[thelist] How important is height when using tables?

Ken Schaefer ken at adOpenStatic.com
Sun Aug 1 05:36:44 CDT 2004


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From: "Sarah Sweeney" <mr.sanders at designshift.com>
Subject: Re: [thelist] How important is height when using tables?


...
: Upgrading a browser is fairly easy to do, even for
: not-so-savvy computer users. Learning how to use the
: upgraded version of a browser is also not very difficult.
: Even learning a totally new browser is pretty easy,
: cause they are fairly similar in functionality and l
: ayout (if not in how they display web pages).
: Like pulling a tooth, it will hurt briefly, but
: the pain will go away, and leave the "patient"
: feeling much better :)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, Microsoft says the same thing about getting the latest version of
Windows, but a lot of people don't seem to like that. They either don't like
the cost, they don't like learning something new, or they don't like how it
works. :-)

Additionally, a lot of the world operates in corporate land. How long do you
think it takes to download/install a browser? 30 minutes? Multiply that by
10,000 machines. What a waste of money (since employee time is money). You
need some kind of automated system to do this.

But that just covers installation. What about all the other time that's
required:
a) a corporation may have 10, 20, 50 or 100 line-of-business apps. Will any
of those stop working if we replace browser components (either because the
app relies on those components, or because the browser doesn't work with the
app). How do we do all this testing?

b) if we do an upgrade, and it doesn't work, how do we back everything back
out again?

c) are there other things we should be upgrading instead of the browser. Ms
Sarah Sweeney says that upgrading the browser is really important, but
<other person> says upgrading the OS is important, and <some other person>
says we should get the latest version of Office (or OpenOffice or whatever),
and the folks over the dev section want the latest Dreamweaver, Flash and
VS.NET. If we upgrade everything all the time, then we won't have time to do
anything else except upgrades! and users will probably start to struggle
when everything's always changing. So what are the upgrade priorities?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~:
: Honestly, I think all this coddling of users with older
: browsers is just holding the industry back and not
: doing anyone any good. It encourages users to not
: bother upgrading, and encourages (a lot of) developers to
: not bother learning new techniques.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As mentioned, when you're the developer, you always want your clients using
the latest and greatest. However, when you're the user, you typically want
whatever you invested in to work forever. How many people here run out and
get the latest versions of /everything/ as soon as they come out (browsers,
server software, development tools, operating systems)? Not too many I
wager.

Cheers
Ken



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