AOWhat?

In Designing For AOL - Your Take, D. Keith Robinson asks if we, the designers and developers, feel that the AOL browser is important and if we test our stuff in it.

For me the answer to both those questions is a solid no, for several reasons:

• As a general rule, I build sites for standards, not for browsers. All modern web browsers handle valid HTML and CSS well enough for just about any site to at least be usable even if it hasn’t been tested in, or adapted to the quirks of, any specific browser.
• Some people will say that you have to test in everything. Sure, testing is good. But how do I test in an AOL browser? By paying AOL for a subscription? Yeah, right. Until there is a way to test in AOL browsers without subscribing, I won’t know (or care) if there are any problems with my sites in those browsers.
• Because I’m not in the US, most sites I build/design have very few, if any, visitors using any AOL browser.

• October 7, 2003
• Comments closed
• Posted in Browsers Web General

• Previous post: Very Weird Web
• Next post: Accessibility Internet Rally

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