User distribution by browser

[Thomas Dowling]

----------
> From: John J. Burke <U536A at wvnvm.wvnet.edu>
> To: Multiple recipients of list <web4lib at library.berkeley.edu>
> Subject: User distribution by browser
> Date: Tuesday, January 28, 1997 11:23 PM
> 
> Reading the discussion on frames brought this question to mind:  does
anyone
> really have any idea what level or type of browser the majority of
Net users
> have?  I often see comments to the effect that "well, no one uses
Lynx anymore"
> or "Now that everyone has moved to Netscape 2.0 or beyond . . . "  I
know that
> my institution is behind the times (we still are predominantly
Lynx-only), but
> what about the Net as a whole?  While any of us can construct local
resources
> based on the local dominant browser, should we all feel the need to
play to the
> lowest common denominator?  (My personal view is yes, but I'd like to
know
> others').
> 

It seems to vary tremendously by server, user population, etc.  Some
sites (www.browserwatch.com, www.interse.com) show MSIE in the 30% to
40% range, while on my site I seldom see it above 8%.  I have a little
script at <URL:http://www.ohiolink.edu/cgi-bin/browsers.pl> which does
little more than grep part of the agent_log file and present the
results.  The most recent 10,000 hits on our server break down this
way:

Netscape Navigator 3.0x / 6265 / 62.6%
Netscape Navigator 2.0x / 2522 / 25.2%
Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.x / 463 / 4.6%
Others / 213 / 2.1%
Netscape Communicator 4.0x / 148 / 1.5%
Netscape Navigator 1.0x / 139 / 1.4%
Netscape Navigator 1.2x / 68 / 0.7%
Lynx / 59 / 0.6%
Microsoft Internet Explorer 2.x / 52 / 0.5%
Netscape Navigator 1.1x / 48 / 0.5%
NCSA Mosaic / 19 / 0.2%
Opera / 3 / 0.0%
Web TV / 1 / 0.0%

This time last semester, Lynx was typically running around 5%.  This
time last *month* Netscape 1.1 and 1.2 were usually combining for
around 15%.

Thomas Dowling
Ohio Library and Information Network
tdowling at ohiolink.edu