294953 - activeworlds.com - AutoInstall requires IE3+ or Netscape 4+ but doesn't work in Firefox 1.0

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Tech Evangelism Graveyard :: English US, defect)

Description

[Neil Young]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.8) Gecko/20050511 Firefox/1.0.4
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.8) Gecko/20050511 Firefox/1.0.4

I visited http://www.activeworlds.com and followed all links to Launch their
Free Plugin and I get a popup window saying "AutoInstall requires IE3+ or
Netscape 4+"  This window really should work in my browser (it being the
equivalent of Netscape 7 and therefore compatible according to that message) the
site works fine on IE6 (although there are security warnings on my version as I
have Service Pack 2 installed)

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Visit http://www.activeworlds.com
2. Click Launch the plugin (for example)


Actual Results:  
A window pops up saying AutoInstall requires IE3+ or Netscape 4+

Expected Results:  
A window should popup and a plugin be downloaded and installed (IE installs an
ActiveX control)

Comment 1

[djpohly]

More than likely Tech Evangelism.

Comment 2

[Chris Lawson (gone)]

There are a couple issues here.

1) "Netscape 4+" doesn't always mean that browsers after Netscape 4.x will work. It's quite possible the site's software (by which I mean the plug-in they're offering for download) truly is not compatible with later versions of Netscape or the various Gecko-based browsers. Neil, you should download the software using their direct link

http://objects.activeworlds.com/downloads/awb41.exe

and see if it works if you manually install it.

2) The "expected results" says "IE installs an ActiveX control". ActiveX is not compatible with any browsers other than IE, and if their plug-in is written in ActiveX, there's not a lot that can be done about it.

I doubt this site has enough users for a Tech Evangelism effort along those lines to be worthwhile, an opinion supported by the facts that no other bugs have been filed on this site since and the site doesn't seem to have made any effort to be more compatible with Firefox or any other browser in the last three years.

Now, if the software works fine with Firefox via a manual installation, that's a different kettle of fish. Then we just need to educate them as to how they can make the auto-install work for Firefox. Neil, if you could try that out, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Comment 3

[Chris Lawson (gone)]

Absent any response from the reporter, INCOMPLETE.