It's not the governments fault...

The problem is not with the government failing to provide support for multiple operating systems / browsers, but a lack of compatibility amongst them.

It would be more efficent if, across the whole of the internet, the browsers would all responsed the same way to the same code, rather than have to make different versions of web pages for different browsers.

Or is that stating the bleeding obvious?

Eagle Down

The point that i think several people are missing is that the debate was not about oss or event about open standards its about illegal state aid, ie your and my tax pounds being used to prefer one supplier. Where government preferences a platform that people must use (and it does it repeatedly and systematically without realising it) they are distorting the market and not in a little way, look at the consequences of doing that EU vs MS (interoperability and preferencing platforms by bundling media players). This is the charge the minister refused to answer.

It is the bleeding obvious...

@Peter Ingram

It is the bleeding obvious but you have to blame M$ for producing a browser that you have to code differently for. Mozilla is pretty standards compliant - not 100% but good. But when it comes to IE, you HAVE to do things the MS way.

Most decent web developers spend 20% of their time making a nice website that works properly for browsers and 80% of the time making it work in IE

@Anonymous coward: its worse than that - it has nothing to do with OS platform - I run Firefox under windows and STILL can't use most of these sites. I'm having a long-running argument with my bank as they insist Firefox isn't secure enough to use on their website and I insist back that IE isn't secure enough for me to trust it on their site.

NHS Choose and Book

I don't give a damn about the technicalities. All I know is I can't book a hospital appointment because the "choose and book" site tells me: "We are sorry, but the web browser you are using is not compatible with the online Choose and Book service." Yeah, thanks, so which browser IS compatible? (It doesn't say. I've tried Safari and Firefox so far).

Try it yourself: www.chooseandbook.nhs.uk/patients

Click on: Book or change your appointment online now

There's a telephone number offered instead. Thanks a bunch. If I could use a telephone, I wouldn't need to see the audiologist! Thank God I don't have a life-threatening illness.

Sam