Slightly Remarkable

I recently came across a link to an Intel-optimized version of Firefox 3.1 called Shiretoko. I tried it out this afternoon, hoping to be surprised, since Firefox has been known to run slow due to heavy extension usage. So I gave Shiretoko a shot, and my discovery was that it does indeed run faster, if only by a little (and that is probably due to the fact that it could not load any of the themes or extensions I have installed). In light of this, I am going to stick with the default Firefox builds for the time being — the difference is negligible, and while I applaud the folks who have been working on optimized versions of Firefox, I am finding my extensions far more pragmatic than saving a couple hundred milliseconds here and there.

Interesting to note, Facebook seems to think that Shiretoko is “an older browser” and tosses the chatting function into a new window for you. Looks like they do browser sniffing instead of testing for available functionality. Of course, the browser could be cloaked to report that it is Firefox, but that would only be worth it if Shiretoko provided a significant performance improvement. I do, however, like that the only browser that Facebook suggests upgrading to is Firefox — it doesn’t mention Internet Explorer, Opera, Chrome, or any other browser. Facebook likes Firefox.

The issue occurs in IE only. When you run the example, you get an error that says, “‘getElementsByTagName(…).childNodes.0′ is null or not an object.” The problem is not with the JavaScript code itself, but rather a setting in Internet Explorer. Under the Advanced tab in Tools -> Internet Options, enable the checkbox next to “Use HTTP 1.1 through proxy connections.”

This should fix the error. If not, try working on a server (localhost or an online webserver), because operating systems’ file systems differ from that of the Web’s, which is what Ajax uses.

As before, install the user file and begin using it. The update simply converts “<-" and "->” into “←” and “→” respectively. Enjoy!

The bug basically is when you put a comment in the middle of a CSS attribute. I’ve only tested this with backgrounds, but I’m guessing it will “work” (the bug, that is) if used in the middle of any mutli-value CSS property.


background: #FFF /* #EEF */ url(background.jpg) 50% 0 no-repeat;


IE 5.5 outputs no background image, though it does get the background color right. Removing the /* #EEF */ comment from the CSS makes it work fine. Does anyone know why this is? It’s interesting to also make note that IE 5.01 doesn’t have this problem, nor does IE6. I think there are fewer bugs in IE 5.01 (although it supports less CSS) than IE 5.5. A few simple things (text-align center and such) to center my current design, and it worked absolutely fine in IE 5.01; IE5.5, however, didn’t center the menu or display the background (due to the bug I just mentioned). In order to center the menu for IE 5.5, which I’m guessing more people use, I had to offset the menu’s centeredness for IE5.01. I’m sure that’s acceptable, as you can still use the navigation. It might not look as pretty, but I doubt many people will be browing my site with IE5.01 (and if they use an old version of IE, there’s not much of a chance that the version will be prior to IE5.5). Thoughts? Anyone encountered this problem before? What were your experiences with it?