Windows browser on Mac

[echristie]

An internet banking system I must use from now on will not run on any Mac browser – I have tried 6 different ones (safari, mozilla, camino, firefox, netscape, as well as IE). Any thoughts on how I can run Internet Explorer (or Netscape) for Windows on my Mac? I am currently running 10.2.8, but don’t mind using OS9 if necessary.
I really don’t want to have to go the pricey route of Virtual PC and then the Windows set up as well if I can avoid. Any bright ideas?

 

[Omen88]

An internet banking system I must use from now on will not run on any Mac browser – I have tried 6 different ones (safari, mozilla, camino, firefox, netscape, as well as IE). Any thoughts on how I can run Internet Explorer (or Netscape) for Windows on my Mac? I am currently running 10.2.8, but don’t mind using OS9 if necessary.
I really don’t want to have to go the pricey route of Virtual PC and then the Windows set up as well if I can avoid. Any bright ideas?

You could buy an ultra cheap pentium. Something that runs windows 98. There is also another emulator called guestPC. But I don't know how much that costs.

 

[Nermal]

Does the site not work properly in Safari, or does it just pop up with a message saying that you must use Windows? If it's the latter, go to Terminal and type:

defaults write com.apple.Safari IncludeDebugMenu 1

then restart Safari. You will now have an additional menu which you can use to pretend that you're running IE for Windows, which will hopefully let you into the site

 

[katie ta achoo]

Does the site not work properly in Safari, or does it just pop up with a message saying that you must use Windows? If it's the latter, go to Terminal and type:

defaults write com.apple.Safari IncludeDebugMenu 1

then restart Safari. You will now have an additional menu which you can use to pretend that you're running IE for Windows, which will hopefully let you into the site

This is AWESOME. I can reach the whole internet again!!

(is that a good thing?)

 

[Nermal]

This is AWESOME. I can reach the whole internet again!!

(is that a good thing?)

Hehe. To be honest, I haven't used this feature for about a year now. Most sites are cross-browser compatible these days

 

[katie ta achoo]

Hehe. To be honest, I haven't used this feature for about a year now. Most sites are cross-browser compatible these days

eh, there are still some sites that hate Macs.
I'm guessing it's due to the superior operating system and yada yada yada.

woowoo, launch.com, I'm coming back for 10 minutes, then I'll remember that I hate music videos. Rock!


edit: nope, launch.com hates my PowerBook. bla!
Oh well, I just won't get reminded of how much I hate music videos.

 

[echristie]

Geez, that really got my hopes up. Shots of pop-up windows in attachment.
UK/Irish Banks these days are a total nightmare with their IT issues. Incompatibility is a daily problem and they are not really interested in cross-platform solutions. This is a particularly abd example, but I have no choice to try to find a solution.
I presume your suggestion unfortuneatly won't work here, or am I wrong? Clicking on <OK> in final pop-up just exits.

Does the site not work properly in Safari, or does it just pop up with a message saying that you must use Windows? If it's the latter, go to Terminal and type:

defaults write com.apple.Safari IncludeDebugMenu 1

then restart Safari. You will now have an additional menu which you can use to pretend that you're running IE for Windows, which will hopefully let you into the site

 

[Nermal]

woowoo, launch.com, I'm coming back for 10 minutes, then I'll remember that I hate music videos. Rock!

Launch doesn't work in OS X, apparently due to MS not integrating Media Player properly (that's the excuse they use anyway). I should try it with Flip one day.

However, regardless of whether the site works or not, kicking you out because you're not running a certain browser is A Bad Thing™. How are the Safari/Firefox developers supposed to improve compatibility if the site doesn't let them in there in the first place?

I presume your suggestion unfortuneatly won't work here, or am I wrong? Clicking on <OK> in final pop-up just exits.

Gah! I don't see why they can't make the site work properly in the first place. I'm a web developer myself, and it doesn't take too much effort to get your site working on all browsers. The biggest problems I've had aren't my code, but the server being "clever" and reformatting it because it "knows" that the browser I'm using doesn't support CSS

Serves me right for using IIS, I suppose

 

[MacDawg]

I have the same problem with Wachovia's bill pay.
The rest of the online banking works, just not bill pay.

I have to use IE to do that (only time I use it).
I contacted the bank, and they said they support Netscape and IE.
I said, try writing good code.
They said to get over it.

You say that IE for the Mac won't work either?
That's odd.
I tried the IE workaround for Safari a long time back, and it didn't work for me.

Good luck...
mrjamin got IE 6 for Windows to run, but don't think you will like his solution much better. Check this thread to read about it.

Woof, Woof – Dawg

 

[tuartboy]

If you are having problems running a site on anything other than IE/Win, 2 major things are possible:

1. They have jscript in there that kicks errors when you use other browsers. For this you can spoof your browser or use netscape 8 for win which uses both ie and gecko engines.

2. The site is using activex which means there is nothing you can do because OS X doesn't have activex commands and all mozilla browsers have this removed because it is a security crater. The only thing that activex could be good for is system level access from a remote web location (ie, windows update). But that is actually really bad in practice because it can be used maliciously very easily. I read about 3 months ago that some guy had written activex code that would format hard drives when you visited the webpage. this was also his first time coding with it! I'll have to go find that article, but i'm sure it was on /.

either way, it's annoying.

 

[echristie]

So far no luck with spoofing.
How can I use Netscape 8 on 10.2.8? Can that run on a Mac with out the likes of Virtual PC? Also, I think it's only available to download as .exe file which I cannot open.
Or am I totally wrong here?

If you are having problems running a site on anything other than IE/Win, 2 major things are possible:

1. They have jscript in there that kicks errors when you use other browsers. For this you can spoof your browser or use netscape 8 for win which uses both ie and gecko engines.

2. The site is using activex which means there is nothing you can do because OS X doesn't have activex commands and all mozilla browsers have this removed because it is a security crater. The only thing that activex could be good for is system level access from a remote web location (ie, windows update). But that is actually really bad in practice because it can be used maliciously very easily. I read about 3 months ago that some guy had written activex code that would format hard drives when you visited the webpage. this was also his first time coding with it! I'll have to go find that article, but i'm sure it was on /.

either way, it's annoying.

 

[tuartboy]

So far no luck with spoofing.
How can I use Netscape 8 on 10.2.8? Can that run on a Mac with out the likes of Virtual PC? Also, I think it's only available to download as .exe file which I cannot open.
Or am I totally wrong here?

yeah, sorry. what i said doesn't really apply to os x users there. netscape is win only. it is going in the right direction, though, with it's support of multiple engines.

 

[echristie]

success

Success at last! I tried the first time login on a Windows machine and still no success. Rang the helpdesk who said I was doing it wrong – go to step 3, then skip step 1, and start on step 2 again (yes really- what idiot set that up?). So I tried that out this morning on my own machine. It worked on good old Mac IE. To really log on to my actual bank account it wouldn't work on IE, but a debugged Safari did the trick. Thanks for all suggestions!

yeah, sorry. what i said doesn't really apply to os x users there. netscape is win only. it is going in the right direction, though, with it's support of multiple engines.

 

[GFLPraxis]

http://emulation.victoly.com/windoze/

iEmulator, MacBochs, QEMU, PCx (no sound, only basic VGA, enough for web browsing), and OpenOSX WinTel (http://openosx.com/wintel/) should all work for you.

MacBochs, QEMU, and PCx are all free.