

Ask HN: Any stats on how many users browse your sites with javascript disabled? - doctorosdeck

Are there still valid reasons for browsing sites with javascript disabled?
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rmoriz
Please forgive me my near-off-topic answer:

Sure there are users out there without JS. There are still some IE6 users out
there. But in most cases you need just look at your target: If you build a
SaaS service you probably focus on the early adopters, first movers or
whatever you call them.

Old browser or obscure security settings are a niche. If your product focus on
that niche - great, consider it in your technical setup.

After attending a horrible freelance project as a ruby/rails guy in 2009 I
finally made a decision for all of my hopefully upcoming projects:

* focus on the early adopters who may understand your product without a big introduction. these people usually have the best and modern browsers available.

* optimize for Safari/Mac, Firefox and maybe Chrome

* optimize only for iPhone

* __forget the rest until you have 100 paying customers. Then decide again __. (100 is just a number, maybe 50, maybe 1000 — you decided)

BUT: If you know _for sure_ , that most of your taget customers are using
IE6/have no javascript support/whatever: Support it. But I doubt it.

And don't think that your startup will have the same % amounts of
browsers/settings like the big sites on the web. Also keep in mind that people
need to be able and willing to spend money. I can imagine someone without
javascript and cookies will never (be able to) enter her/his payment
information over the web into a form.

They'll be very conservative and in my opinion it's not worth the time to try
to "convert" them.

TL;DR

Try to focus the easiest reachable solution only. Know your potential
customer's setup. Be selective.

~~~
_delirium
My guess (though no stats) is that a decent proportion of the early-
adopter/techie crowd actually has JS purposely off, via an extension like
NoScript. Probably a bigger proportion than among "normal" people, though I
assume still a smallish minority.

~~~
prodigal_erik
This, exactly. Don't assume I can't fill out a js-only form. I will if I
decide to trust you. But I'm not likely to, when you have just demonstrated a
lack of web authoring competence. In fact seeing who knows what they're doing
is part of why I don't leave js enabled.

------
pw
To channel patio11: any stats on how many users have no idea what JavaScript
is, let alone how to disable it?

Sorry for the slightly flippant response (but thank you to patio11 for
training me to think that way). I just couldn't help myself, since you phrased
it as 'disabled' rather than 'not JavaScript capable'. In regards to the
latter, you might find this StackOverflow post useful:
[http://stackoverflow.com/questions/121108/how-many-people-
di...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/121108/how-many-people-disable-
javascript)

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Travis
I don't have many stats, but I believe some IT installations (where the
browser is supposed to connect only to intranet sites) will severely restrict
the allowed use of JS.

Also, I've had JS randomly break in firefox sometimes, and it doesn't get
turned back on until the next install.

I think graceful degradation is still the key word here. Not just because it
will allow non-JS users to access your site, but also because it helps force
you to realize the semantic separation of the HTML versus JS layers.

------
mike-cardwell
Valid reasons? You mean other than to defend against the constant barrage of
high profile XSS vulnerabilities reported to exist on large numbers of major
websites?

~~~
doctorosdeck
I suppose. I never do any developing with javascript so I don't really have
any first hand experience for people not using it.

------
clausaugusti
I'm working for one of the world's biggest web hosting companies. The
percentage of users accessing our pages with JavaScript disabled is around
0.2%. Couple years ago, it was around 1%. I assume this number might not be
correct for all target groups (naturally, ours is rather tech affine).

And for your question: Personally, I wouldn't support non-JS users for most
cases at all. There are security reasons to switch it off, but I hardly see
any aspect of life where you get 100% security. JavaScript is an essential
part of the web, if someone has a problem with that: don't surf and don't
expect me to emulate things that I can solve easily in the client on the
server (if at all possible).

------
joe_bleau
I only enable js on sites I trust, and only when needed.

~~~
markstahler
I used to do this a year or two ago but nowadays 90% of sites dont work
properly without javascript. Is your whitelist so big that you dont notice it
anymore?

~~~
joe_bleau
Not really. I run Opera (or as my co-workers pronounce it, Oprah), so it's F12
and a click to turn JS or cookies on if a site doesn't seem quite right.

