Dynamic HTML: The Definitive Reference, 3rd Edition

Chapter ONLINE SECTION II. Cross-Platform Compromises

With the World Wide Web Consortium’s XHTML, CSS, and DOM standards activities having been on the radar screens of browser makers for so many years now, developers might expect all mainstream browsers to adhere to a sizable chunk of those standards. If that were the case, the benefit to the DHTML developer would be significant: writing one set of code that works on a vast majority of browsers. Indeed, some browser makers have gone to great lengths to implement as many details of the W3C standards as possible. Mozilla-based browsers tend to lead the pack in this regard, but Apple’s Safari and the Opera browser are no slackers. In an ironic twist, the latest version of the browser that pioneered the notion of dynamically altering any piece of an already-loaded HTML document, Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 for Windows, lags behind supporting some key standards. At the same time, however, Microsoft also pioneered several features that have proven so popular with developers that they have become de facto standards in other browsers. This chapter begins by comparing categories of DHTML features that are available in a wide range of modern browsers (plus or minus implementation bugs) against important proprietary features with which virtually all DHTML developers must contend. It also explores some overall strategies that you may wish to use for DHTML applications that must run identically across multiple browsers, as well as suggestions ...