Javascript enabled

The numbers....

[Rusky]

Hi All

Does anybody have any figures concerning the number of people who surf with javascript enabled browsers ?

Thanks in advance

[tedster]

I think mivox's analogies to restaurants and lingerie shops are on the money. A few years ago, I wouldn't have taken that approach to javascript — and I would probably have ranted along with you, perlyking. But that was before I really keyed in on the fact that the web works best as a finely targeted medium, rather than as a mass medium.

It's a marketing truth that businesses do best by targeting their optimal client, instead of trying to be all things to all people. So now I work to create sites that tell the optimal client "This is what YOU've been looking for" instead of asking everyone "See if you might like this."

[David]

>>SITES DONT NEED JAVA SCRIPT
I think you are absolutly correct.

Unfortunatly web users do need it.

I have just spent the last couple of weeks upgrading a site that was very dependant on js for navigation form validation and shopping cart. I went looking at several retail-ecom sites with js and cookies off and did not find one that I could both navigate well and get the cart to work (I know they are out there I just didn't find one).

Now that this site works with out cookies and js it lacks the spice that js can add. So its time to concentrate on the 85 to 95 percent of users who can benifit from js. The more I dig into the power of js past rollovers and such the more ways I can see to improve my users experence.

I said all that to say... get the base of the site running on flat HTML and server side scripting and then have some fun with the bulk of the web users.

[gmiller]

What it really comes down to is which costs you more? Having a site that doesn't function without JS or having a site which doesn't absolutely require flash JS add-ons? It seems to almost always be the former.

It's almost never truly difficult to provide extra JS to impress the newbies without breaking the site for everyone else. If you have suicidal customers, explain the situation to them. If they don't change their minds, let them suffer the business consequences of the poor decision but make them promise not to tell anyone you designed the site.