Comments about inline frames?

**jimhanus** · 26 August 2009, 09:57 AM

I've started using inline frames (iframe) a lot and find them to be quite useful. But I have some concerns about browser compatibility, having only read that some browsers may not support it or can be configured to not support it. Does anyone have experience in this matter? Why would a browser be configured to not support it? If it only affects much older browsers then I'm not going to worry about it. I've looked through w3.org specs but can't seem to find a definitive answer. Thanks!

**haakoo** · 26 August 2009, 10:05 AM

All major browsers support the iframe element.
Its indeed the older(way old) browsers or the "only text" browsers that do not support it.

Hans

**steve.ledger** · 26 August 2009, 10:07 AM

All modern browsers do support iframes Jim, a long time ago when <ilayer was introduced by Netscape, iframes (introduced by IE in the late ninties) were not fully supported right away.

Google even now gives you iframe code for embedding certain gadgets and google maps.

Although the iframe element is not supported in HTML 4.1 Strict DTD and in XHTML 1.0 Strict DTD, in practice and application they are all over the web.

The chances of this changing (that is, iframes being not supported anywhere) before you revamp any site you build today is next to none.

**covoxer** · 26 August 2009, 10:09 AM

Don't worry, all browsers staring somewhere in the IE4 era support inline frames perfectly.
They are enabled by default and I'm not aware of anyone disabling them for any reason.

edit: I'm getting slow at it.

**covoxer** · 26 August 2009, 10:15 AM

Originally Posted by sledger

Although the iframe element is not supported in HTML 4.1 Strict DTD and in XHTML 1.0 Strict DTD, in practice and application they are all over the web.

The chances of this changing (that is, iframes being not supported anywhere) before you revamp any site you build today is next to none.

Good point here Steve. The chances are actually none. All future browsers will have backward compatibility and surely will support XHTML Transitional which we use and which allows ifames. Besides, unlike some deprecated features of HTML, this one is so widely used that browser not supporting it would fail to gain any users interest as it would render most of the sites correctly.
This stands true for a very long time to come - we have probably well over a billion of iframe using sites on the web.

**jimhanus** · 26 August 2009, 10:41 AM

Thanks everyone. I've been concerned about using iframes since the FrontPage 97 era only because of the "your browser may not support it" message Microsoft includes with every iframe. The site I'm currently working on uses iframes on 4 different pages so thanks for the quick replies.

Jim

**haakoo** · 26 August 2009, 10:55 AM

And from what i gather is in the specs of html5 even the IFrame still present.
http://www.w3.org/TR/2009/WD-html5-diff-20090825/

Hans

**steve.ledger** · 26 August 2009, 11:29 AM

Originally Posted by jimhanus

I've been concerned about using iframes since the FrontPage 97 era only because of the "your browser may not support it" message Microsoft includes with every iframe.

This is because IE introduced <iframe in 1997 to oust <ilayer (which it did)
So in 1997 it was right that FP gave this message.

**slavelle** · 27 August 2009, 02:05 PM

And for those of you who may be concerned about how including things in iframes may affect the abilities to be searched, just keep in mind that if the content that is being pulled into your page is contained within the same domain/web hosting, it's fine. It's only when pulled from external sources and brought into your page that it is not searched. This is to prevent people from just iframing some popular website and sticking their ads on the side of it or something, I would guess.

Hope that adds something.