Most Benevolent Reader GreenLED informs me that this site is showing major visual bugs in Internet Explorer. Aaargh, I had hoped I was immune to that curse...

I don't have a ready means to test my output in Internet Explorer, having no Windows computer. Alas, it looks like I'll need to use virtualization software in my upcoming MacBook Pro purchase, just for the purpose of testing sites on IE.

Until then, I sought out one of those "test your site on multiple browsers" services, and gave http://browsershots.org/ a whirl. I don't think these services are any substitute for testing on my own, as the services are very slow to use, and I have no control over the configuration. But in a pinch, they're handy to have on call.

Interesting results: I get good lovin' on Firefox+Linux, Safari+Windows, and, of course, all things OS X. Things are also looking OK for IE 7 on Windows XP. But the results for IE 6 and under on Windows 2000, as well as Firefox 2.0.0.4 and under on Windows 2000, really surprised me. It's not that there were bugs in the theme; there was no theme at all. Cast your eyes leftward:

Holy minimalism! It's like the 1994 web all over again. (I really want to see some huge Netscape Navigator buttons on the top of that screenshot.)

Now, for anyone saying, "But, that's all I see anyway; what's it supposed to look like?", send your gaze rightward:

Schweet! How green it is!

Readers, if anyone sees something like the mess on the left, or some other mess, I'd like to hear what you're using. I don't relish having to clean this up, but a job's a job.

Fortunately, most visitors to the site are using Firefox and some recent OS (including XP, which we'll pretend is recent, as Vista is still "Vis-what?"). Visitors using affected combinations are quite few. (And as hinted at above, I don't know that the browser testing service's results are definitive.)

But needless to say, this matter is a potential problem for anyone downloading this site's theme. I suspected the theme would be OK, being built upon the IE-safe Zen CSS theme, but clearly something got lost in the translation. (I did realize that I'd need to properly test on IE before uploading the theme to the drupal.org gallery, which is one reason I haven't done so yet.) So please use the theme with care.

What's the solution? Fixing the theme, of course... but it's a shame we have to worry about it at all. Hacking sites to work properly with IE seems to be a whole sub-industry of webmastering, and that's just not right. Even as we grudgingly resign ourselves to that, let's keep reminding users to get up to speed with modern browsers like Firefox (or at least IE 7). We even have a Drupal module to help with that: http://drupal.org/project/iedestroyer .

Anyway, the lesson for the Drupal newbie: Until Microsoft shapes up and starts sticking to standards, or until the public shapes up and collectively wipes IE off of their hard drives, be sure to test your sites in IE, especially if you've modified the theme at all.

I know, that's the most basic of webmastering basics. I'm a little slow.