MobileMe: No IE6 Support... at all?!

[rikadik]

I've been using the MobileMe free trial recently, and have discovered that you can't even check your emails unless using Safari, Firefox or IE7.

Bearing in mind the times when MobileMe is supposed to be useful is when you're away from your own computer - public computers, PCs at work, etc - this presents a big problem due to the vast amount of computers still running IE6. 99% of the time installing a new browser isn't going to be an option in these situations, even if you're desperate.

Steve, please tell me how in God's name the email aspect of this service is "Mobile" when I can't access my emails on about a third of computers out there?!

 

[Kaido]

IE7 came out like 2 years ago...it doesn't make sense for Apple to support older browsers, especially with all the crazy AJAX stuff that MobileMe has.

But I feel your pain

 

[JackBurton]

iPhone?

 

[aphex]

I think the issue stems from the fact that IE6 is nearly 8 years old (it turns 8 in two weeks) and doesn't fully support everything needed to make Mobile Me run as designed. - http://www.37signals.com/svn/p...drops-support-for-ie-6

In some ways I agree, supporting an 8 year old browser is a bit much. That being said, its impossible to deny that many corporations are still on lockdown with IE6. Is Apple solely to blame? I dunno. I would almost think Microsoft is just as much to blame as the corporate environment still apparently doesn't trust IE7. As the link I referenced above notes, I think Apple just made a decision to only support current gen browsers to keep not only the coding down, but also to keep the issues and variances at a minimum, especially when it comes to support.

At the least, I think Apple should release a watered down version (maybe even e-mail only) for IE6 if that indeed is the issue. I agree with the article of 37folders though, as much as it sucks, its a step in the right direction IMO as something needs to change.

 

[Goosemaster]

While I understand your issue, odds are that such a solution will never materialize. The ROI is probably too low and the user experience would suffer,
They also market consistency on all platforms supported and IE 6 would go against that philosophy.

To make matters worse, corporate employees wouldn't garner attention for speaking up; it would have to be the corps complaining for it to be heard. No Corp in their right mind would use MobileMe as a communications platform so there you go.

 

[rikadik]

I have to agree with what's being said here - IE6 should be gone by now and Apple isn't really to blame for the fact that it isn't.

The irritating thing however is that .Mac supported IE6, and now that functionality has gone - whatever the reasons behind it, it is frustrating.

Since MobileMe obviously checks your browser when you visit the site, and tells me I can't access login because I'm using IE6, I don't really see why the ability to check the emails should go altogether. Can't they tell me that IE6 sucks and most of MobileMe's features won't work, but okay here are your emails?

It's going to affect some people more than others, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who has been left in the lurch on a few occassions by this move.

 

[Kmax82]

Yea.. I feel like they could've made an unannounced feature of just a simple table based email solution for IE6. It would take a bit of time to implement, I'm sure, but not much more than a few weeks for a coder to do. I write web code, and this would be fairly simple to implement.

Now that they've launched the service though, I doubt they'll add it.

On the complete opposite end, I blame the idiot IT people who don't update their computers. I could be misplaced here, but I think that the reason a lot of these corporations aren't updating is because IE7 required that you have a legit copy of WindowsXP. Maybe they are legit and they don't want the hassle of installing the software, but I'm thinking there is probably some pirating going on and that might affect some percentage of those IE6 users.