Windows development.

[InLikeALion]

I'm working on setting up some VMWare Fusion (2 beta) installs of windows XP Pro, and wondering what type of web dev setups I should be looking at. I will not actually be developing on the vms, but testing/debugging IE 6 and 7.

My initial searches made me think it would be best to make a separate vm for IE 6 and 7, in order to have "true" versions (non emulated) of each. Is this true?

Also, what dev tools should I look for that would ad firebug and web dev toolbar functionality to internet explorer?

 

[SrWebDeveloper]

You could end up setting up all kinds of guests for all the major versions of MSIE ad nauseum even for basic testing as version 8 of MSIE is now part of the mix. Seems like alot of wasted resources and time, my .02

Short of doing that:

To save ya setup with 8 comes out just add this to your HTML in the head section to force any user with 8 to render as if they're using version 7:

<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=EmulateIE7" />

This is a documented Microsoft solution because version 8 will be (according to them) more standards compliant and less quirks mode than 7. We'll see, of course. Sigh.

Or visit a web site like http://browsershots.org/ if all that needs to be tested is basic layout of certain pages. I mention this because if you code by web standards and your code also validates you'll save alot of time debugging 3 versions of MSIE.

-jim

 

[InLikeALion]

Thanks for your reply. I do validate my code and try to keep things as clean and semantic as possible. I have used browsershots.org in the past, but I need to test natively in order to debug javascript interaction and resulting layout changes.

I'm not sure why I would want to keep my users with ie 8 rendering as 7. Aren't we all supposed to be excited that IE8 is more standards compliant?

Any other suggestions or opinions?

 

[SrWebDeveloper]

When you add that tag the browser is V7, so no need to also install 7 andl 8, hence the suggestion

 

[InLikeALion]

Oh, so you're saying install 8 on my vm, and for testing purposes add that to the head section to then debug for IE7 within the IE8 browser. Naturally, after testing I would then lose the snippet. Is this what you were saying? Sorry that I was slow on the uptake.

 

[Fleetwood Mac]

Oh, so you're saying install 8 on my vm, and for testing purposes add that to the head section to then debug for IE7 within the IE8 browser. Naturally, after testing I would then lose the snippet. Is this what you were saying? Sorry that I was slow on the uptake.

No, I don't think so. The basic suggestion was to use IE7 for testing and make IE8 permanently (or until its out of beta) act like IE7 to reduce workload.

I think that's a little silly. IE8 is beta, and you have no real obligation to support its quirks at this time. If it turns out to be e Microsoft promised, you won't need to worry about it anyway.

 

[dantherevelator]

Multiple IEs

Have you tried MultipleIEs? 't's what I use--seems to do just fine.

 

[InLikeALion]

Have you tried MultipleIEs? 't's what I use--seems to do just fine.

I had heard mention of it this weekend, but thanks for the link. So, you have found this a satisfactory method?

 

[SrWebDeveloper]

Of course I meant when 8 is out in stable release, sorry.

When I mentioned coding for standards, I inferred not for browser version. This is a developer credo, an accepted best practice suggested by many developers including myself, but it does tie into my thought process.

Knowing V8 is more standards compliant than any previous version, maybe it makes sense (in my mind) to do the following when V8 is finally out:

• Install stable V8 as a guest
• Use it to also test as V7 using the meta tag
• Install V6 as a guest because regardless if you code to the JS/HTML DOM or not, V6 introduced new JS DOM support features such as those listed here so just clarifying it is worth using to test

Any version earlier than V6, screw it - the burden is on the user now, even Microsoft doesn't support W98 anymore, more example.

Hey, all this is just my .02 and I'm just speculating on a few possibilities to optimize your testing and save some resources where possible. Okay, I hope this clears up my statement. Take care! Cya.

-jim

 

[SrWebDeveloper]

ignore