Does the Scumm Bar website work for you?

[Important-Looking Pirate]

This was one of best MI sites back in the day and my personal favourite (http://www.scummbar.com) and they've brought it back (kind of) but I can't seem to click any of the links. Is this a problem with my browser or are other users experiencing problems?

[Guybrush_Threepwood]

Links work for me!
Dunno...

[AndyBundy]

You mean like you can't click on anything? yeah got that with IE, but it works with Firefox.

[Pirateguybrush]

www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com

This site will save you ever having to ask that question again.

EDIT: Didn't see it was the links that weren't working, I assumed it was the whole site. Still, the above link is a handy tool regardless.

[Edward VanHelgen]

you just have to click on the right where it says old site, old stuff

its confusing yeah, took me also a little to figure

[Aractus]

You're right it says this at the top:

Wait! This doesn't look right! This site does not support Internet Explorer 6. IE6 is ancient, and even when it was brand spanking new -- in 2001 -- it was less than a stellar browser. Upgrade to Internet Explorer 8 or Firefox and you'll be a much happier person!

Amateurs!

Don't they know Maxthon is the greatest thing ever and that it runs best using IE6 version Trident (well I think it does anyway)?

(I have IE8 installed in standalone mode, it works better that way).

Oh and the webpage uses the XHTML doctype, but it is sent as an HTML file (not as an XML file) plus it contains errors so it can't be phrased as XML anyway! Amateurs! Don't they know that XHTML is only for XML and not HTML? In an XHTML document the first line has to be <?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?> and then the next line is the DTD.

http://schneegans.de/sv/?url=http://...ummbar.com/tx/

http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=ht...ummbar.com/tx/

So you're right BTW, the website code is very poorly written. And the links do not work in IE6 (I just tried) so to everyone else who replied first read his problem, he didn't say the site was down - just that it didn't function correctly. The fact that IE6 is old is no excuse not to support it. You can connect IE 3 to my new website (or OffByOne or any other primitive browser)... and while the design looks rather simple for now I can update and expand it at anytime (it's entirely controlled by the stylesheet)... this is how you're supposed to design a webpage:

http://scummgames.net/testpage.htm

And here, this is what a real XHTML document looks like (don't worry if it doesn't open in old browsers, it's not supposed to because XHTML isn't HTML it's XML and old browsers don't understand what to do with XML):

http://scummgames.net/testpage.php

It's not that hard is it? In conclusion: To the SCUMM Bar: If you'd written your HTML correctly it wouldn't have issues in any browser.

[Leak]

Originally Posted by Aractus

You're right it says this at the top:

Wait! This doesn't look right! This site does not support Internet Explorer 6. IE6 is ancient, and even when it was brand spanking new -- in 2001 -- it was less than a stellar browser. Upgrade to Internet Explorer 8 or Firefox and you'll be a much happier person!

Amateurs!

Maybe, but they're absolutely right that IE6 needs to be nuked from orbit, just to be sure.

(And if Maxthon has troubles with the newer Trident engines I'll gladly nuke it alongside IE6... IE7 has been out for 2 and a half years now.)

np: Phantom Ghost - The Charge Of A Light Brigade (Thrown Out Of Drama School)

[Chris1]

Originally Posted by Aractus

The fact that IE6 is old is no excuse not to support it.

OK, you just triggered a rant.
I'm aware this rant may offend you, but if it does let me assure you that you deserve it.

The problem with IE 6 isn't that it's old. Old applications aren't necessarily bad. However applications that just plain don't work properly are.

Imagine you were trying to guide someone through the process of baking a cake. How would you like it if the person who you were trying to guide didn't understand instructions properly, and tipped the sugar down the sink when you asked them to weight it, and broke the eggs on their face when you asked them to break them into a cup?
OK, now imagine that this person is one person in a class of people, and you're trying to guide a whole class of people through baking a cake. Everyone interprets you instructions correctly, apart from this one guy. Yet you can only give one set of instructions to the whole class, and at the end you need everyone to end up with a nicely baked cake.

This is what it is like trying to support IE 6.

Of course, most people still do support it. Many people access the internet from their place of work or an internet cafe, and have no choice to use IE6 because of corporate resistance to change. (After all, they are not the ones suffering, so why should they expend effort to get the latest version?)

Don't count this to be the case forever, however.

[LogicDeLuxe]

For all that IE6 nostalgia: http://www.saveie6.com/

Originally Posted by Pirateguybrush

www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com

Try typing www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com in there.

[Gryffalio]

I should stop being so cynical. At first I thought this was just shameless plugging! :$

P.S. People who are still in love with IE6 remind me of scientists who still use abaci instead of calculators "cos those pesky 'memory' and 'times' functions are like so last year"

[Aractus]

Originally Posted by Chris1

OK, you just triggered a rant.
I'm aware this rant may offend you, but if it does let me assure you that you deserve it.

The problem with IE 6 isn't that it's old. Old applications aren't necessarily bad. However applications that just plain don't work properly are.

I'm a web developer - I might only be a hobbyist web developer, but I assure you my HTML and CSS coding is the most professional there is. Trust me, to say your page doesn't work in a web browser and then to not even write it in a correct web format (ie why webmasters should not use XHTML) is a complete contradiction.

One of the reasons I use IE6 is so I can benchmark any page to it easily (IE7 and 8 in standalone mode allow me to test any page in the newer versions too mind you).

Imagine you were trying to guide someone through the process of baking a cake. How would you like it if the person who you were trying to guide didn't understand instructions properly, and tipped the sugar down the sink when you asked them to weight it, and broke the eggs on their face when you asked them to break them into a cup?

Imagine trying to explain to "webmasters" that 99%+ of all pages using the XHTML doctype are not true XHTML format (ie they're not XML)? Imagine trying to give them the instructions to code an XHTML page, or even asking them to read it on WC3 - XHTML was introduced in early 2000 as an "A reformulation of HTML 4 in XML format".

And correct usage of XHTML really helped website compatibility with mobile phones accessing them. But of course that's irrelevant if you send the file with the wrong MIME-type or if your file contains errors (doesn't validate). The fact that they use the wrong doctype for their site just illustrates that they're the ones not being "standards compliant". Either use XHTML properly or use HTML. We've had almost 10 years now of webmasters using XHTML in place of HTML which is the wrong way to use it.

This is what it is like trying to support IE 6.

You're talking to a web developer - trust me supporting IE/FF/Opera, Safari AND HTML 3.2 Browsers (IE3, OB1, etc) is easy. And supporting XML-based browsers isn't too hard either, with the correct XHTML usage (as demonstrated with that previous page I uploaded).

Originally Posted by LogicDeLuxe

For all that IE6 nostalgia: http://www.saveie6.com/

That's pretty funny:

Great! You are using IE6, the best web browser in the world. The crazy ramblings of the anti-IE6 establishment haven’t affected you. Please sign our petition.

And pretty fantastic too. BTW, Maxthon is the best browser in the world. I'd die without it's simple ability to disable scripts or sounds/images, etc on a tab-to-tab (page-to-page) basis and the ability to deny new tabs focus.

[Iron Curtain]

Aractus: Maxthon doesn't have an OS X version. And in my windows partition, I use Firefox.

[Chris1]

Aractus, please don't think the fact that I hate IE 6 implies that I was standing up for scummbar.

If a lot of people are stuck using IE 6 then it justifies the effort to support it.
I can still complain about it, however

[Important-Looking Pirate]

lol, this ranting is all my fault

[Important-Looking Pirate]

and btw i have ie 8. the links in the box on teh right hand side dont work

[Aractus]

My beef isn't with any of you guys - I have a beef with webmasters who think it's ok to say "don't use that web browser" and webmasters who use XHTML incorrectly. It's not even true that XHTML 1.0 is "backwards compatible" with HTML, if you believe that then try putting this in your page:

<script type="text/javascript" src="noframes.js" />

That's valid XHTML 1.0 (in fact, that's how you SHOULD write it), but browsers that only understand HTML will treat everything that follows after that self-closing tag as being a part of the script (because they need a </script> tag). That's just one little example of how to send a correctly formatted XHTML 1.0 document using the "text/html" MIME type that will break "legacy browsers". It's one example of many as to why webmasters who are not designing their site to work with XML devices shouldn't use XHTML in the first place.

I like Opera on Windows above all other 3rd-party browsers... and if there's an error in rendering my page in FF or any other browser I use it to see what it "should" look like.

[Gryffalio]

If you want people to read and enjoy your website, you can't just say "you have to have X, Y or Z." That's Bill Gates language.

Technology moves on, and IE6 does have many security laws. But for the record, though I prefer Firefox, I detest IE7/8 and would rather use IE6 as my backup browser (though I cba finding it to get rid of IE7).

It's unfair to discriminate against people because of their choice of browser. Still, as the coding seems to prove, it's a very amateur website which reflects personal preferences of a couple of internet users.

[RyanJW]

You're getting a bit over-excited here, Aractus.

The new SCUMM Bar page is simply an aggregator for the Monkey Island-related news on MixnMojo at the moment, put up in a rush after the Monkey Island announcements. While I do agree with many of your points, I suspect the webmaster is fully aware of your criticisms — he was doing standards-compliant code before most sites took it seriously — and will look into it when he can be bothered. It's just a hobby site, after all.

I do think you're getting a little pedantic about the whole serving XHTML with the XML media type thing, though. XHTML is so widely served as text/html and has caused such a minute number of genuine issues that openly chastising people for it is a little ridiculous.

I think I'd rather than people adhere to strict XHTML and write documents that are easier for me to work with than start getting all anal because they're not also serving them as XML. While you can be equally structured with HTML 4, the relaxed rules usually result in them not being.

Plus there's the aspect of compatibility with web and server applications, which increasingly output XHTML code that can break HTML validation.

Using XHTML over HTML 4 encourages better code, which I think is a worthwhile compromise. It's the lesser of two evils until HTML 5 becomes viable, anyway.

[Aractus]

Originally Posted by RyanJW

You're getting a bit over-excited here, Aractus.

The new SCUMM Bar page is simply an aggregator for the Monkey Island-related news on MixnMojo at the moment, put up in a rush after the Monkey Island announcements. While I do agree with many of your points, I suspect the webmaster is fully aware of your criticisms — he was doing standards-compliant code before most sites took it seriously — and will look into it when he can be bothered. It's just a hobby site, after all.

Transmitting XHTML documents as text/html is not standards-compliant (the only reason it's "allowed" to be is so that HTML-based parsers can still read it, you should still use a function that sends to the client as application/xhtml+xml if the client program supports it). It's lazy, sloppy and above all useless. The only XML parsers that will actually read it are web browsers, which could phrase HTML just as easily.

XHTML is so widely served as text/html and has caused such a minute number of genuine issues that openly chastising people for it is a little ridiculous.

It causes a minute number of genuine issues with html-capable web browsers, but with true XML applications it causes a multitude of issues. XHTML 1. has to validate, 2. Must contain the "<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>" tag before the doctype, and 3. must be transmitted using application/xml or application/xhtml+xml MIME type to be compatible with XML parsers. In style sheets the "body" property must be replaced with the "html" property. And that's not to mention the required html tag properties (xmlns, lang, xml:lang) and the http-equiv meta tag - all of which are also mandatory in XHTML documents.

So we're going to have to agree to disagree - XHTML is XML it is not HTML. It is designed to reproduce the level of expression that HTML is capable of in XML - that's it, that's what XHTML is. Sending an XHTML document with the wrong MIME type is akin to sending a PNG file with the "image/jpeg" MIME type and expecting that the application will magically figure it out (which it won't).

I think I'd rather than people adhere to strict XHTML and write documents that are easier for me to work with than start getting all anal because they're not also serving them as XML. While you can be equally structured with HTML 4, the relaxed rules usually result in them not being.

That's just ridiculous, I don't write HTML that's any less structured than XHTML, and nobody else has to either. Every single person who uses XHTML that does not validate has not made a real XHTML document, they've made an HTML file that has XHTML syntax and as a result a multitude of errors in it.

Using XHTML over HTML 4 encourages better code, which I think is a worthwhile compromise. It's the lesser of two evils until HTML 5 becomes viable, anyway.

Does it? Can you explain to me why:

http://www.amazon.com/

Contains no doctype (so the file is an HTML file) yet has XHTML formatting in there (it is riddled with "/>")? Seems to me that XHTML has taught webmasters how to abuse the net instead of how to code properly.

[RyanJW]

Taught webmasters how to abuse the net? Are you kidding me? Or did you just not do web development during the pre-XHTML days?

I'm aware of all the issues that serving XHTML as text/html has, and have been for years — you're not telling me anything new. But whatever the case, the whole push for XHTML compliancy across the net has done a tremendous amount of good for web development as a craft.

Perhaps it did take a nonsensical buzzword to get people interested in writing standards-compliant code. But who cares?