It looks like Google Apps is taking some bold action and phasing out support for older browsers, namely Internet Explorer 6. Does this mean that as web developers we can safely begin to stop supporting IE6? Probably not, but it would be nice.
Dear Google Apps admin,
In order to continue to improve our products and deliver more sophisticated features and performance, we are harnessing some of the latest improvements in web browser technology. This includes faster JavaScript processing and new standards like HTML5. As a result, over the course of 2010, we will be phasing out support for Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 as well as other older browsers that are not supported by their own manufacturers.
We plan to begin phasing out support of these older browsers on the Google Docs suite and the Google Sites editor on March 1, 2010. After that point, certain functionality within these applications may have higher latency and may not work correctly in these older browsers. Later in 2010, we will start to phase out support for these browsers for Google Mail and Google Calendar.
Google Apps will continue to support Internet Explorer 7.0 and above, Firefox 3.0 and above, Google Chrome 4.0 and above, and Safari 3.0 and above.
Starting next week, users on these older browsers will see a message in Google Docs and the Google Sites editor explaining this change and asking them to upgrade their browser. We will also alert you again closer to March 1 to remind you of this change.
In 2009, the Google Apps team delivered more than 100 improvements to enhance your product experience. We are aiming to beat that in 2010 and continue to deliver the best and most innovative collaboration products for businesses.
Many other companies have already stopped supporting older browsers like Internet Explorer 6.0 as well as browsers that are not supported by their own manufacturers. We’re also going to begin phasing out our support, starting with Google Docs and Google Sites. As a result you may find that from March 1 key functionality within these products – as well as new Docs and Sites features – won’t work properly in older browsers.
2010 is going to be a great year for Google Apps and we want to ensure that everyone can make the most of what we are developing. Please take the time to switch your organization to the most up-to-date browsers available.
I wonder if Opera did something to upset Google to not get a mention in this list also…
From my experience as a web developer IE6 has been a thorn in my side when it comes to CSS support and buggy javascript. As far as I know, Googlebot doesn’t use IE6 when indexing websites so I’m not sure how an entire search engine could phase out a specific browser.
I think it’s significant that they’re going to be discontinuing support for IE6 with Google Apps because it’s one of their major web applications. Additionally, it’s probably their most attractive application to corporate clients which happens to be where the bulk of leftover IE6 users reside.
And the chances are that a number of them corporations also use web apps which need IE6 to run. It could push some corporate (and some private users) away from Google Docs, mail, etc towards other rivals. Those using older OSs won’t have a choice about the use of IE6.
I think it’s sensible for Google in respect of Google Apps, web applications do tend to have higher requirements than conventional websites so it’s fair to make such a statement, especially with the future integration of docs with Google Wave (which uses HTML5) being in production - which I believe may be a significant reason behind the decision. With a higher dependency on JavaScript (as would be required) it could impact the performance of their services and therefore, reducing the extrenous bulk code (in CSS and JavaScript rendering) will be beneficial to users not running a deprecated browser.
That might just be Google reading what browser your using from the user agent and if it’s not chrome displaying that message.
I doubt it… I assumed it’s just shown with CSS, using * html #thething {display: block;} since that’s safer than looking at appnames (browsers lie)… but to tell the truth I’ve never looked, maybe partially because I can’t read the junk they throw into one big line, and I’m too lazy to copy it and space it out myself just to read it : )
I should set the security settings on high and see if it still appears (to see if they use JS for any of it). It would seem kinda dumb to add stuff to the HTML, just to hide it from all the other browsers in existence…
The thingie doesn’t appear with other browsers… FF, Opera, Konqueror, even IE7 don’t get the message. It seems directed specifically at IE6 and below.
It’s a good effort and definitely a noticeable trend to stop supporting for IE6. However… I still see IE6 in coming years… oh well, it would be nice… ah wait! I’m no longer web developer…why am I complaining?
Its great that they have done this. Its only going to cause a dent but that fact that it is Google doing this will give a lot of developers/companies a lot of justification in calling for upgrades from IE6.
