PNG support (was Entities)

> Side question: will PNG images be added to MSIE so they can be 
> included using <IMG> or does one have to rely on plugins and the use 
> of <OBJECT> which is handled in a buggy manner by most browsers 
> (enough to make me avoid using it for years).

The current release of IE4 that I have supports PNG only in a
perfunctory buzzword-on-the-box sense, but fails to support it in
the most natural, useful ways.  In particular, an <IMG> tag with a
PNG src will work with built-in support, but an <OBJECT> tag will
look for a plug-in, even though PNG support is built in, so you
can't do the nested object fallback thing.

  This fails on IE4:

  <object type="image/png" src="/images/test1.png">
    <img src="/images/test1.gif">
  </object>

Also, IE4 does not send image/png in its HTTP-Accept headers, so
you can't do content negotiation either.  Finally, neither gamma
correction for color matching or partial transparency is supported.
In short, IE4 may claim to "support" PNG, but the claim is hollow.

-- 
Lee Daniel Crocker <lee@piclab.com> <http://www.piclab.com/lcrocker.html>
"All inventions or works of authorship original to me, herein and past,
are placed irrevocably in the public domain, and may be used or modified
for any purpose, without permission, attribution, or notification."--LDC

Received on Friday, 22 August 1997 19:32:38 UTC