Re: Single Browser Intranets (was: Web Accessibility Myths)

Hi, Charles

Part of the problem related to supporting multiple browsers is that
there is very little technology available which makes this very easy
with little effort.  (Supporting multiple of anything usually requires
working at an abstract level that many people, including programmers,
have little experience.  Look at the problems of software portability
between versions of UNIX, multiple types of graphics devices, etc.)

A user model that I try to keep in mind is an associate sociology
professor who is interested in using the web for her class.  She has
minimal web background.  If you tell her that she needs to support
multiple browsers for her class of 100 students, how do you think she'll
respond?  Her focus is on subject material and class preparation.  Now,
tell her the various challenges of supporting multiple browsers, like
she'll probably have to hand-code each page so that it looks right for
each browser.  (Most page editors do a poor job supporting multiple
browsers.)  Also, any time she makes a change, she'll have to check the
page in each browser.  Sociologists at MIT might be more technically
motivated or have great technical support from the university, but it's
not true for many campuses.  Do you think she wants to read computer
manuals or sociology journals?  Do you believe she is very worried about
interoperability for her class?  The reality is she probably tells her
students that they all have to use a particular browser.

I'm sorry to contradict you, but you are not looking at the underlying
values of W3C.  It's an organization whose focus is the web.  People are
much more likely to go that extra step, at least for appearance sake.
What would people think of a web organization whose web pages don't look
good?

With regards to supporting multiple browsers in a company, my suspicion
is that most companies would look at the cost and benefits of this type
of arrangement.  While a company may use multiple operating systems,
they are probably sectioned off since there is probably little need for
interoperability for most employees.  For example, web servers might be
UNIX, but most employees have a windows machine on their desk.  System
administrators might have to manage multiple operting systems, but
probably handle this with multiple displays on their desks or using
telnet.

Your comment about letting an employee choose software is kind of
interesting.  Many companies do decide what browser will be used.  I
have to admit I never heard of an employee quitting his job just because
the company chose a browser he didn't like.

Your comment about a company's employees developing misunderstandings
about the web seems not very relevant to many companies.  How many of
them are that concerned about this issue that they are willing to take
on any additional costs?

Scott

> Although I agree that W3C is not a typical organisation in general, I think
> we make a good model for the question, and even more so for an educational
> than a traditionally corporate setting. We represent a diverse group of
> people who have a large amount of common purpose (like people studying a
> particular course, or developing software) but also a variety of individual
> requiremetns that aren't shared (some people work on graphics, some on
> transport protocols, some on marketing, just as students study a range of
> courses, and corporations expect engineers to work on engineering,
> administrative staff to keep the organisation running smoothly, marketing
> staff to promote the product to the world). In addition, we model the
> corporate situation where there is a single language throughout the
> corporation (in W3C's case US ENglish is the official language) but many of
> our employees speak other languges (for example many of the team in Japan
> speak Japanese, and there are a number of french speakers, german speakers,
> etc).
> 
> W3C is not typical, but partly only becuase we are small.
> 
> Universities, COlleges and Coroporations have some important things in common
> with us:
> 
> 1. Although we are working broadly on the same thing, we have different
> needs. Some of us work on graphics, some on transport protocols, some on
> marketing.
> 
> 2. We are distributed worldwide. We have one official language (US
> English) but employees often use another language in their everyday life and
> work.
> 
> 3. We have a range of different backgrounds, and are used to different
> tools (and computers and operating systems). Some staff take up new software
> daily, others are reluctant to change from the tool they used three years
> ago.
> 
> 4. Our systems team does not support all the software people use, but people
> are prepared to read the manual to be able to use a piece of software they
> like if it is unsupported. 
> 
> (The level of support I have seen at colleges does not justify relying on
> their supported software, but that is probably just bad personal experience.)
> 
> We have some important differences
> 
> 1. We are vendor-neutral. Although we develop our own browser and our own
> authoring tool (Amaya is both) we do not force people to use them as part of
> a corporate culture-buidling exercise. 
> 
> That is a legitimate reason for having a single-browser intranet at Lotus, or
> at Opera, or at Citec (who make Doczilla), or at Netscape. It does not apply
> to educational institutions.
> 
> 2. Interoperability is a stated goal. That is true of some businesses, and
> not of others.
> 
> In summary, I am not saying that it is always a bad idea to have
> single-browser intranets, just that there are very strong reasons not to in
> most cases. I think education institutions are one of the cases where it is
> extremely unwise except in certain very narrowly defined circumstances.
> 
> Just my 2 bits worth
> 
> Charles McCN

Received on Sunday, 24 October 1999 19:27:19 UTC