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HOUR 22:Test Twice,Publish Once: Professional Cross-Browser Testing with
SuperPreview
In addition, you have the option of packaging web pages for remote browser pre-
view. As the dialog states, this option ensures that sites running on intranets (inter-
nal networks) preview properly on the remote browsers. In layman’s terms, this
means if Packaging is checked, SuperPreview gathers all the relevant files for the
page in question and bundles them before sending them to the remote browser. This
is done because, on an internal network or intranet, you may have sites that use
assets from other internal network locations that will be unavailable for the external
browser. The bottom line is this: If you are working on intranet or internal network
sites, Packaging should be checked. If you are not working on such sites, but man-
age all of your assets locally, Packaging should remain unchecked.
Watch
Out!
A Broken External Browser Preview May Be Due to Lack of
Packaging
If you see a dramatic difference in the page preview from a local browser as
opposed to an external browser, such as missing images, missing text, or other
strange or broken elements, it is likely because the external browser could not
obtain these elements. If this happens, try checking Packaging in the
SuperPreview options and reload the page. More than likely, the external browser
preview will now show up properly.
Identifying, Diagnosing, and Solving
Cross-Browser Issues with
SuperPreview
By following the lessons in this book, you have created a fully working version of
the MyKipple.com site. If you followed my previous advice, you tested it against
your browsers at every step along the way, and you probably have a fairly good
idea of what, if any, cross-browser issues exist. However, that applies only to current
browsers. For older browser versions, such as Internet Explorer 6 and 7, you don’t
know unless you have a fairly advanced setup, or you have deliberately avoided
updating your browser for some time.
Now that the site is done, it is time to make sure it looks the same across all
browsers. To do so, open default.html in SuperPreview with Internet Explorer 9 as
the baseline browser and IE8, 8→7, 7, 6, Firefox, Safari for Mac, and Chrome,
respectively, as the testing browsers. As you can see from clicking through the differ-
ent testing browsers, and from Figure 22.19, a couple of elements look different
between the browsers: Depending on the browser, the sidebar is either next to the
content or the content appears below the sidebar. In addition, in IE6, everything
seems slightly shifted, and the transparency is gone.
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