[dillo99]

Shad,

Got a Mac for Xmas and I can't seem to post to the new forum.   Works okay on the old forum.   Basically, I get the form, can fill it out and then when I hit submit everything blanks out and the post never appears.

Is the forum not compatible with Macintosh/Safari?

Thanks.

 

[Jerry Barnes]

LOTS of places do not work with Safari. I have a Mac and use Firefox, it's a free download and works GREAT! Jerry

 

[CCSII]

I regularly visit some hundred websites with Safari, this is the only one that is broken. I was going to become a first class member until I discovered that the philosophy was essentially "use different software." I find Firefox limited for what I need in the way of a browser so I'm stuck using Quick Reply and not being able to start a new thread. I enjoyed this site in its old iteration but find that I am drifting to other LS sites now and I'm still able to enjoy Safari.

Just one man's take.

 

[JerryB]

Along with CCSII, I too regularly visit (many) hundreds of websites using Safari and can confirm that this is the only one I can think of that doesn't play well. That only started when the 'new' forum software went into use. And I too find myself ". . . drifting to other LS sites . . ." rather than put up with the aggravating performance of the 'new' (as in not ready for prime time) forum software here. Still, Shad's MLS site has the most content, friendliest folks and great discussions. I really appreciate having access to this resource in spite of the newly created access difficulties and full intend to continue my First Class Membership.

As Jerry Barnes wrote above, you can solve the problem yourself by downloading Firefox. It's free and works well on a Mac. I currently have Firefox 2.0.0.12 installed on both my G4 PowerBook and my new MacBook laptop. I would provide a link to Firefox, but that too doesn't work well in quick reply since the changeover. Just Google for it.

I only use Firefox to access MLS, while continuing to use Safari for all other internet access. There are still some major problems with using the 'new' MLS Forum software, but it does work much better with FF. Now if Shad or the developer could just fix the problem of persistence of the latest threads select box, all would definitely be better.

IMHO, both Shad and the developer of the 'new' software are really anti-Macintosh computers and will do nothing to help this situation. My IP engineer says we all just need to have several browsers to take care of these kinds of situations.

Happy RRing,

Jerry

 

[MarkLewis]

If you want to use Firefox, download the latest version 2; the beta version 3 has a lot of annoying bugs yet to be killed.

Mark

 

[Dwight Ennis]

Posted By JerryB on 02/20/2008 5:13 PM
Along with CCSII, I too regularly visit (many) hundreds of websites using Safari and can confirm that this is the only one I can think of that doesn't play well.


With all due respect Jerry, you guys are rather glossing over the facts here, and the simple fact is that Safari has plenty of known compatibility issues with many, many other web sites besides MLS.  Do a Google search on Safari compatibility and you'll get 388,000 hits.

On a hopefully more helpful note, AppleInsider.com states that a new Safari build was released in August which improves browser compatibility.  Anyone running Safari may want to check their version and see if thay have the latest build.

 

[JerryB]

Dwight:

Not to divert from my perception that the 'new' MLS forum software has quite a few problems, but doing a Google search on Internet Explorer compatibility produces 1,440,000 hits. The same search for Firefox compatibility produces 738,000 hits. Using your suggested test, should I conclude that Safari has the upper hand (as in lower numbers) when it comes to compatibility issues? LOL!! (I would put some smiley faces in here, but don't know how to access them from 'Quick Reply'.

I'm currently using Safari 3.0.4 / OS X 10.4.11 on my G4 PowerBook and Safari 3.0.4 / OS X 10.5.2 on my new MacBook. Since the 'new' MLS forum SW was installed, I have to use Firefox 2.0.0.12 for access. I have only had the MacBook since the 'new' MLS forum SW was installed, but there previously were absolutely no compatibility problems with this site while using various (increasing) versions of Safari on a G3 PowerBook, G3 Desktop, or on the G4 PowerBook. That was from the very beginning of MLS, as I was among the first users to come here and was also one of the first to make a post here.

I use both (Safari browser equipped) systems for my business and can't remember having a problem with any website, the exception of the occasional inability to print some .pdfs from Safari. There's an easy work around for this.

The fact remains that I believe the 'new' MLS forum software has quite a few problems and is really SW that is still in development. My hope is that eventually it will get better, but doing major forum SW development in real time / public is difficult and can be very frustrating for the site owner, moderators and users. As a Mac user deaing with a PC-centric forum owner and developer, I also realize that I am probably at the far end of a long line!

I remain a very strong supporter of MLS and everyone's efforts to make this forum the best it can be!!

Happy RRing,

Jerry

 

[ShadsTrains]

Posted By JerryB on 02/20/2008 5:13 PM
IMHO, both Shad and the developer of the 'new' software are really anti-Macintosh computers and will do nothing to help this situation.

Now that's just not a fair accusation to make.  And I kind of resent that sentiment.  I think it's been proven pretty well in the past that I try to accomodate everyone regardless of operating system or web browser.  Like Dwight and many others have mentioned, Safari has a lot of compatibility problems that are well documented on the internet.  I'd dare say that most of the other sites you visit aren't as advanced and complex as the new MLS is. 

Unfortunately, there are more pressing issues that I need to adress.  You have a workaround in a different web browser.  Other problems I have to work on have no workaround at all and affect more people.  So you'll just have to be patient. 

 

[Dwight Ennis]

Posted By JerryB on 02/21/2008 3:11 PM
Dwight:

Not to divert from my perception that the 'new' MLS forum software has quite a few problems, but doing a Google search on Internet Explorer compatibility produces 1,440,000 hits. The same search for Firefox compatibility produces 738,000 hits. Using your suggested test, should I conclude that Safari has the upper hand (as in lower numbers) when it comes to compatibility issues? LOL!! (I would put some smiley faces in here, but don't know how to access them from 'Quick Reply'.


Not to start an argument here, but the first his listed is, "Don't lose potential revenue from your site due to incompatibility with the Safari browser."

The second hit is similar.

The third opens with, "Anonymous Coward writes "It seems that everywhere I turn, I feel unwelcome on the Web as a Safari user. There have always been major sites that I could not use (like OldNavy.com), but I ran across many more while doing some shopping this holiday season. What is worse are the sites and services which used to be compatible, no longer work (for example, Nextel's recent "upgrade" renders their Mobile Locator service unusable in Safari and Bank of America's "upgrade" last July removed support for Macintosh Quicken direct connect). This made me wonder: is there currently or should there be a registry of web sites which are not compatible with Safari? Would making such a list public coax these companies into making their services compatible with Macintosh?"

The fourth is a forum where people are sharing their experiences that their web sites aren't compatible with Safari.

The fifth is a site devoted to helping with Safari compatibility for web developers.

The sixth is dev.FCKeditor.net, and states, "This milestone will be used to group tickets relative to the compatibility of FCKeditor with Safari. Once we'll announce the compatibility, the milestone will not anymore exist, and all Safari bugs will be moved to the normal tickets system.  


We are working together with the developers of Safari's core software, named WebKit, to fix both sides. It means that not only FCKeditor must be fixed, but also Safari needs fixes to be able to work properly."  The progress bar is at 81% (81% compatibility?).

While I didn't peruse the remaining 387,994 links, to me the evidence suggests some glaring compatibility issues with major corporate sites (BofA).

I'm not trying to knock the Mac or its browser, and I know most Mac users are "extremely committed" to their Macs and how simply fabulous they are (  ), but I think laying the blame entirely at the feet of MLS when major corporations have the same problems is entirely unreasonable.  

Blame where blame is due, and certainly at least some of it belongs with the Safari core code. /DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/shocked.gif  The fact that IE, Firefox, and other major browsers work is indicative of a problem with Safari.   If it doesn't play nice with the rest of the world when the rest of the world plays together just fine, then it's broken regardless of how "correct" it is concerning W3C.

MHO.

 

[CCSII]

"The fact that IE, Firefox, and other major browsers work is indicative of a problem with Safari."

This is false logic, though it may be true. The fact of the matter is that there is a compatibility issue between Safari and this site, the nature of the problem is yet to be defined.

Some sites that didn't work with Safari worked just fine with Safari if you identified your browser as Internet Explorer to that site (still using Safari), a site problem not a Safari problem. Most of these ID problems have been eliminated over time.

 

[SteveC]

Posted By JerryB on 02/21/2008 3:11 PM
Dwight:

Not to divert from my perception that the 'new' MLS forum software has quite a few problems, but doing a Google search on Internet Explorer compatibility produces 1,440,000 hits. The same search for Firefox compatibility produces 738,000 hits. Using your suggested test, should I conclude that Safari has the upper hand (as in lower numbers) when it comes to compatibility issues? LOL!! (I would put some smiley faces in here, but don't know how to access them from 'Quick Reply'. «snip...»

No, I would say that the results you've stated reflect more on the percentages of use across the Internet of the respective browsers mentioned.

While not intending to put it forward as an absolute answer. It can be seen from the monthly browser statistics reported on the World Wide Web Consortium's W3Schools web site, which can hardly be accused of bias toward any particular browser since they are the international standards organization for the Internet. That of the computers that access their web site for the month of Jan. 2008 MS/Internet Explorer accounts for 54.7%, FireFox 37.2%, and Safari accounts for  1.9%. And with approximately 80 million page displays a month I would say it represents a fair cross-section of Internet activity.

And if you scroll down toward the bottom of the above page you'll find the following quote as the second paragraph.

Excerpt from W3Schools browser statistics page:

"W3Schools is a website for people with an interest for web technologies. These people are more interested in using alternative browsers than the average user. The average user tends to use Internet Explorer, since it comes preinstalled with Windows. Most do not seek out other browsers."

 

[Dwight Ennis]

This is false logic, though it may be true.emphasis mine
Again, not to start an argument, but you can get as theoretical and philosophical about this as you wish. The FACT is what I stated, and I'm a realist. It is NOT just MLS that Safari has problems with, and other mainstream browsers work just fine here and elsewhere.

Disclaimer: BTW, I'm speaking in these posts as a forum member and an IT professional, NOT as a moderator or MLS staffer. As my company's IT Manager, if I switched everyone to Macs and Safari and suddenly everyone experienced compatibility problems, theoretical/philosophical arguments defending my choice and its compatibility with W3C would do little to save my job.

 

[Jerry Barnes]

I've found Firefox will not do a few things on a certain web site, so I just use Explorer then. Not a big problem to open it up to use on one web site, I don't think. You can run two browsers at the same time. A guy has to be flexible in this 'puter world.
Jerry

 

[SteveC]

Posted By Jerry Barnes on 02/21/2008 6:21 PM
I've found Firefox will not do a few things on a certain web site, so I just use Explorer then. Not a big problem to open it up to use on one web site, I don't think. You can run two browsers at the same time. A guy has to be flexible in this 'puter world.
Jerry

Jerry

I've run both MS/IE and FireFox simultaneously on my system when checking out various things here on MLS, additionally I've had both running with each at different sites, and as yet I haven't encountered any problems in doing so.

 

[JerryB]

So I wrote a reply to this thread, clicked "Submit" and it just disappeared. It was written using MS Explorer / Windows XP Pro.

Then I wrote a reply using Firefox / Mac OS X. Same behavior.

I won't try to recreate what I wrote, but just want all to know that the 'new' forum SW continues to have issues that make it unpleasant to use.

Now to see if this will post. BTW, I'm using Firefox 2.0.0.12 / Mac OS X 10.4.11 this time.

Happy RRing,

Jerry

 

[CCSII]

My point was that the logic was false but that the fact might be true. I am not in IT but my degree in Math can help me see where logic fails.

 

[dillo99]

WOW...I didn't mean to start an argument! This is a great site and I have never had problems. I use Firefox on all my Windows PC's because I like it better than IE. I don't mind downloading it to my new mac as well.

Thanks Guys! And sorry to cause a debate!!!!!

 

[markoles]

I am using firefox and this is a test to see how it works.