Web Design with HTML and CSS

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Tools to identify browser problems

Web Design with HTML and CSS Digital Classroom

Windows Virtual PC

Windows Virtual PC is Microsoft’s native virtualization tool that allows you to install one or

more virtual machines on your system. The process is fairly straightforward; however, you need

suffi cient system resources, such as hard-drive space and memory, to make this a viable option.

Browser compatibility applications

Software virtualization programs have many benefi ts, but they are better utilized for more

than just testing web browser. An alternative is to use a browser testing application or service

whose only job is to test web pages. Although the details diff er, the basic concept is the same:

to provide “snapshots” of your web pages in diff erent browsers.

Adobe BrowserLab

Adobe BrowserLab is an online service that you can use as a stand-alone product or in

conjunction with Adobe applications, such as Dreamweaver CS5. BrowserLab lets you

preview your page in a number of diff erent browsers and platforms, so you are not limited

to Mac or PC. The basic steps are to enter the URL of the page you would like to preview

to generate a screenshot of the page. Once the screenshot is generated, you can compare the

screenshots if you defi ne multiple browsers.

Adobe BrowserLab with a split view of Internet Explorer 6 on Windows XP (left) and Safari 3.0 on OS X (right).