IETester and Javascript Errors

I was playing with IETester, which lets you open Internet Explorer tabs using rendering engines from IE 5.5 up to IE 8 beta 1 for testing compatibility, and noticed for the first time that my blog was throwing a Javascript error only in IE.

Being the pain in the ass IE is, of course the line number it gives isn’t really valid. I looked and looked and couldn’t find the problem. As a last ditch effort, using the IE Developer Toolbar, I hit the menu option to validate the page. Thanks to the W3C Validator, I found that there were some duplicate ID attributes on elements.

After checking out the lines the validator referenced, I found that the Google Analytics plugin for WordPress was improperly tearing apart href attributes for links created by the Footnotes plugin I use, causing it to include long strings of HTML in the onclick attribute for tracking outgoing links1.

Thankfully, the Analytics plugin has an option to turn off outbound link tracking. I’ll miss those stats, but it’s not like I pay all that much attention to them (or care) anyway.

In the end, I don’t really have anything to test with IETester, it was just a fun toy for a few minutes. It also helped me notice a problem I probably wouldn’t have found otherwise, so in the end it was time well spent.

  1. Rather than just the link the user was headed for, as it should – and does for regular links. [↩]

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6-3-2008
Date
9:21 am
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423
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247
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Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 Screenshots

I threw together some screenshots and comments on Flickr while I was quickly giving IE 8 a run through tonight, if anyone’s interested.

IE 8 Beta 1 gallery

Desktop Icon

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3-5-2008
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5:07 pm
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136
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25
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What’s with the Vista SP1 Delay?

Vista SP1 was RTM earlier this month, and they announced a laid-back release schedule.

Their plans for slowly rolling it out to end users sound great, but I have to wonder why Microsoft doesn’t plan on releasing SP1 to IT Pros through TechNet until it’s publicly available for users to download.

This seems like negating the entire point of the TechNet community if you ask me. It’s there so its members can get their hands on essentially all of Microsoft’s software for testing and pre-deploy purposes. Several Windows 2008 Server builds have been on TechNet, and it was available for full download the day it went RTM. Why, then, is Vista’s service pack different?

Update: Per the rumors, the release schedule for SP1 has indeed been changed, so that technical users get updates sooner than expected.

  • Beta testers got it Friday (RC2 was identical code, so they actually already had it), because that makes so much sense.
  • Volume License customers will get it the end of this week.
  • MSDN and TechNet users won’t get it until later this month.

I still don’t understand why we’re waiting for TechNet. If nothing else, those users should get it at the same time VL customers do – they’re likely one and the same people.

I was waiting to rebuild my Vista box at home1 until SP1 was available, but it looks like that’s still going to take too long. Maybe I’ll move ahead with my plan to make that box a Windows 2008 Server and using my Ubuntu laptop as my primary machine…

  1. Which I’ve pretty thoroughly trashed. [↩]

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2-11-2008
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4:05 am
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128
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263
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Democracy 2.0 Beta Test

Just testing the Democracy 2.0 poll system. Nothing exciting, just a simple question… What’s your favorite RGB color?

{democracy:2}

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9-19-2006
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6:11 pm
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104
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18
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One Stats Plugin to Rule them All!

I’m testing a new plugin for Wordpress that keeps track of visitors to your website.

Firestats is still in beta, but it’s looking incredibly attractive already. One simple plugin activation in your WP admin panel, and you’ll start getting in a flood of information about who (and what) is visiting your website.

Unlike most other stats packages available, where Firestats really shines is in its ability to drill down to the information you actually want to see. Its big feature as of the 0.9.x beta release is the ability to filter your stats, eliminating bots that are constantly crawling your website. By eliminating all that extra crap data, you can actually (and easily) see the user data you really care about.

Thus far, I’ve been particularly impressed. Omry, the developer of Firestats, hangs out in the Wordpress IRC channel, and is very responsive to suggestions and bug reports. With his excellent start on this plugin, I’ve been able to easily realize just how few real viewers I have, and just how many bots are out and about crawling around the web on a daily basis.

It’s not the most feature-packed plugin available (yet), but it’s off to a good start. If you’re looking for a new stats plugin, or just want to see what kind of development progress is made, I highly recommend that you check out Firestats and see for yourself just how much of your blog’s traffic isn’t real traffic.

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8-31-2006
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5:59 am
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291
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242
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