1 Untitled

While user experience is extremely important, who the users are is an enormous factor to consider. In Lala’s case, they didn’t necessarily need to use all that flashy Ajax to make their site go; but some sites (like Gmail) would actually be hamstrung if they tried to make concessions for every unique case that came down the pipe. Requiring Javascript is probably not a wise choice, but it’s not devil worship.

posted at 07:13 am on March 27, 2007 by Jesse Gardner

2

Whereas I definitely think we should always make a serious attempt at building web apps without JavaScript, I do think there are cases where the app would be so hamstrung without it that it’s not worth the effort. In these cases, I think it’s perfectly fair to require JavaScript.

We place all sorts of technical requirements on desktop software (RAM, processor, video card, OS, etc.) — so I don’t see why it wouldn’t be okay to do the same with web-based software. Those technical requirements should be as low as feasible for the given app, but if something truly requires JavaScript to be built, then I would suggest it’s fine to require JavaScript rather than simply not building it or dumbing it down (and the same goes for Flash, in my mind). Just the same, if Adobe seriously can’t make Photoshop run in less than 512MB of RAM, then I’d rather than require 512MB of RAM than dumb the product down into something that can fit int 128MB.

All that having been said, Lala is clearly an example of a site that could have been built to work without JavaScript and simply wasn’t, out of pure negligence. That’s not cool.

posted at 09:19 am on March 27, 2007 by Jeff Croft

3 Netscape 4 / IE5 Mac

Good article, but is anyone out there still going to the effort of catering for Netscape 4 or IE5 Mac?

Whilst it is a nice idea to be able to get it right in these browsers, surely the extra coding & kbs required outweighs the benefit for such a small number of users – Time which could be better spent constructing/adding valuable content. (Does anyone have any statistics about how many people are still using these? – my Google Analytics stats show tiny percentages, – much less than 1% – but are probably not all that reliable given that the stats themselves rely on javascript!)

posted at 12:09 pm on March 27, 2007 by James Smith

4 Netscape 4, what a fuzz

Asking for a Netscape 4 compatibility is a waste of time IMO. Try browsing the web with it and you know what I mean.

posted at 01:32 pm on March 27, 2007 by P K

5 Don't miss the point

For those criticizing the statement about IE5 and Netscape 4, don’t miss the main point of the article. The point is, make sure the websites that you create work, despite varying technologies (or lack thereof) installed on different computers. It may very well be that less than 1% use any given browser, but given high amounts of traffic, that can still be a substantial amount of visitors. Regardless, the writer did not say you always had to cater to these browsers, but that sometimes you may need to.

Also, I can think of very few situations in which javascript is absolutely necessary. So to leave users without javascript unable to use your website is just a little lazy. What if a road were built on which you could not drive a ’55 Chevy? Wouldn’t seem fair, would it?

posted at 02:14 pm on March 27, 2007 by Chris Huff

6 3 levels ~ nice!

I’m very taken with the three levels:
-Level 1: No frills
-Level 2: Make it pretty
-Level 3: Make it sing
…I’ve been thinking of a development sequence to apply that ensures all bases are covered at the appropriate time – content drives layout drives style…those three seem to do the trick neatly and concisely.

posted at 02:18 pm on March 27, 2007 by martin ford

7 Knowing your user (base)

We can actually learn a lot about our user base through the use of web analytics. In your restaurant example, we could take a detailed accounting (or just make mental notes) of who comes to our restaurant, when they come to eat, what type of food they order, how much they spend, etc. I would be disturbed to find a restaurant profiling its patrons, but that is besides the point.

We can do the same with web analytics; we take a detailed accounting of who is coming to our site, what they are capable of receiving (XHTML, JavaScript, CSS, applets, etc), what they do while at our site, where they come from, where they go to, how much they spend, etc. We may not know very much about the specific user coming to our website (although we do know some things when they arrive), but we can make educated guesses and safe® assumptions based on our analysis results.

posted at 03:45 pm on March 27, 2007 by John Bradley

8 Re: Untitled

Jesse,

GMail is probably not the best example. Google serves a capable non-AJAX GMail solution to user agents that do not support JavaScript. A better example (staying in the same family of apps) is Google Docs. Google Docs requires JavaScript because the functionality behind Google Docs requires JavaScript (or another scripting solution, or an applet, etc). I think that’s the key when making hard decisions that could alienate users. We have to ask ourselves, “Does our application/service/site require this to function?” If not, then we should leave it out or do as Google has done with GMail and implement a safety net.

posted at 03:56 pm on March 27, 2007 by John Bradley

10 Untitled

I can appreciate the article. Knowing your audience is very important, and I’d say that most people who are swapping albums on the net are probably web geeks, with new shiney dells.
I doubt they are using their pda’s.

It’s just my opinion, but designing for non-javascript users is like building a parking lot with a horse barn just in case someone doesn’t have a car. Those users are a niche group and the handful that they are should probably have their own pda version of a site.

I’ve never in my life used a browser that didn’t have javascript.

posted at 05:31 pm on March 27, 2007 by Brandon Richards