Yesterday Microsoft posted on it’s support page a solution for the following problem: “Your Web site may not display correctly in Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1,” which has the following symptoms:

• Misaligned Web page layout
• Overlapping text or images
• JavaScript functionality issues and errors

There solution is simple. First, you need to verify that this is a IE8 specific problem by:

1. Opening IE8
2. Clicking the emulate IE7 button (which is not that great of an IE7 emulator)
3. Close IE8
4. Open IE8 back up.
5. Verify that the emulate IE7 button is checked
6. Navigate to the Website in question
7. Check to see if the problems are gone.
8. Click the emulate IE7 button
9. Close IE8
10. Open IE8
11. Verify that the emulate IE7 button is not checked
12. Navigate to the Website in question
13. Check to see if the problems are there again

In as little as 13 easy steps you can be certain that IE8 sucks and is the cause of your Websites not displaying correctly.

I know Microsoft only posts 6 steps but if you read carefully they cram two, three or four in one line to make it seem as 6 when it is really 13.

But, that’s ok. The steps are simple enough and at least they offer us a way to test in two of their browsers with out the need of different computers or the Multiple IE program. The problem is the solution they give for this issue: “To resolve these issues, Web site owners and administrators can add a meta-tag that tells Internet Explorer 8 to display an entire site or a specific page like Internet Explorer 7.” In other words: “Call your Web Developer and ask for a quote for adding a Meta Tag to all the pages in your Website. Please remember that your Web Developer may be going insane with several similar requests by all his clients who are experiencing the same problem.”

Some may say that I shouldn’t be complaining since this may result in more money thrown my way just to add a simple meta tag in a bunch of pages. Although I won’t argue that some more money may come my way, I already made clear the scenario most likely to happen on this post: More on the Meta Nightmare. So you don’t have to click on the link I’ll summarize it here for you: Some clients might understand and be ok with paying to get their websites updated for IE8 although they might not understand why a newer browser doesn’t work with their current website. Others, may need a little bit more time (time = money) for us to explain why this needs to happen and why they need to pay us and may decide to do it, keep the website as it is or, the one I’m scared about, go somewhere else thinking that their web developer doesn’t know what he’s doing since Microsoft is a Multi Billion dollar company and they must know what they are doing.

But let’s end the post in an optimistic mode. If this happens, if I loose a client because of this meta tag I’m pretty sure I could sue Microsoft for damages and then a lot of money may be thrown my way. Maybe I should revise my posts and praise the meta tag. Who knows, right?