Common client misconceptions about the web

I’ve been working in the web industry for a number of years, and in that time, have found a number of common client misconceptions about the web. In this article, I will aim to debunk some of these myths, and help to better educate clients and users of the web.

My website needs to look the same in every browser

This misconception originated many years ago, where there were only a few combinations of web browsers. With 5 main desktop browsers, with multiple versions across each one, this is almost possible to ensure, and this is made worse by the addition of mobile browsers in smartphones and tablets.

This results in a wide range of browsers, which all support different functionality. Most current generation browsers support features like rounded corners, shadows, gradients etc, but up to and including IE8 doesn’t support any of these.

Although the same effects could be achieved images (and this was done in the past), or a JavaScript based solution, this adds unnecessary page bloat and is less flexible. The alternate solution is to use progressive enhancement.

Modern browsers which support these features will display them, and older browsers won’t, but the page still functions the same.

Users don’t scroll

“The fold” refers to the point of a page which isn’t visible without scrolling. There is a common misconception that users can’t scroll, and therefore all the content needs to fit above this fold. This results in two problems:

1. It crowds the design and items lose priority, as white space and size are no longer available to prioritise content when everything is crammed above the fold
2. It actually discourages scrolling, where as having less above the fold encourages scrolling
3. “The fold” is not at a fixed point – It depends on the browser size, browser chrome and screen resolution. This means even if you try and fit everything above the fold as you see it, there will be someone who won’t see everything above the fold

Although there are some things you’d probably want to keep above the fold (navigation, branding etc), users do scroll, so no need to try and cram it all above the fold.

Free or open source software is inferior

There are several key reasons why people make this assumption, these include:

1. It wasn’t developed by a company, so the quality and security will suffer.
2. There is no “real” support available
3. There is no guarantee that it will still be around in 5 years’ time

These points are all based on the assumption that a single authority controlling a piece of software, platform or framework, but in reality, it’s often better to not have this. One of the most popular CMS’s, WordPress is open source and has a huge community, which develop, test and provide help with the platform. Help is decentralised via support forums, meaning anyone can help, so it’s often a lot quicker to get a reply. The large community also provide lots of guides and tutorials on how to use and develop for the platform.

In hope in this article I’ve helped to debunk some of the common myths and misconceptions, but I’ve only scratched the surface. Leave your misconceptions, or ones raised to you, in the comments.