internet explorer - Why do some IE10 browsers get stuck in IE7 mode?

29
2014-01
  • Patrick M

    We were doing some investigation into user sessions on our consumer facing sites and came across something that really disturbed me.

    On an average day, we have ~140k visitors to our sites who bother sending in a user agent string (most bots and crawlers who identify themselves don't get their session information recorded, so the vast majority of this is real people).

    • Around 45000 of these are Windows 7 (UA contains 'NT 6.2'), about 4000 of which say the browser is IE7.

    • Around 5000 of the total are Windows 8 (UA contains 'NT 6.2').

    • Around 200 of those Windows 8 user sessions say they're running IE7!

    Now, Windows 7 originally shipped with IE8, and you cannot install IE7. Windows 8 came with IE10 and you cannot install IE7.

    I know how this can happen; in IE9 and IE10, either of these can cause the browser to behave and identify as a different version.

    • The user manually changes the browser mode via developer tools. (Highly unlikely that 4% of our users even know what developer tools are, let alone regularly toggle the browser mode.)
    • The user goes to the Tools → Compatibility View dialog and checks the "Dispaly all websites in compatibility mode" checkbox.

    The question is: Why??!

    The only possible explanation I have for an ordinary user willfully carrying out this abomination is that some external authority figure told them to do or did it for them: a systems admin did it for handling the stereotypically crappy business intranet/portal site or some 3rd party website they regularly visit and depend upon (a bank? perish the thought) popped up a page saying they would have to take the following, totally secure steps to consume their awesome application.

    Even with that totally plausible scenario in mind, 10 and 4 percent for Win7 & Win8 users respectively seems terribly high.

    Is there some other process, like an internal help or troubleshooting prompt that IE itself makes, to tell the user to permanently enable compatibility mode? Is there some other way that IE can automatically change this setting? My curiosity is killing me on this one.

    • Answers
  • techie007

    Ensure your pages implement a proper X-UA Compatibility Meta Tag.

    Something like <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=7" /> might be causing what you're seeing.

    Some related info over on StackOverflow: How to force IE10 to render page in IE9 document mode

    Additionally, IE's compatibility modes can be forced by domain policies, so the users have no control over it.


    • Related Question

    compatibility - Why does IE9 not work right on some sites?
  • oscilatingcretin

    I really love IE9. Where performance is concerned, it is to prior versions of IE what Windows 7 is to prior versions of windows.

    However, it acts all glitchy on certain sites unless you go to compatibility mode. For example, on these StackEchange sites, I have to go into compatibility mode to mark something as an answer. On Facebook, when I click the comment link on someone's post, it doesn't set focus to the textarea element on the page. I am also a web developer and have been introduced to a host of browser issues with IE9 in regards to our third-party web development tools. These are just some examples.

    My theory is that IE9 is actually doing things correctly now -- at least more correctly -- and all the IE9 hacks that developers have had to implement on their sites to get IE to work right are now breaking. It might seem like a stretch to think that Microsoft have finished doing things their own way, but perhaps they've finally got the message?

    Anyway, what's up with IE9's odd behavior on some sites now? Anyone else notice these issues?


    • Related Answers
  • ta.speot.is

    Question:

    (What's) up with IE9's odd behavior on some sites now?

    Meet answer:

    all the (IE) hacks that developers have had to implement on their sites to get IE to work right are now breaking

    I've noticed this too. Unfortunately I think you'll just need to sit it out until IE6/7/8 die out and we get more standards compliant sites without the <!-- LT IE7 --> markup or whatever it is.

    This isn't a fix to your problem, but I was a heavy IE user/supporter up until about Chrome 5. I understand that IE9 has some nice features that Chrome doesn't (stronger jumplist support, pin websites to the taskbar) and I want to like IE9... but Chrome is just so much faster.

    Give it a shot.