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  Argh, WTF is wrong with IE?

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Author Topic:   Argh, WTF is wrong with IE?
uilleann
Alpha Geek

Posts: 253
From: St Albans, Herts, England
Registered: Apr 2002

posted June 17, 2002 04:43     Click Here to See the Profile for uilleann   Click Here to Email uilleann     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
This seems to be something only the matter with Win IE 5.5, iCab at home on my Mac doesn't do this. For some reason, IE won't keep the geekculture cookies properly (and yes, cookies are enabled in the IE settings). Every time I return, all the light bulbs are gone because the site thinks this is a first-time visit. Thus, I cannot track new posts that have arrived during the day.

Clearing out all my cookies and re-affirming the setting in the geekculture preferences made every light bulb show as on the first time around, and after that, they all disappeared.

If anyone knows how to exorcise the Cookie Monster from my PC, I'd be grateful. No need to make him throw up those already devoured, I can easily go buy IE another packet.

- Uilleann

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uilleann
Alpha Geek

Posts: 253
From: St Albans, Herts, England
Registered: Apr 2002

posted June 17, 2002 05:54     Click Here to See the Profile for uilleann   Click Here to Email uilleann     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
*scowls*

Seems that if I dock "?action=intro" off the address bar, the light bulbs return, I'll have to examine the URL more closely from now on.

- Uilleann

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quantumfluff
Uber Geek

Posts: 847
From: under the mouse pad
Registered: Jun 2000

posted June 17, 2002 06:28     Click Here to See the Profile for quantumfluff   Click Here to Email quantumfluff     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I wish I could offer some useful advice, but I can't. Instead, I'll rant about IE as well. Part of my job entails writing Browser Helper Objects, which plug into IE to add features. It is the most painful thing I have ever done in 25+ years of writing code. The problem is that microsoft has no concept of version control and configuration management. There is no such thing as IE. IE is merely a collection of DLLs that happen to work together to be a web browser. Any of these DLLs may be updated with any microsoft (and sometimes 3rd party) software package or update. Install an Office patch, you may change IE. Install an IE patch, you may change Office. Install an OS patch, you might change bits of anything. Install a word processor, and it may change the way text fields work in IE. It's friggin nuts.

I actually think microsoft is serious when they try to say in court that IE is inseperable from the OS. Their internal culture is one where there is a very loosely defined boundary between the OS and the applications. If an application needs it, it can include an OS patch as part of it. They don't really think of them as separate products.

Of course, this position is indefensible if you want to deliver secure, reliable software. But, that's not really their goal, is it.

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uilleann
Alpha Geek

Posts: 253
From: St Albans, Herts, England
Registered: Apr 2002

posted June 17, 2002 08:52     Click Here to See the Profile for uilleann   Click Here to Email uilleann     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Indeed, I've been noting as of late that Windows does seem to be a heap of parts that I can't tell what does what. An interesting thing I noted the other day was that the shortcuts for my QuickLaunch are held in a subfolder of an Internet Explorer folder... I thought they belonged to plain Explorer (the shell). Grr.

Despite my theory that getting a Mac helped reduce my geekiness by making everything too easy, I do love how easy Macs are to work on, because I can clearly identify programs and their components; few programs ever install system extensions, so there is no DLL hell and tangle to content with, although I'm also fortunate not to have been blighted with extension conflicts.

Oh well, one day, maybe, I'll be taught how to program PCs and I'll know how Windows really works under the bonnet (aka hood). One day. Then I can join in with quantumfluff and the wailing for real :)

- Uilleann

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ilovemydualg4
Super Geek

Posts: 249
From: *GASP* THE 3RD DIMMENSION
Registered: Mar 2002

posted June 17, 2002 11:09     Click Here to See the Profile for ilovemydualg4   Click Here to Email ilovemydualg4     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by uilleann:

Oh well, one day, maybe, I'll be taught how to program PCs and I'll know how Windows really works under the bonnet (aka hood). One day. Then I can join in with quantumfluff and the wailing for real

- Uilleann


lol, of course no human brain can hold the secret to how windows REALLY works, unless you are THE ONE

------------------
my geek code
Hazards: "There is an island of opportunity in the middle of every difficulty, miss that, though, and you're pretty much doomed."

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dragonman97
Alpha Geek

Posts: 326
From: Westchester County, New York
Registered: May 2001

posted June 17, 2002 17:01     Click Here to See the Profile for dragonman97   Click Here to Email dragonman97     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I'm just starting to get a clue about some of the components from the work I've been doing lately. I'm trying to get a copy of the SDK here, so I don't have to use google to find everything (M$ has no concept of how to integrate all their stuff into one website). And the .dll updates are driving me crazy - they changed a patch they released (14 February 2002 & and also 12 Feb 2002), and didn't make it clear that it's changed, which means that if someone goes to Windows Update, my script goes into an infinite loop trying to apply the old version. I wanted to kill this guy who put IE 6.0 on his machine today, I had my scripts for 5.5 SP2 perfect, and I fixed 5.5 SP0 scripts today after I saw that I hadn't made the version fix yet, and then my boss came back from the field and told me that there was an infinite loop on this tinkerer's PC - because we don't officially support IE 6, so I never bothered to fix the script for 6.0.

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dragonman97
Alpha Geek

Posts: 326
From: Westchester County, New York
Registered: May 2001

posted June 17, 2002 17:09     Click Here to See the Profile for dragonman97   Click Here to Email dragonman97     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Oh, and lest I forget to [plug|mention] it, my browser of choice is Konqueror.

Edit: URL for Konq. fixed - thanks uillean.

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quantumfluff
Uber Geek

Posts: 847
From: under the mouse pad
Registered: Jun 2000

posted June 17, 2002 20:09     Click Here to See the Profile for quantumfluff   Click Here to Email quantumfluff     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
... and fluffy continues ranting Even using another browser like Konqueror does not make you safe from the DLL hell. You may get a security update to Outlook, or even just Office, and it changes your TCP/IP stack as a side effect. Suddenly Kongueror does not work through certain firewalls. I see crap like this all the time. I have found a partial solution is small batch bourbon - applied liberally on Friday evening.

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uilleann
Alpha Geek

Posts: 253
From: St Albans, Herts, England
Registered: Apr 2002

posted June 18, 2002 01:45     Click Here to See the Profile for uilleann   Click Here to Email uilleann     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Konqueror is here.

It would, indeed, be nice if Microsoft could take on the concept of keeping every application separate and distinct, especially its own. I do appreciate the spell checker in Mac Outlook Express that it borrows from my Office installation (I think MS apps share components even on the Mac), but more than not, it's just a menace. Being able to open an e-mail in an IE window helped spread Nimda (Microsoft adore adding features that do nothing other than open exploits), and because Windows only lets me do FTP with IE (have you ever found a setting to make Windows use any other app for FTP?), I can't see any FTP site messages.

True, I could install a new app and its pluggable protocol handler for IE for better FTP, or something (too lazy to go find something better than WS_FTP LE), but I take pleasure in being able to just take an old copy of Fetch (3.0.3) and set Mac OS to send FTP URLs over its way.

The package idea for Mac OS 9 and X apps looks the nicest, all self-contained and safe (in theory, bet there's someone with a rant about those, too).

Now, someone remind me why so many system tray icons can only be removed by editing HKEY_LOCAL_CLASSES\This\That\Some other\Didn't Know This Existed\Deep Dark Place\etc. In fact, whose stupid idea was the Registry anyway? I suppose it's a miracle that more people haven't had all their settings destroyed in one go than actually have (like those who installed IE 4.0 :)

- Uilleann

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dragonman97
Alpha Geek

Posts: 326
From: Westchester County, New York
Registered: May 2001

posted June 18, 2002 09:46     Click Here to See the Profile for dragonman97   Click Here to Email dragonman97     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by quantumfluff:
... and fluffy continues ranting Even using another browser like Konqueror does not make you safe from the DLL hell. You may get a security update to Outlook, or even just Office, and it changes your TCP/IP stack as a side effect. Suddenly Kongueror does not work through certain firewalls. I see crap like this all the time. I have found a partial solution is small batch bourbon - applied liberally on Friday evening.


I must point out that Konqueror is the core browser of KDE, therefore, it has no relation to Windows (R) whatsoever. It is a Linux browser, and therefore cannot be affected by M$'s terrible software, unless you are trying to access a website being run off of IIS, or are behind an M$ proxy.

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uilleann
Alpha Geek

Posts: 253
From: St Albans, Herts, England
Registered: Apr 2002

posted June 19, 2002 04:05     Click Here to See the Profile for uilleann   Click Here to Email uilleann     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Argh! Fsck's sake!

Damned light bulbs don't work properly in Netscape 6 either. iCab is the only browser I've seen that can ever make them work.

IE refuses to show them at all now, and so I switched to NS 6, and after briefly working, they froze (didn't change with a page refresh) and wouldn't go out. I tried a super-reload, and then they all went away, though I can't see why that upset my cookies.

Who the fsck wrote UBB, and how come they made such a mess out of it? I think it's clear now that IE is exonerated, abeit to the disgust of Steen :)

- Uilleann

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quantumfluff
Uber Geek

Posts: 847
From: under the mouse pad
Registered: Jun 2000

posted June 19, 2002 05:56     Click Here to See the Profile for quantumfluff   Click Here to Email quantumfluff     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Originally posted by dragonman97: I must point out that Konqueror ... is a Linux browser
Yes. That's true. So substitute Opera or Netscape for Kongueror in my above post and it holds true.

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