User distribution by browser

[Earl Young]

     There was a joke circulating about fifteen years ago that the reason 
     God created the earth in only seven days was He didn't have to worry 
     about an installed base.  The issue of how far back to anchor your 
     software has been going on for a long time.
     
     The reach of the Internet exceeds anything those of us who hacked on 
     the old ARPA/DARPAnet ever imagined.  Were browsers more expensive - 
     and they are nearly free these days - a case could be made that more 
     attention should be paid to users and systems that are still 
     character-based.  But its hard to imagine that anyone doing serious 
     work doesn't need everything that we can provide.  Consequently, I 
     skew toward building toward a Netscape 3.0 world.  I normally leave 
     the glitz out - the ShockWave and such - because I've not seen 
     evidence that those items add value to reference content.  They do 
     consume bandwidth, and bandwidth - more than browsers - is the choke 
     point on the Internet.
     
     I choose to design toward Netscape instead of IE because (a) we have 
     lots of Unix systems, and IE doesn't run on Unix, and (b) anyone 
     competing with Microsoft is doing the user community a favor.  I am 
     not an enemy of Microsoft - and I use some of their software.  But 
     power corrupts, and all that, and they seem to do better work in the 
     markets where they still have to scramble.
     
     One encouraging trend is the "high-width/low-width" capability on some 
     of the site creation tools.  I build mostly intranet applications, and 
     bandwidth is as important inside the firm as it is outside.  I prefer 
     giving our users the option to (a) see the cute stuff, or (b) get to 
     the data faster.  This has the effect of providing access to older 
     browsers, but it doesn't require that I avoid trying new tricks just 
     because someone or some institution hasn't caught on to the 
     technology.  I don't believe we should reduce the functionality of the 
     site to everyone just because some people don't find the information 
     important enough to buy the tools necessary to secure access.  Thus I 
     design for bandwidth because it make sense - and allow older browsers 
     in as a side-effect - but otherwise the folks happy to live in the 
     late-80's never cross my mind.
     
     Earl Young


______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re: User distribution by browser
Author:  henkm at python.konbib.nl at INTERNET
Date:    1/29/97 5:55 AM


Hi
     
On Tue, 28 Jan 1997, John J. Burke wrote:
     
> 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').
     
Analyzing your logfiles with ANALOG
(http://www.statslab.cam.ac.uk/~sret1/analog/)
will get you some info on the types of browsers/spiders hitting your site 
at the National Library of the Netherlands (about 65% of our hits are from 
the .nl domain, the rest is from all over the planet)
     
Just to give an indication,
here's the distribution of total reguests for december 1996 of our 
(bilangual) site (http:\\www.konbib.nl)
     
(Mozilla = Netscape)
     
 #reqs: browser
------  -------
204260: Mozilla
 41609: Mozilla (compatible)
 29381: MOMspider
  3784: NetCarta_WebMapper
  2328: Ilse-robot (wiebe at il.ft.hse.nl) 
  1646: Mosaic
  1266: WebSeer
  1225: ArchitextSpider
  1117: Scooter
  1111: MuscatFerret
  1083: Lynx
   761: Microsoft Internet Explorer
   686: NetAttache Light 1.1
   489: MSProxy
   380: IWENG
   328: Lycos_Spider_(T-Rex)
   322: Webinator-bow
   289: IBM-WebExplorer-DLL
   250: Gulliver
   235: Cyberjack Web 7.00 (Windows)
     
It gives an indication on how important other browsers are beside 
Netscape.
BTW, our stats are not publicly accessible.
     
Groet, Henk
                                                         _
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