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› March 21, 2002
Online cross-platform website testing
Musing yesterday: Wouldn’t it be great if someone was to set up a website that’ll provide snapshots of a given URL on any browser on any platform? I put down my thoughts here. Would have been very useful with our recent debate on font sizes on this site.
Anyone care to speculate on the feasibility of something like this?
Comments
1. March 21, 2002 09:33 AM
2. March 21, 2002 09:42 AM
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francois Posted…
Yes, another way of approaching this problem is as a collaborative network -- you "volunteer" as a provider of screenshots, registering on the site which platforms you can provide. A site that worked on this basis was WHQuestion -- you registered your areas of expertise, and total strangers ask you questions that you may be able to answer for them. [I see it died... It even inspired a "shrine" site: http://www.geocities.com/whquestion_uk/] But I don't see this working for the cross-browser screenshot idea. Too much work involved, too little reward. And volunteers for obscure platforms will be hard to find.3. March 21, 2002 10:56 AM
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pup Posted…
i wonder how expensive/practical it would be to just set up a farm of computers running various platforms and browsers all networked up and running a screen-capture program that can respond to requests from a master server. you'd need a few pc's for the different versions of ie, a few macs, a linux box or two, and then a cross-platform client/server app that can take snapshots and post them to a web server. on the requesting side, you'd just put in your desired url/platform/browser/resolution/colordepth/etc and click submit. but that will only get you so far. a snapshot is valuable, yes, but it still tells you nothing about how any scripts run on that platform.4. March 21, 2002 11:04 AM
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Nate Posted…
Perhaps someone could create a "seti" like app that used various platform's down time to grab screenshots? You're right about not helping with scripts, but just having that resource for css layout alone would be invaluable.5. March 21, 2002 11:20 AM
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But yes, script testing would also be really valuable, but would add a prohibitive degree of complexity.
Nate, using distributed computing is a great idea. It's basically the same as the collaborative network idea, except removing the human effort. Other problems still remain, however: recruiting volunteers, especially for obscure platforms. It would also make it a much less responsive service. Most distributed computing hosts don't care how soon they get their data back, but a designer testing a particular page certainly will.
francois Posted…
Pup: You wouldn't need a different computer for every hardware platform; you'd run virtual machines (emulating other machines down to the hardware level) on a single machine. A server farm would be just a speed consideration.But yes, script testing would also be really valuable, but would add a prohibitive degree of complexity.
Nate, using distributed computing is a great idea. It's basically the same as the collaborative network idea, except removing the human effort. Other problems still remain, however: recruiting volunteers, especially for obscure platforms. It would also make it a much less responsive service. Most distributed computing hosts don't care how soon they get their data back, but a designer testing a particular page certainly will.
6. March 21, 2002 03:27 PM
7. March 22, 2002 02:44 PM
8. March 24, 2002 12:14 PM
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Thanks for the interesting feedback! It turns out there are a couple of services like these in existence: Of these, Netmechanic’s "Browser Photo" seems most comprehensive, testing a total of 16 different browser/platform combinations, and it claims to provide “Actual Photos, Not An Emulation”. They charge $135/year, or $15 for a one-off test. So I guess the next question is if anyone can offer a testimonial. I might try it sometime just out of curiousity, e.g. on aardvark’s character entity page. If I do I’ll report back here. (All of Anybrowser’s "compatibility" settings displayed the same entities that IE5.5 does.)
I have to admit my skepticism, though. Both Netmechanic and Anybrowser use the hype-ridden, obfuscatory language aimed at inexperienced developers (or their employers), a style familiar from those largely useless search engine-submission services (services both sites also offer). Dejavu seems closest to the style I’d prefer, but I don’t know how accurate its “emulations” are—they are appearing in your existing browser, after all.
Owen speaks for me too when he says this service ought to be sponsored by the browser companies who caused the whole mess. All of them need to offer “test site in previous versions of our product” on their websites. Not even Opera does this.
But anyway, taken with Dan’s point about cross-browser scripting, the moral of the story is simply to set up a good local testing station.
francois Posted…
If I may be permitted to cross-post the conclusion I put on my own site:Thanks for the interesting feedback! It turns out there are a couple of services like these in existence: Of these, Netmechanic’s "Browser Photo" seems most comprehensive, testing a total of 16 different browser/platform combinations, and it claims to provide “Actual Photos, Not An Emulation”. They charge $135/year, or $15 for a one-off test. So I guess the next question is if anyone can offer a testimonial. I might try it sometime just out of curiousity, e.g. on aardvark’s character entity page. If I do I’ll report back here. (All of Anybrowser’s "compatibility" settings displayed the same entities that IE5.5 does.)
I have to admit my skepticism, though. Both Netmechanic and Anybrowser use the hype-ridden, obfuscatory language aimed at inexperienced developers (or their employers), a style familiar from those largely useless search engine-submission services (services both sites also offer). Dejavu seems closest to the style I’d prefer, but I don’t know how accurate its “emulations” are—they are appearing in your existing browser, after all.
Owen speaks for me too when he says this service ought to be sponsored by the browser companies who caused the whole mess. All of them need to offer “test site in previous versions of our product” on their websites. Not even Opera does this.
But anyway, taken with Dan’s point about cross-browser scripting, the moral of the story is simply to set up a good local testing station.
9. March 25, 2002 01:04 AM
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Nate Posted…
Funny, I have been thinking about some sort of exchange system, where you can register and get "points" for submitting screenshots, which are then approved/denied. Points built up could then be exchanged for requesting rights.