Hey folks,

I'm running into a major problem building a website, which I know you are all so dearly familiar with, and I'm not even gonna ask for a solution as such for any of the problems, instead just a single question coupled with the scenario.

I have been designing a site on perhaps the bad idea of never having to refresh the entire page (it revolves around an interactive Flash Navigation element), which displays perfectly, the entire page and it's features in FireFox with no problems whatsoever.
Yet in IE6, most of the "Display: None;" DIV's don't appear via my JavaScript buttons (which modify the Display style), which do work in FireFox, and the Flash Object won't even load (but I think that is my IE being a pain about loading it as it contains JS within it as well).

Regardless! After briefly noting the type of problems I'm experiencing - is it even possible to make a site like this compatible with two very different browsers?

I personally don't wanna get involved with messy CSS Hacks and stuff if there is a lot needed - in the end I wanna try to keep to W3 standards (despite using probably deprecated Methods of Website Navigation eg: flash), but... bleh, perhaps you see what I mean anyway ¬_¬

I just wanna make a nice, user friendly website, abiding to the set standards (but perhaps not Web Etiquette!), working with at least FireFox and IE6/7 - perhaps this is a massively tall order :/

It might be worth noting I have thus far incorporated mainly XHTML, ASP and JS - it wouldn't surprise me in the least if IE6 had some quirks in relation to the use of several languages combined *Rolls Eyes*

(www.banksitters.com/flash/index.asp if you wanna view the disaster, you will also probably find it doesn't follow the Box/Inline element procedures, and contain hundreds of validation errors, among other issues - I say it's a work in progress! Heh)

Oh god yeah, and don't give me a lecture on IFrames if there is still a hate for them ^_^;; I had little choice (apart from the far more complicated in comparison "AJAX" or whatever) for the way I'm going about building the site.

After all that's been said, I do appreciate any words of wisdom you can offer! Thanks in advance!

There are no "quirks" with using multiple backend languages to build your pages. IE, and any other browser, only cares about the code that is delivered to it - not how it was generated.

I hate Flash almost as much as I hate frames (especially IFrames). Sorry, had to say that.

Anyway, have you noticed that you have a javascript error in IE? I would suspect that is the cause of your problem since you are using javascript for the navigation.

Michael J

Heya Michael J,

Thanks for the reply! I did look into that when I noticed it, the cause of that error is the use of an ASP Call function (Used To Post) in an OnClick "attribute" (or whatever its called) - I think it is a bit of a bodge job method, originally it was basically a seperate posting board, but eventually I merged it ~_~

Anyways, unfortunately removing that slice of ASP Code in the OnClick does solve the Page Error, but doesn't solve any JavaScript Function issues that are seen in IE6 :/

So anyway, I'm gathering making it compatible with IE6 & FireFox is possible, just a nightmare to do so?

I gotta sign out, will check back here later this evening!

Well, it is only a nightmare depending on how you built it. If I understood your first post correctly, you are combining a flash navigatioin with javascript. I personally wouldn't do such a thing, but I see nothing technically wrong with doing so. However, as I have not done that before, I'm also not sre if and JavaScript initiated by the flash would even show an error for you to debug.

Michael J

Right... perhaps the program I'm using to make the flash can somehow do this for me >_< I will have to check it's in-built tools, but I have a feeling I'm hoping too much.

I understand what you are saying, but I don't think I noted this before: Before I became accustomed to FireFox, I usually referred to IE6 to test the development of my Website, there was a time when such simple features such as using JS in the Flash did work perfectly - perhaps just analysing my old site backups will lend some insight... why didn't I think of this before posting ¬_¬

I will report back in the near future with any discoveries I make - I appreciate the support Michael J, and the confirmation of the "Will Work In Theory" premise of my site, hehe, thank you again!

Alright, it turns out after talking to some folk on another Forum, one specifically for the Flash Developer I'm using; they confirm it's an IE Bug towards the JS inside the flash.

The work-around which I havn't tested, as I thought of it (it's not genious, it's obvious); have the JS Div Modifications placed externally, group them together accordingly in functions, and call them from the Flash File.
-Original Problem Solved I Hope-

On a separate note, I'm currently trying to implement AJAX, but I'm missing the big picture it seems, particularly after talking to my Web Hosts Support Guys (Seems XML 4.0 _is_ supported, I figured lacking that would be quite an issue, heh).

But anyway, it's proving a nightmare, I apparently need an XML File or something to emulate the Database Data into an appropriate format, and then convert it back on the intended page... something crazy like that, and apparently configure some MIME header.

So, rather then just relearning a couple of familiar languages, I have brought on the apocalypse of several new ones (ASP Includes is as far as I go there).

Fun, fun for me! Thank god it's the Easter Break. Gotta be honest, although I don't sound thrilled, I am intrigued to learn new languages :) Weee! I'm done.

Thanks for your support on this matter guys :) Much appreciated!

AJAX is not as complex as you are making it out to be. It is simply a matter of "requesting" a page via Javascript. The output of that page would then be returned back to your Javascript where you can do with it what you please.

There's no need to transfer raw data in XML (or any other format) and then process it via Javascript. I find Javascript cumbersome for dealing with datasets. Instead, do all of your data manipulation on the server side in ASP and produce the final HTML output and return that back to the javascript. Then you just need to simply display the returned output using something like innerHTML.

Michael J