This term has flown by and I can’t believe that A5 and A6 are due in next week. Even though there is not as much to be submitted as on previous assignments, I still feel there is a lot for me to do to get it up to submission standard. I’m not sure why I feel this as I only need to write the evaluations and add link decoration to make the links more noticeable.
I’ve done plenty of testing on the website and could probably full up a sketchbook with all the screen shots I’ve taken and after using browser shots and getting 54 screen shots of the website in browsers I’ve never heard of, in versions as old as Firefox 1.0.8. But still more testing is needed as I’ve not managed to find one of the browsers from my goals and as I’ve tested the website in all the other browsers; I need this one to achieve the goal. So if anyone knows where I can get hold of AOL 6, I would be very grateful.
The feedback I received from John was very helpful and has made the website a lot more accessible. I’ve implemented most of his ideas and just need to add one more thing then the website should be done.
I really enjoyed the timed task today, but I have to say I’m not looking forward to the timed task/s next Tuesday as I can see it been very difficult. For this weeks timed task I was unprepared for the need to put exact measurements on the designs.
I’ve finally got the presentation done and now I just need to practice it a few times before the real one.
I think for future assignments you will find testing a lot easier if you only test in some of the more popular browsers such as Firefox, IE 5+, Opera and Safari. There isn’t very many people using Firefox 1, so there isn’t really much point in testing in this.
Same goes for AOL – there may be more than that using AOL, but in the grand scheme of things it is an extremely small percentage. Also, the AOL browser uses Microsoft’s Trident engine; the same as Internet Explorer.
I commend your rigorous approach to testing, but in future you would be better to test fewer browsers for more time than all the browsers you could find that most people don’t use.
I understand what you mean about over testing, I probably did chose too many browsers to test it in, but the test in the Firefox version 1 was just something Browser Shots happened to do and in my goals I went for Firefox version 1.5.
As for the AOL browser it’s surprising how many people still use it, for example my family do and that’s probably the only reason I chose to test the website in it.
For browser testing, I chose the ones I simply mention in my goals in the first part of the webplan. This gave me 13 screenshots to work with and print off – i’ve had to test my website three times due to different designs i’ve done therefore using about half of a sketchbook!
If you take a look here, you can have a more detailed look at what browsers are used month-by-month since 2002. Considering that browsers that account for less than 0.5% of users are not listed, and AOL hasn’t been listed since 2002, this would indicate that the browser isn’t really used enough to warrant an individual test.
These aren’t definitive figures though, so I guess it depends what source you use for your statistics.
And as Craig said, as it uses the Trident engine, there shouldn’t be any major differences in rendering between the two browsers.
Its good to see that you have done lots of brower testing. Making sure that you have taken screen shots of all the changes and testing you have done to your site can be really usefull to use as evidence in your sketch book.
I wouldn’t spend too much time looking for AOL 6.0 unless your sure you are completely finished.
Browser testing is important but as Craig said it is better to test the most popular ones.
I have checked at your site in Firefox IE, Opera and Netscape 7 and I not have see any problems so I wouldn’t worry about it.
You really did go into some serious overkill when it came to the browser shots, I couldn’t believe you found 52 actual browsers to test on. I’m sure 60% must of come out very similar or exactly the same.
But definitely record these in your sketchbook, that what I’ve been trying hard to do along this process and it’s something I didn’t work out well on in the past.
Glad to see your getting on well with the course, you’ve definitely got the hang of somethings I can tell by the way you work in class. Your becoming more confident in yourself, and with the work your doing.