BOF website crashes; is it just me?

[Scott]

The flash header is a big part of the problem, and frankly is entirely unnecessary - if they just had a background jpeg with some text links overlaid (like the Nopersport navigation banner above) the website wouldn't look any worse. The buttons would no longer pulsate, but personally I think I could manage to live with that.

[Mr Chips]

The flash header is a big part of the problem, and frankly is entirely unnecessary...

Precisely. It is a gratuitous waste of bandwidth. Frustratingly they have a "noflash" version already encoded, which is what you see if you turn off javascript, which is why I mentioned the NoScript add-on earlier. Unfortunately NoScript defaults to blocking scripts on all sites unless you whitelist them; if I could find a way of blocking scripts (or flash animations) on a per-site basis I'd be almost as happy as I would if BOF just took out the animated navigation buttons.

[distracted]

if I could find a way of blocking scripts (or flash animations) on a per-site basis...

A couple of options in Firefox - you can use AdBlock Plus to block all scripts/flash in a particular website by setting up the appropriate blocking rule.

Or use the Permissions Manager in Multizilla, which looks like it has a simple interface to block whatever you want it to wherever you want...

[Adventure Racer]

The worst of it is I bet they paid some web developer loads of money to design that Flash menu. Is it only web designers who actually like Flash? I have it blocked by default, which still allows plenty of very nice sites to work perfectly well - from what I can work out the only purpose of Flash is to eat bandwidth and processor cycles in order to make some things look ever so slightly more pretty.

[DeerTick]

if I could find a way of blocking scripts (or flash animations) on a per-site basis

That's possible if you use Opera.

[Mr Chips]

Thanks to Deertick and Distracted for helpful suggestions. Multizilla will not install for me on Firefox; I have AdBlock Plus but can't make it block these animations without losing the navigation altogether. Opera does the trick, but I'm not keen to switch browser just for one rogue website. Digging further I found a Firefox add-on called YesScript which seems to do exactly what I want so I'll trial it. I have yet to see if it blocks any useful functionality of the BOF site.

[DeerTick]

Opera does the trick, but I'm not keen to switch browser just for one rogue website.

But it's not just one site - there are many out there you can deal with. Opera has many advantages over IE.

Opera Tickboy.

[Paul Frost]

...Is it only web designers who actually like Flash?

Not all web designers, I've never used it and can't see the point of it in this case.

I suspect that Flash may be on the decline soon, the iPhone doesn't have Flash capability, and Apple seem firm that it's never going to. I've already heard the tale of a company director that discovered he couldn't visit his own companies website on his new iPhone, so insisted that the site be re-built without Flash.

Flash has a place on a cutting edge interactive site that will be used by people with the latest kit, but not on a National Body information site.

[pyrat]

Browser stats for oentries are high on internet explorer.

1. Internet Explorer
2. Firefox
3. Safari
4. Chrome


Out of internet explorer, 7 is the most popular, then 8, then 6. All in equal amounts currently. I would like to drop support for IE6 but it doesnt look like I can for some time to come.

[Paul Frost]

I checked out the stats for my orienteering sites and all come in with a similar splits except:
ecko.org.uk has Firefox at 29% and IE at 49%
routegadget.co.uk has Safari (Mac) at 21% and IE at 51%, but that is for the main help pages rather than the individual club gadgets.
(my own use of these sites is excluded from the results, so it's not me!)

At least the IE6 share is getting smaller, so there is some hope it will die eventually. I had to do some testing on IE yesterday and was reminded how slow it is when there is any javascript on the page (like Google maps). So if there is anyone out there that can try another browser I urge you to do so and reclaim some of the time wasted waiting for pages to load to go out running.

[Adventure Racer]

Are IE6 stats still distorted by automated stuff saying it's IE6 (or do some built with newer VS versions now say they're IE7 or IE8)? IIRC that oeentries browser stat looks extremely similar to the global browser stats.

Posted from IE6 - would love to be using something different, but I've no choice on this platform! Though I wouldn't ever use oeentries or routegadget from here (the latter doesn't work).

[roadrunner]

I'd like to upgrade IE from version 6, but if I do then it breaks my DVD writing software

So I use Firefox most of the time, but some sites only work with IE.

[Adventure Racer]

So I use Firefox most of the time, but some sites only work with IE.

Which ones? Can't remember the last time I had to use IE at home (apart from to do some MS update thing). I do use Chrome rather than FF, but I can't see why that should help much and don't remember any problems when I last used FF either. If sites really don't work with anything but IE then that makes them non-compliant with standards, and given latest browser stats the designer/owner is seriously negligent in terms of the market share they're losing.

[Scott]

I do use Chrome

I do like Chrome, but I fear Google taking over my whole life.

[roadrunner]

So I use Firefox most of the time, but some sites only work with IE.

Which ones?

One of Skandia's - nothing to do with orienteering.