With the release of Internet Explorer 9 (IE9) and Microsoft's lifecycle support of Internet Explorer 6 (IE6) ending July 2010, SiteBuilder Pro support of IE6 will be deprecated on March 31, 2011 and eventually dropped by Essent. After the release of IE9, SiteBuilder Pro standard support for IE6 will end and will fall under billable maintenance.
What does this mean to you?
SiteBuilder Pro Designer support for IE6 ended in in 2009. For web designers and editors using SiteBuilder Pro Designer, most likely this changes means nothing since the majority of designers have moved to newer versions of supported browsers. If you still use IE6 for an Essent software product, you may not be able to adequately resolve any support or compatibility issues that may arise because you are using outdated software.
It is our policy to enhance our software, add-on products and technical support services for the latest releases so we can provide the best possible service. You are highly encouraged to use the latest version of the supported browsers.
If you have a current Support Plan with Essent it will continue to be honored, but Essent may not be able to adequately resolve any support or compatibility issues that may arise.
Should you need assistance, support will be based on a pay-per-call basis charged at our current hourly rate for technical support.
What does this mean to your SiteBuilder Pro website visitors?
If your visitors still use IE6 for SiteBuilder Pro, they may encounter a compatibility issue that arises under some circumstances and you may not be able to adequately resolve the issue.
For website visitors, a website is measured by a number of factors, including how well a web page renders as the designer intended. Multiple components impact rendering but possibly none greater than how well a given browser's rendering engine, itself, correctly processes the web protocols and standards used in the web page.
As of December 2010 no SiteBuilder Pro Site Engine rendering problems were identified for IE6. This is not to say potential problems don't exist, simply that testing and real-world feedback didn't identify any. Depending on the web standards implemented by your web designers, your version of SiteBuilder Pro, and how well the pages are rendered by IE6, your visitors using IE6 may not encounter problems now or in the future. As newer web standards are employed and newer versions of SiteBuilder Pro are released, incompatibilities may result.
According to Wikipedia Internet Explorer Market Share, as of the end of 2010, IE6 is still in use by approximately 17% of web users in the world, decreasing from a high of approximately 83% in 2004. The number of visitors browsing your SiteBuilder Pro website with IE6 may vary, but it is expected to decrease further over time. Conversely, potential issues are expected to increase as an unsupported browser becomes more and more obsolete.
If a visitor contacts you regarding a problem, identify if it is due to an unsupported browser. If so, communicate to them that due to the nature of the world wide web, standards evolve over time; and due to the nature of digital security software revisions are regularly released and older releases become unsupported over time. Encourage the visitor to upgrade to a supported version of one of the many popular browsers if possible.
What can you do about it?
Do not continue to rely on unsupported versions. Upgrading now will give you continued access to support, product updates, and valuable add-on products and services which may be important to your business.
What browsers are supported?
SiteBuilder Pro supports multiple versions of the most popular browsers. Support varies between SiteBuilder Pro Site Engine used to generate pages at run-time and SiteBuilder Pro Designer use to layout web pages, which requires more browser features and consequently has more stringent HTML compliance requirements.
For more information on browsers supported by SiteBuilder Pro, please see:
http://www.essent.com/SiteBuilderProAdvancedEcommerceFAQ.html
Supported browser changes over time due multiple factors like the introduction of new browsers, new versions, retirement of outdated versions, rendering behavior, and security issues. As a policy, Essent strives to support the last three major release of a browser and typically notifies the user community 24 months in advance of a change in browser support. Even so, deprecation or retirement of software may occur with little or no advanced notice do to a number of technical reasons.
References
For more information on SiteBuilder Pro, please see:
http://www.essent.com/SiteBuilderPro.html
For more information on Microsoft lifecycle support, please see:
http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifesupsps/
For more information on Wikipedia Internet Explorer Market Share, please see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Explorer