CrossBrowserTesting.com: News, Info, and more...

New blog location

2009-09-05T14:39:00.003-05:00

We have moved our blog, check out http://crossbrowsertesting.com/blog.

Thanks!

Maintenance this Saturday 09/05/2009

2009-09-01T08:32:00.002-05:00

We will be down for maintenance on Saturday morning September 5, 2009 starting at 8:00 AM. We expect to be back up and running in a few hours.

Thanks.

Firefox 3.5 now available

2009-06-30T22:21:00.002-05:00

Firefox 3.5 was released today and we have added it to our XP and Vista configurations. We know that you can't wait to start testing. ;-)

You know that old story about a duck on the pond? Calm on top, paddling like heck underneath. You haven't been able to see a lot of the work we've been doing, but you will soon. We are adding a lot of new functionality and rolling out a new website. You know, one that doesn't look like programmers created it.

That is all for now, I need to get back to work if we are going to make our August release date.

Mike

IE8 and FF 3.1 Beta 3 now available

2009-03-22T17:00:00.002-05:00

I finally got Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox 3.1 beta 3 up today. Sorry for the wait. Guess I was too busy playing with Expression Web SuperPreview. Not!! It is ironic that the company whose products cause the most incompatibility has decided to build such a tool. Seems like the energy would have been better spent on making the browser more standards compliant. But what do I know?

Enjoy,
Mike

Our stimulus package

2009-02-16T00:59:00.003-06:00

We're not giving out billions of dollars, but we are rolling out some new features that we hope you will like. A lot of work has gone into enhancing the infrastructure to improve performance and stability. These changes are not necessarily visible except that they enable us to add other features.

For example, one thing you will notice when you launch a session is that you now have the ability to select a resolution before the session launches. Besides the obvious new capability of being able to test sites at the resolution you choose, this has the advantage of allowing you to control the performance of the session to some degree. The smaller the resolution, the more responsive the service will be. The changes that allow for this feature also give us the ability to automatically reconnect you if the applet has an error. Nice huh?

Another feature we hope you will like is the new Send Text feature. It is not exactly the same as cut and paste, but it will help you enter those long URLs a lot easier than before. Simply enter your text in the provided field and click the Send Text button. The remote session will then type in the text you sent into whatever text box has focus. We will also keep a copy of the text you enter so that you can access it in the future. It even has a nifty type ahead feature that lets you start typing and it will find matches from any part of a previous entry. Very cool, right?

Lastly, we'd like to mention to the handful of people out there that have opened up ports on your router, you will need to make some changes. You should not be using the static IP as it will be changing in the next couple of weeks, use www.crossbrowsertesting.com instead. Also, our port range is changing to 6020-6040.

That is all for this announcement. We just wanted to keep you all apprised of what we are working on and how we are trying to improve the service. As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please let us know.

Regards,
the CrossBrowserTesting team
P.S. When those stimulus checks do start rolling in, remember that we do have a great deal going on right now. ;-)

IE8 RC1 browser testing

2009-01-28T10:40:00.006-06:00

Microsoft's IE8 RC1 browser is now available on Windows XP and Vista for testing. RC1 stands for Release Candidate 1 - this is likely to be Microsoft's 'final cut' before the general release of IE8. Use this opportunity to check out your sites and correct any issues before the phone calls start coming in!

Look for the following configurations:

You can read more about IE8 RC1.

Thanks,
Ken

And the winner is...

2009-01-23T20:19:00.002-06:00

yudhiecavalera! If you are looking for some design work, we recommend contacting him. Don't keep him too busy though, we'll be needing some more from him.

We were not sure what to expect from the contest at 99designs.com, but we are glad we tried it. We got a nice logo an we can't wait to put it into use. The place could use a little sprucing up. ;-)

Mike

Help us 'Redirect' our image

2009-01-15T19:53:00.004-06:00

We are using 99designs.com to get some help creating a brand for our service. We are having a logo designed first and we hope to quickly follow that up with a website redesign.

If you are interested, the link is http://99designs.com/contests/16361. Since most of our users are designers, we are hoping that one or more of you will help us with establishing our brand and a new look. We hope to start a relationship with a designer and as I said, follow with a complete website overhall.

It isn't hard to tell that we are code monkeys and not designers. One indicator would be the way our site looks now (we butchered a really nice css template) and the other would be the fact we thought it was clever to say we are 'redirecting' our image with our $302 prize. For the less nerdy among you, a 302 is a server side redirect code. See, we need help (on sooo many levels).

So please help us out. We really would love for our users to help us shape the future of our site, both in functionality and form.

Mike

Future proof your site - Test the Windows 7 Beta and IE8!

2009-01-14T12:22:00.003-06:00

We have added a few instances of the Windows 7 Beta to our list of browser testing configurations. You can use this configuration to perform a browser test of your site with IE 8 beta while running on Windows 7.

We set the configurations up last night, and I will have to say the Windows 7 install was really nice - it seemed stable and quick. Overall, I have to think this Windows 7 release is going to be an improvement over Windows Vista. There is a slight artifact that is sometimes showing up on the vnc display - the bottom task bar is sometimes black. Moving your cursor over it corrects this issue.

We have created a slideshow of some of the Windows 7 and IE8 features - this slideshow uses our builtin slideshow creator. Here is a preview of it:

View a full sized version of this Windows 7 / IE8 tour

We are busy working on delivering automated screenshot capability across browsers to CrossBrowserTesting.com, but felt our users would like the opportunity to try out WIndows 7.

The CrossBrowserTesting.com Team

IE's demise makes "cross browser" even more important

2009-01-05T20:10:00.005-06:00

Here is a great article on SitePoint about how IE's decline is making crossbrowsertesting.com important for web developers.

As browser parity nears (at least in terms of user reach), cross browser and cross platform functionality is becoming more and more important.

Web developers will end up with more work for all of this of course. Which is why we came up with a site for browser testing in the first place (we are web developers!)
So when IE10 and Chrome4 are in heated competition and you need to test a web page we will be there!

first year for crossbrowsertesting.com

2009-01-01T21:51:00.002-06:00

Crossbrowsertesting.com started this year (in March really) because of a need that we had. We thought other people probably had the same problem: cross browser testing.

In the 9 months that we have been active, we have had just over 38,000 individual browser testing sessions run. During that same 9 months, we went from 3 users (us) to over 6,700 registered users!

In 2008 we added Macs, slideshows, snapshots to flickr and the ability to run your own local VNC client (my favorite).

The last thing we added was subscriptions and that has done really well.

What lies ahead should be interesting and hopefully exciting (at least as exciting as testing browser compatibility can be...).

As we continue to grow, we are grateful and happy that customers find our service useful.

Thanks!
from the crossbrowsertesting.com team

Two big announcements

2008-12-06T12:39:00.003-06:00

First, we are excited to offer a new subscription based pricing model for the frequent users of the service! The cost is $29.95 for the first month and then $19.95 a month thereafter. Don't worry, we will still be keeping the credit based model for the more casual users and the free option will also be available. This new pricing model will save frequent users even more over what similar services cost. It also allows you to easily budget your costs and provides convenient signup and cancellation through your existing Paypal account. There is no minimum signup term, no contract, you are free to cancel anytime. You now have even more control over your cross browser testing needs. Signup today and start saving! For more details, see our pricing page.

Second, we are equally excited to announce that we will be adding automated snapshots to our list of services! Simply type in your URL and well deliver an image of your website in any of our OS/Browser combinations that you choose. This service is not yet ready for use, but we wanted to let you know it was coming. Why? Because we have a special offer for you, our current users.

We are offering a price freeze to the first 100 people to signup for the new subscription service! That's right, if you signup today, your subscription price will be locked in when the new snapshot service comes online in the next 6 weeks. To help cover our costs with this new service, we will be raising the credit prices by roughly 25% and we will be raising the price of the subscription from $19.95 a month to $29.95 a month. We'll also be raising the initial month signup from $29.95 to $39.95. By locking in now, you'll be saving $120 a year or 33% over the new subscriber price. This is our way of saying thank you to the people that have helped us make the service what it is today.

We hope you are as excited as we are and as always, please let us know if you have any comments or questions.

Happy Holidays,
The CrossBrowserTesting.com team

use you own vnc client software at crossbrowsertesting

2008-11-30T15:56:00.005-06:00

Now you can use your own software installed on your own machine to work on crossbrowsertesting.com. You can still use the java applet if you choose.

The clients that we recommend for Windows is TightVNC. For Ubuntu it works great with Vinagre (the default). And for the macs we like Chicken of the VNC.

For it work you need to first start your client software on your machine then go to CrossBrowserTesting.com. Sign in a go to the 'My Account' page. Click on the red checkbox that says "Beta! Use local VNC Client instead of web based Applet" and then click on the launch button. Pick your session type and you will see an alert to remind you to start your local VNC client.

Now you will see an IP address, port and password that you will use in your local VNC client.

When you are done running you session remember to click on the Stop Session in the web browser window.

My main development machine is a somewhat slower Ubuntu box and the local client has made a *huge* difference in my performance. We think that performance for all platforms will be better with the local client. Check it out and see if you agree.

Screenshots and slideshows

2008-11-05T22:42:00.008-06:00

We have added to the site to make it easier for you to document the work you perform while using CrossBrowserTesting.com. As you know, a picture is worth a thousand words, so we have made taking snapshots easier and added the ability to create a presentation of several screenshots via a slideshow. Here are some of the new capabilities:

Hot key 'Alt+p' while in a testing session will take a snapshot. Sometimes, it is necessary to have the mouse over a certain element to show an interaction, and you would like to take a snapshot at that moment. Before, you had to move the mouse up to the snapshot button and ... you see the problem?!? Now, you can hit the 'Alt+p' (p for photo) key, sort of. The browser window has to have focus for this to work, not the java vnc remote desktop client. The easiest way to do this is to get the screen exactly where you want it, then click somewhere on the blue bar above the remote desktop - this will give the browser window the focus. You can then move the mouse over the element you wish to highlight. Press the 'Alt+p' key to capture a screenshot. If you click anywhere in the remote desktop window, it will have focus and the 'Alt+p' hotkey will not work.

You can now document your photos. Add a company name or project name to them, select or type in the browser or software you were using, and take your notes.

Usage screen shows list of photos. While viewing the history of sessions you have run, you can now see the number of screenshots you took for a particular testing session and drill down to those screenshots.

Slideshows. Ok, SLIDESHOWS!!! You can now produce a web based slideshow. There are several potential uses for this:
- Document all the issues with a site with the screenshots, then create a slideshow of them and send a link to the developer telling him to GET BUSY!
- Create a deliverable for your customer. If your contract for a web site specifies that you will insure it is cross browser compatible, create a slideshow showing the site with screenshots from multiple os's and browsers. Include a link to this slideshow as the proof that you have met this deliverable.
- Create a tour of your site, and embed it on your site. You can use the comments to discuss the benefits and flow of your site.
- Add slideshows to your portfolio demonstrating some of the work you have done for your client, and showing screenshots from a variety of browsers and operating systems. Let them know that you are a professional and thoroughly test the sites you build.

To create a slideshow, log in and scroll to the bottom of your my account page. You will see a 'Slideshow' area - hit Create Slideshows.

Here is an example of an embedded slideshow. You can hit the full screen button at the bottom right to make it larger. When creating screenshots, you have full control over the height and width.

Pick an OS - Pick a Browser - Test a Website at CrossBrowserTesting.com

We were already big fans of jQuery, but we used a bunch of jQuery's UI's components with this project to handle all the drag and drop functionality - these UI components are really becoming nice. The people working on that project are doing amazing work. Check it out at http://ui.jquery.com/.

Thanks,
Ken

Google Chrome arrives

2008-09-02T23:14:00.002-05:00

Well, Google apparently knew I had just finished updating the configurations to add IE8 beta 2 and Firefox 3 so they went and released a new browser on me. This is almost like having a job. Oh wait...

Anyway, Google Chrome is now installed on XP and Vista for all your testing needs.

Mike

IE8 beta 2 and FF3 now Available

2008-09-01T16:32:00.003-05:00

Internet Explorer 8 beta 2 and Firefox 3 are now available on XP and Vista configurations. There's not a lot of difference in the FF3 beta 4 and the final release, but it is there for your testing pleasure.

On the other hand, IE8 beta 2 might give you pause before installing it yourself. Especially if you've been reading about how it behaves with XP SP3. If you have IE8 beta 1 and SP3, IE8 can become permanently installed with no way to back out if you don't like it. You'll be able to upgrade, just not downgrade or remove it. Adding insult to injury, it is incompatible with several services and applications.

Fortunately for you, you don't have to take that risk. Just fire up one of our configurations and test away, safely insulated from any of those issues.

Rock on,
Mike
More details on IE8 Beta 2 here.

Mac OSX 10.5.4 Now in Beta!

2008-07-06T09:35:00.018-05:00

When is CrossBrowserTesting going to have Macs? Are you going to support Mac OSX? When are the macs coming? Will you ever support Safari on the Mac?

Ok, Ok, we get it. You want to be able to test your web sites on the Macintosh platform also. This by far has been one of the most requested additions to CrossBrowserTesting from you, our customers. We are eager to announce that Mac OSX 10.5.4 is now available as a Beta and ready for your testing!

This project has consumed our time and energy for the last 3 months. We had several goals for the project:
- Provide a consistent feel for launching the Mac configuration as we have for the other OSs
- Continue to provide unrestricted administrative access to the OS so you can install software, etc. Do not provide just a 'dumbed down' guest account, but full control.
- Have the configuration revert to a 'clean' configuration after each user, so your browser history is deleted and any changes to the OS are removed before the next user accesses the configuration.

These goals proved more challenging than we thought. Due to software licensing restrictions Apple places on running the Mac OS in virtualized environments, we had to get creative with our implementation. We were finally able to make it all work and deliver what you have been asking for. Though the technology is very different in the backend, we hope the user experience will be on par with our other configuration offerings. For instance, you have full control over the OS and are not locked into a limited user account. You also have the security of knowing that as soon as you log off, that session is destroyed and there is no trace of your session remaining for others to "snoop" through.

This is a Beta... we have numerous moving parts integrated to provide this solution, and we will be monitoring it closely to look for issues. We will try to resolve these as quickly as possible.

Thanks,
Ken, Mike, and Tony
CrossBrowserTesting.com

New Browsers Available

2008-06-22T02:22:00.001-05:00

We've added Firefox 3.0 and Opera 9.5 to several of our configurations. Enjoy!

Just the FAQs...

2008-04-29T20:03:00.002-05:00

If you haven't noticed, there's a new item in the menu bar now. We are starting to compile a list of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) regarding CrossBrowserTesting.com. As any of you who have used the Contact Us page know, we answer all of our mail with a personalized message. We also pay attention to the comments from the Feedback form at the end of a session and respond to those as well.

After reading enough of these messages, there were some things we noticed that were not clear to many of our users. This obviously means that we need to fix our site, but we thought putting up a FAQ wouldn't hurt either. So if you don't understand something, check the FAQ, you might get lucky. ;-) Otherwise, we are always happy to take your questions on the Contact Us page.

Hopefully, you'll also see some changes on several of the pages over the next weeks as we try to make things simpler and clearer.

Thanks for reading down this far,
Mike

AOL Explorer now available

2008-04-20T09:46:00.005-05:00

So you said you wanted Macs to test on right? You said you wanted faster response time right? So we delivered. We installed AOL Explorer as another browser for your testing. Huh?

Ok, we actually got a lot of requests to add the AOL browser, it was an obvious oversight on our part in the first place. So while all the smart developers are working on the first two items, I took some time yesterday to get AOL loaded on the WinXP configurations. This let the other developers concentrate on the Mac implementation while still letting you know that we are listening and that your comments do count. Besides, you can only play desktop tower defense or peggle for so long. (right)

I hope you find the new addition useful.

Mike

Record breaking day, Woohoo!

2008-04-12T09:35:00.004-05:00

We had a lot of people on the site yesterday. Being at the top of Hacker News didn't have anything to do with it I am sure. ;-) We answered a ton of feedback and questions and based on those clarified some of the wording on the site. It was a fun day for all of us. We also finally got Dugg and we are also getting traffic from many other big site like reddit, though I can't find a post on there. The reddit bug hasn't changed so I'm not sure what is going on with that. I am thankful for the traffic though. Stumbleupon is also throwing a lot of traffic our way and we were up to #4 most popular on de.licio.us for a while. Hacker News sent the most referrers by far though DZone was up there too.

Today is already shaping up to be another big day. Lots of people are on and we have had a lot of people sign up since I went to bed last night at 1:00 (when things finally seemed to slow down and there were no more emails to send).

Anyway, thanks to all of you who tried us out. Thanks for leaving feedback or asking questions if you did. Finally, thanks if you helped in getting the word out about our service, we really appreciate it!

Mike

browser breaks

2008-04-06T08:03:00.003-05:00

I saw this article on digg.com which lead me to the source.

I can verify that a lot of people are still testing IE6 (it was the top browser in our stats for the last 30 days).

No matter which browser you are having to support... you can always go to CrossBrowserTesting.com to make sense of it all.

Screenshots, Flickr, Mashups, Oh My!

2008-03-30T22:18:00.004-05:00

Our 'next big enhancement' to the site is officially out... well,officially out in beta - the ability to capture screenshots of your testing session.

We had several goals for this release:
- make it easy for you to document problems you see by taking a snapshot
- ability to annotate the snapshots, recording details about any issues
- make it easy for you to share this information with others on your team
- ability to put together 'proof sheets' showing that web site has been tested in multiple browsers and rendered correctly in all of them.

In looking at this, we wanted to have a really slick UI to manage the photos, add captions to them, etc - so we started looking at how the 'pros' do it at sites such as Flickr. In looking at Flickr - it had everything we needed... so, instead of writing code to duplicate their functionality, we mashed!

We you press the 'snapshot' button at the top of the testing console, a new window or tab will appear. You will have to login or create a Yahoo Flickr account, then authorize CrossBrowserTesting.com to have write permission to this account. The snapshots will be automatically loaded into your Flickr account, where you can label them, share them, and create really cool slideshows which showcase your work, and let everybody (particularly your customers) see that your sites are built to work across multiple browsers and configurations.

Here is an example a test of Digg.com across multiple browsers and operating systems:

Help Wanted: Evangelists on the cheap

2008-03-22T22:12:00.007-05:00

You may have noticed a new section added to the front page today. We now have a "Spread the Word" block to make it easy for you to help us get the word out about CrossBrowserTesting.com. If you happen to use one of the services in that block (or any others), please take a moment to post your opinion of our service (even if it isn't a glowing review, we'll take anything).

We've got some BIG things coming out. Oh I wish I could tell you. You won't have to wait long for the first, it should be in production in less than a week. Could be even just a couple of days. If I didn't think my partners would kill me for announcing it before it is ready I'd tell you.

Oh what the heck, it's mmmpph....

<signal terminated>

holy moly... someone posted us on to hacker news....

2008-03-22T00:48:00.002-05:00

Wow, we got posted on hacker news. That is really cool. And we did not even have to pay them or anything... :)