MSN Explorer vs. IE-8: Relative Positioning and Float Interaction

Hello, everyone.

Since starting Ian Lloyd’s book, “Build Your Own Web Site The Right Way,” back in May of 2007, after receiving my first computer a year earlier as a gift, I’ve been studying how to put together websites. I still refer to Ian’s book. It it a great beginner’s book.

Recently, after completing a few online “website-building” courses and discovering from my teachers that a web page can look completely different in the large variety of web browsers that are out there, I did a little test.

The two browsers that I compared, MSN Explorer and Internet Explorer-8, are the only browsers on my computer and the only ones that I’ve ever used. So, how this “test page,” (http[colon, then two forward slashes]whowillbethenextonline.com/box-movement.php), that I just put together will display in say, Firefox, or Opera, has yet to be determined. Maybe somebody will write in with their findings.

The “test page” shows the different manner in which MSN Explorer and IE-8 handle “HTML” elements that are positioned “relative” to a “floated” HTML element on the page, when “PHP” is used to “write” the HTML to the page, and then the PHP is used to dynamically-change the dimensions of that floated element.

If the results of the “test page” above are common knowledge, then I apologize for wasting your time; I wasn’t able to find any reference to what the page demonstrates during a brief search on the Internet.

If, on the other hand, the “test page” can be of help to anyone who can’t figure out why one of their web pages is acting funny–then all the better!

Sincerely,

Bennie2

There is no such thing as MSN Explorer.

This isn’t a PHP question and you will get more/any responses in the CSS forum.

Actually, there is such thing as MSN Explorer. Back then 5 years ago (in the good ol’ dial up days), I used to use MSN explorer which is a somewhat re-branded Internet Explorer 5.5

http://explorer.msn.com/install.htm

Dear Alien,

This link will tell you all about MSN Explorer:

http[colon]//www.bing.com/reference/semhtml/MSN_Explorer?fwd=1&src=abop&qpvt=msn+explorer&q=msn+explorer

The article says that MSN Explorer is a graphics-heavy version of Internet Explorer.

Bennie2

Almost no one uses MSN Explorer. There are occasionally people who ask how to remove it from their computer though so there are at least a few people around who are aware of its existence and how it wastes space on their hard drive and lowers their security slightly (one more unused program with the possibility of security holes).

If you are creating web pages then test if Firefox or Opera first and leave IE to last. Any differences are easier to fix if you work that way around.

Also no reason why you can’t install Firefox, Opera, Safari, Google Chrome, and Lynx on your computer alongside IE as they don’t interfere with one another. The only limitation is you can’t install IE unless you are running Windows as it only has an IE version.

Dear Mr. Chapman,

It’s a small world! Just yesterday I was reading your article on this website,

http[colon]//javascript.about.com/od/reference/a/accessibility.-1mi.htm

about “CDATA” tags.

I had read the article some time ago, and then proceeded to replace all of the HTML “comments” between my Javascript “<script>” tags with Javascript-commented-out “CDATA” tags, like so:

<script type=“text/javascript”>

// <![CDATA[

// content of your Javascript goes here

// ]]></script>

Then, the other day, when I was having a problem with a Javascript script, I noticed that I had inadvertantly “commented-out” the closing “</script>” tags in all of my web pages!

Even though the pages validated and worked fine, I spent countless hours lowering the closing “</script>” tags one line. And, I have many more pages to go!

As far as installing other browsers, my ailing computer almost croaked when I tried to install an “Opera” browser for one of my online “web-building” courses.

I’m hoping to win the lottery soon so that I can buy a “Cadillac” computer installed with every computer known to man; and then, I’ll be able to view my web pages in all of them!

I’m not sure why so many people seem to dislike Microsoft. The E-mail interface that comes with MSN Explorer, that was part of the free “MSN Premium” package that I got for signing up with Verizon years ago, is incredible. I’ll bet most people who tried it for a couple of minutes would never go back to their old E-mail program!

I’m honored that someone of your stature in the web-world would personally respond to my “thread.”

Thank you,

Bennie2

This has got to be a troll …

Bennie2, I am with everyone else… there’s no point testing for MSN Explorer (which indecently uses a VERY old Internet Explorer rendering engine) because very very few people use it (it’s not even in the top 50 browsers in common use). If you want to ensure your website works for a wide audience, focus your testing on the browsers which the general public use (rather than just the ones you have worked with before). The browsers which are important to test for (and make up 99.6% of all browsing) will be Internet Explorer 6 / 7 / 8 (all three versions are still in common use), Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Apple Safari and Opera. :slight_smile:

PS: If your computer can handle MSN Explorer, it can handle ANY browser… MSN Explorer absorbs more system resources than any other browser in existence.

Everyone just ignore the existance of MSN Explorer and maybe it will vanish like we are hoping with IE6…

I wonder if Wine can run MSN Explorer.

That would be interesting but a big waste of time.