WebFacing support for multiple browsers

Currently supported browsers

For the list of supported releases of Web browsers, refer to the detailed HATS system requirements from the HATS System Requirements .

Attention:

Unless client customizations are explicitly coded for multiple browser support, they might not work in Firefox. Avoid using functions only supported by a particular browser in your customizations; for example, using document.all() (an Internet Explorer function) in a customization would cause the application to fail when running it in a Firefox browser.

Differences in WebFacing behavior when running in Internet Explorer and Firefox

Different browsers can vary in how they present Web pages, affecting both behavior and rendering. The following list shows some differences in how WebFacing applications behave and are presented in Internet Explorer and Firefox.

• Closing WebFacing connections and session reuse:
  • When running WebFacing applications in the Firefox browser, closing of the browser window is not detected, and the WebFacing job continues to run.
  • Internet Explorer 8 or Firefox browser windows started from same shortcut share the same session. WebFacing allows only one connection per session and issues (by default) a WebFacing Session Reuse Error when multiple connections are detected. Expect this condition to occur more often in Firefox browsers unless you explicitly exit from your WebFacing applications.
• Rendering differences:
  • The layout of an HTML table might be rendered slightly differently from one browser to another.
  • The font of characters might be rendered differently from one browser to another.
  • In Firefox, invalid characters that appear as spaces, boxes, or not at all in Internet Explorer might appear as '?' or as hex values.
• In Internet Explorer, the cursor is positioned at the beginning of a filled input field. Since Firefox does not support overwrite mode, the cursor is positioned at the end of a filled input field.
• Formatted fields work differently in Internet Explorer and Firefox:
  • Initial caret position and html rendering in a date field:
    • In Internet Explorer, the caret appears at the beginning of the field and the month, day, and year characters are close together.
    • In Firefox, the caret follows the first character of the field and the month, day, and year characters appear to have spaces between them.
  • Character overwrite:
    • In Internet Explorer, when the caret is in the middle of an input field and you type a character, the typed character overwrites the next character in the field. Note: This is only if overwrite mode is on, which is the default for Web projects.
    • In Firefox, the caret does not change position, and no characters are changed. This is because Firefox only supports Insert mode.
  • Behavior of the caret when it is at the end of a field:
    • In Internet Explorer, typing a character, for example '4', with the cursor at the end of a filled EDTMSK segment causes tabbing to the next segment and overwrites its first character with '4'. If the next segment originally contained '00', it would now contain '40'.
    • In Firefox, typing the same character with the cursor at the end of a filled EDTMSK segment causes tabbing to the next segment and replaces the segment's entire contents with '4' in the previous example.
• WebFacing bidirectional support is not available in Firefox.