Official site “No JavaScript” message

[Somebody]

Just installed the NoScript plugin for Firefox, and going through sites enabling them as I need to.

And got this message when I went to http://www.reddwarf.co.uk/ :

Welcome to the Red Dwarf web site.

To view this site, you will need a web browser able to run the JavaScript language.

To upgrade your browser, go to the Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape download pages.

Leaving aside the whole ethos of sites which Absolutely Require JavaScript… NETSCAPE? That’s been on life-support for years and they just finally announced they’re killing it off for good. (Plus, the other thing’s Windows Internet Explorer these days.

Topic

[Phil]

I wondered what happened to Netscape. Hmm.

[Jonathan Capps]

Well, obviously it’s just an old message. Surely it’s only recently been made out of date (i.e. in the last year)?

It’s definitely not worth bitching about TOS, anyway (not that I’m saying you are, Somebody) as if there’s one thing that came from that God-awful fuss with matt is that Andrew and co are aware of the limitations and intend to sort it out when they can.

On a side note, I’m actually *looking forward* to writing some boss non-intrusive JavaScript for my final uni project. It’s a nice challenge and very satisfying as it’s good to add some of the functionality JS provides, but there’s absolutely no reason a modern site should require it.

[Somebody]

It?s definitely not worth bitching about TOS, anyway (not that I?m saying you are, Somebody) as if there?s one thing that came from that God-awful fuss with matt is that Andrew and co are aware of the limitations and intend to sort it out when they can.

Yeah, I know (not least from that whole brou-ha-ha with “not here”) they can’t afford a new site, but was caught off-guard – according to the official Firefox Add-ons page, NoScript is the sixth most popular extension (and I think it’s been higher in the past). That means a chunk of people will see that message at least once, and they might just turn around and go away – It’s the only site since I installed it which out-and-out rejected me in whole or in part without turning JS on. People might start getting suspicious. Especially if they’re told to install Netscape ;)

On a side note, I?m actually *looking forward* to writing some boss non-intrusive JavaScript for my final uni project. It?s a nice challenge and very satisfying as it?s good to add some of the functionality JS provides, but there?s absolutely no reason a modern site should require it.

Yeah – 95%+ of major functionality (display, menus & other navigation, etc) can be done either completely without JavaScript, or with it as an enhancement to make things easier or prettier with an alternative non-JS route.

[Author]

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