightmare to get
> working in IE6.
>
> It just seems like there is a need for some "rules of thumb"
boiler
> plate CSS templates.  If Rails had a generator for "drop-down
menu", or
> "horizontal menu bar", and "liquid layout with two dynamic
columns and a
> footer" -- man, that would make life grand.
>
> I''ve seen sites with gobs of "CSS templates".  Maybe
those are tested
> cross-browser?  Maybe an enterprising generator-builder could repurpose
> some public domain templates into a way to describe a page with some
> special-purpose XML and have the generator spit out the main stylesheet
> for a site and an rhtml file with all the "div''s"
already arranged in
> there with their id''s and classes set up.
>
> I know, I''m dreaming...
>
> jp
>
> --
> Posted viahttp://www.ruby-forum.com/.

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wwwguru-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org wrote:
> be sure you aren''t allowing IE to operate in quirks mode (see
> http://www.quirksmode.org/css/quirksmode.html for a discussion)
> 
> set doctype
> 
> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
>   "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

Thanks Ryan, but this is what I have in my application.rhtml

cheers,
jp

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Jeff Pritchard wrote:
> There''s an aspect of Rails development that I have found quite
painful.
> Like many of you, I do my development on a Mac.  Things go together
> quickly and easily for the most part.
>
> Then I look at what I''ve done on a Windows machine (or even Mac
FF) and
> two thirds of it is broken in some way.  Sometimes minor placement
> issues, sometimes stuff just not showing up or buttons that don''t
do
> anything.  Endless refactoring of the CSS and googling for hacks and all
> manner of painful machinations ensue.
>
> I hear so little mention of this here that I suspect I must be doing
> something wrong or I''m missing some important reference or
something.
>
> Have the rest of you developed some process or "rules of thumb"
or
> something that help you to avoid these issues?  Is there another forum
> somewhere that I ought to be on to get help with this sort of thing?
> Are my pages just more complex than they should be?  (sorry, site is
> still  under wraps - can''t show you).
>
> thanks,
> jp
>
>   
I''ve got to say I really sympathise with you. I come from a print 
background where you really do see what you get, and the design programs 
allow perfect positioning and control of type. Dealing with the 
limitations of CSS, and then trying to make it consistent across 
browsers is the single biggest pain I have faced in developing my site, 
and I''m nowhere near happy with where I''m up to so far.

My advice echoes some of the other comments. I subscribe to the A List 
Apart feed, would recommend CSS Mastery by Andy Budd as a slim but 
invaluable practical volume, and code for Firefox, then fix for Safari 
and IE (an Intel Mac and Parallels is a big help). Oh and plan on 
writing off a couple of hours each time you want to fix a tricky 
cross-browser issue.

Good luck,
Chris

-- 
----------------------------
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Chris Taggart wrote:
...Oh and plan on
> writing off a couple of hours each time you want to fix a tricky
> cross-browser issue.
> 
> Good luck,
> Chris

Some people I''m working with just introduced me to Yahoo grids 
(YUIGrids).  It looks interesting, but I haven''t used it yet.  It looks
like it could be the basis for a really great new generator for Rails. 
Wish I had the time to do it myself.

cheers,
jp

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