Wednesday, March 05, 2008

New Acid 3 test available!

In class today we talked about how different web browsers implement either differing subsets of the JavaScript/DOM/XML standards, or in differing, incompatible ways.

The Web Standards Project, self-described as "a grassroots coalition fighting for standards which ensure simple, affordable access to web technologies for all," released the Acid3 test on Monday. Acid3 is designed to test out a browser's implementation of Web 2.0 standards (ECMAScript 262 and W3c DOM2). No current browsers are able to pass the test, there are some hilarious failure screen captures available here.

They previously released the Acid2 test, with similar goals in mind (and as of now, of all the released versions of browsers, only Safari can successfully pass the test).

It just goes to show how horribly non-compliant current web browsers
are in relation to Web 2.0 standards, and how painful it is to write your code so that it looks beautiful across all browsers. Hopefully the advent of strict XHTML will help address this, but until it becomes standardized across all browsers, we will be stuck with crappy workarounds/hacks like:
if ( firefox )
sexyCode() ;
else if ( WebKit )
slightlyDifferentSexyCode();
// else if ( Opera ) # No-one uses opera, lol
else
shootSelfInHead(); // Internet Explorer catch-all

5 comments:

trutheality said...

"as of now, of all the released versions of browsers, only Safari can successfully pass the test"

Unless you count Firefox's beta releases, of course.

Paul Swenson said...

I specifically said "released versions," meaning stable (non-beta) releases. If we want to talk betas, the latest WebKit snapshot from yesterday is actually not that far off from passing Acid3 (85/100 baby!) ;-)

Paul Swenson said...

Also, Microsoft just announced that the latest IE 8 beta successfully passes Acid 2 *yawn*

trutheality said...

"released versions" sounded ambiguous: A beta release still is a "release".

(and, btw, I'm running it and it seems quite stable in its current state)

It's not my fault that the terminology is so messed up.

Paul Swenson said...

Looking forward to FireFox 3.0, 2.0 is awesome as-is... My only complaint is that the Mac version is kinda crappy (really slow to launch, interface is somewhaat laggy even on a modern system). Windows + Linux is flawless tho.