When creating websites, the web browser plays a very important role.
The browser is the application software that resides on a personal computer that
interprets and and displays the HTML code sent
from the web server. Although Microsoft's Internet Explorer is the most widely used
web browser in North America, there are many other browsers available (e.g.
Netscape Navigator, Mozilla, Firefox, Opera and Safari).
Because each browser (and sometimes versions of browsers) renders web pages
somewhat differently, it is important to anticipate which ones will
be used by your website visitors. You can then create web pages that
are optimized for those browsers. For example, if your target audience
is in China, you might want to optimize for Firefox. Normally, websites should be optimizes for a recent version
of Microsoft's Internet Explorer.
As you construct your website, it is important to test your web pages with
different browsers. Once your website is constructed and in production, the
web server log will reveal which web browsers are being used.
Example of Browser Data from a Web Server Log
| MSIE |
88.5 % |
 |
Msie 6.0 |
83 % |
|
|
Msie 5.5 |
1.3 % |
|
|
Msie 5.23 |
0.5 % |
|
|
Msie 5.22 |
0.4 % |
|
|
Msie 5.16 |
0.1 % |
|
|
Msie 5.01 |
0.7 % |
|
|
Msie 5.0 |
2.2 % |
| FIREFOX |
1.3 % |
 |
Firefox 1.0.6 |
0.4 % |
|
|
Firefox 1.0.4 |
0.6 % |
|
|
Firefox 1.0.3 |
0 % |
|
|
Firefox 1.0 |
0.2 % |
|
NETSCAPE |
0.9 % |
 |
Netscape 7.2 |
0.8 % |
|
|
Netscape 7.01 |
0 % |
|
|
Netscape 4.76 |
0 % |
|
|
Netscape 4.0 |
0 % |
| Others |
9 % |
 |
Unknown |
5.6 % |
 |
Mozilla |
1.9 % |
 |
I-Mode phone (PDA/Phone browser) |
1.1 % |
 |
Konqueror |
0.1 % |
 |
LibWWW |
0 % |
 |
Safari |
0 % |
In addition to the browser is used, it is important to optimize for the
most widely used screen resolutions (e.g. 800x600,
1024x768, 1280x600).
