Making Websites Browser Compatible?!

[Ryuslayer]

Hi, brand new on the web designing scene, I have this issue:

Making a site in Firefox doesn't mean it works on IE.

Especially when it comes to layers and tables ( for some reason it won't center in IE ) , I have trouble making it work for both.

Can anyone tell me how you do this? I read somewhere there are things you can put in the head tag to make it easier.

[Paul]

I find it much easier to design for Firefox, and then go back to edit what needs doing for Internet Explorer, however, this always can't be the case; layers are very complicated for Internet Explorer to render.

Basically, when you're using layers, divs, etc., in Internet Explorer, you need to set the 'text-align: center;' to the body, then, align the text to the left of the divs separately. You can also align the layers 50% away from the left, basically, it will end up being in the center: 'left: 50%;'.

[alloydog]

One way I found to allow for IE's 'characteristics' is to include attributes that are normally taken for granted as '0', such as padding and margin and position as relative.

For example:

.div1 {width:200px;margin 0 auto;padding:0;position:relative;float:left;}

is needed for IE where for Firefox

.div1 {width:200px;}

would be enough.

[sloojoe]

Always design your websites for IE. thats what everyone uses. Most of the tech population uses Firefox, but the general public doesn;t have a clue. This is what I do. Code the page, check in it in IE, then Firefox and try to figure out what is causing the layout to suck. Good luck

[dmidwinter]

My recent expericence of building a site has been to clear clean xhtml and css that worked perfectly in Safari and Firefox on my mac, then test it using browsershots.org

This showed that it was working as intended in IE7, Firefox, Opera and Safari on PC

but it was slightly out in IE6

I then added a conditional clause statement with a slight adjustment that brought ie6 in to line.

[zkiller]

Originally Posted by sloojoe

Always design your websites for IE. thats what everyone uses. Most of the tech population uses Firefox, but the general public doesn;t have a clue. This is what I do. Code the page, check in it in IE, then Firefox and try to figure out what is causing the layout to suck. Good luck

while i agree that compatibility to IE is important, i find it much easier to design site for firefox and then making them compatible with IE where need be. in the end it is just a matter of personal preference though.

[Ryuslayer]

Thanks a lot people! I'll try those things out.