I’m pretty convinced that a country with an annual military spend of almost three quarters of a trillion dollars can afford to QA their web services in at least the latest versions of the five major browsers(1). Anything less might be seen as corporate favouritism.
(1) Chrome, Firefox, Edge (so Chrome), Safari, and Opera (so also fucking Chrome, apparently) were the five I’m thinking of but I’m open to persuasion if anyone’s got a better list
Obviously, but that is a self-reinforcing loop. I’m not suggesting that government websites drive the most traffic or anything, but the government is kind of special as an entity. In several other areas the US government is bound to show no preferential treatment to vendors or other entities, such as in public broadcast TV or awarding government contracts. I don’t think “internet browsing software” is one such covered area, but forcing people to use one browser to access their websites is pretty equivalent in this day and age, so if they drop support for Firefox a lawsuit might change that.
My point with the money is that a whole team of highly skilled QA professionals isn’t even a rounding error on that kind of balance sheet, but thinking about it further there’s a solid argument to be made that supporting a variety of web browsers for government web services is in the interest of national security. In that case they could pull the money from the military budget for the project.
I’m pretty convinced that a country with an annual military spend of almost three quarters of a trillion dollars can afford to QA their web services in at least the latest versions of the five major browsers(1). Anything less might be seen as corporate favouritism.
(1) Chrome, Firefox, Edge (so Chrome), Safari, and Opera (so also fucking Chrome, apparently) were the five I’m thinking of but I’m open to persuasion if anyone’s got a better list
Even Opera is now Chrome…
And the last reason to even consider using it goes out the window 🙄 Thanks for the heads-up.
Bold of you to assume there’s QA happening on govt UIs.
I don’t think the issue is if it can afford it. The question is what constitutes a major browser.
Obviously, but that is a self-reinforcing loop. I’m not suggesting that government websites drive the most traffic or anything, but the government is kind of special as an entity. In several other areas the US government is bound to show no preferential treatment to vendors or other entities, such as in public broadcast TV or awarding government contracts. I don’t think “internet browsing software” is one such covered area, but forcing people to use one browser to access their websites is pretty equivalent in this day and age, so if they drop support for Firefox a lawsuit might change that.
My point with the money is that a whole team of highly skilled QA professionals isn’t even a rounding error on that kind of balance sheet, but thinking about it further there’s a solid argument to be made that supporting a variety of web browsers for government web services is in the interest of national security. In that case they could pull the money from the military budget for the project.