How to add websites to Internet Explorer 11's Compatbility List

[nerd rating: 3 out of 5 pocket protectors ]

Microsoft has recently released Internet Explorer 11 for Windows 7.    There have been a lot

of good reviews of IE11 under the Windows 8 environment.   Microsoft has made some vast improvements to their flagship browser that makes it much more compatible with CSS and HTML5.   In fact, many of the benchmark scores for IE11 show it runs faster and is using fewer resources than Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox. 

This post is not intended to be a review of IE11.   Personally, I have been quite impressed by a lot of things with IE11, but unsatisfied with other things.   Maybe one day, I will write my personal review of IE11...probably right around when IE12 is getting released. 

Rather, this post is intended to help with the biggest problem I am seeing with IE11 and that is accessing older sites that require earlier versions of Internet Explorer.  

There are many sites my clients are using that are not compatible with IE11.  Now, whether that has something to do with the technology required by the website or simply the fact the USERAGENT information in IE11 no longer reports that it is Internet Explorer, I don't know.   What I do know is there are plenty of site my clients can't get to using IE11 natively.    



IE11's new UserAgent string.   What happened to MSIE?

However, it is pretty easy to get your old site viewable in IE11.   All you usually have to do is add your site to the IE Compatibility List.  Here is how you would do that:
 

(1) Open up Internet Explorer and navigate to the website you are having trouble viewing in IE. 

(2) Click on the TOOLS icon in the upper left hand corner of IE.   This icons appears as a 'gear':

 

(3) Choose Compatibility View Settings:

 

(4) If it is not already populate in the input box, type the URL of your website in the input box that reads "ADD THIS SITE"  and then press ADD.

 

(5) The site should now appear in the list of websites that will open in compatibility mode.   Choose CLOSE and refresh your page to see if you can now view the site properly.

A great test for me was to use log into blogger.com.   When I tried to log into my account to create this post, I received this error message:

 

After adding blogger.com to IE's compatibility list, I can now open it with no errors.   Hopefully, this will help alleviate a bit of frustration when dealing with IE11.  If you have any problems or questions, please contact us here at Binkley IT Consulting.   We can help!

 

 

How to add an image to your email signature on the iPhone or Office365 Outlook Web App

[nerd scale:2 out of 5 pocket protectors]

 

I have received a lot of questions recently about how to add images to email signatures on the iPhone and the Outlook Web App.   So, I figured I would use this week's blog to show you how you can accomplish this:

 

Outlook Web App:

 

-There may be other ways to do this, but this is the way I stumbled upon.

 

(1) First, you need to be able to access the image you want to add from a web browser.  Since we all have websites, it should be easy enough to upload you picture to your images directory of your website.   Once uploaded, make sure you can view the image by using a web browser to navigate to the image's URL.   My test image has been placed at http://www.binkleyit.com/images/eatup.png

 

This is what the image looks like:

 

 

 

(2) From within your web browser, right click on the image and choose COPY

(3) Log into your Outlook Web App.  The default URL is https://outlook.office365.com.  Navigate to the Gear Icon | Options | Settings

 

(3) Within the email signature text area, press CTRL+V to copy the image into your email signature:

 

 

(4) Check the box the reads 'Automatically include my signature on messages I send' and then click the SAVE button and you should be good to go!

 

 

(5) Now when you create a new email using the Outlook Web App, your signature should appear:

 

 

 

 

iPhone:
- I tested this on an iPhone 5 and iPad2, both running iOS7.

(1) Make sure your email account is already set up on your iPhone, and then email yourself the image you are wanting to use for your signature.


(2) On your iPhone, find the email you just sent yourself.   It should contain the image.  Initiate an email forward of this email.   You won't be sending it to anyone.  Scroll down the email until you see your image.   Press the screen until you can choose SELECT to select the image:

 

Once the image is selected, choose COPY:

 

 

Once the image is copied, navigate to SETTING | Mail, Contacts, Calendars | SIGNATURE

 

If you have multiple email accounts, you may want to change the Signature setting from ALL ACCOUNTS to PER ACCOUNT

 

 

Scroll to the account you wish to set up the new signature.   Add the appropriate text information and then press the screen until you receive the option to PASTE the copied picture into the signature:

 

 

The image should get pasted into the signature:

 

 

 

 

 

(3) Navigate back to your email and create a new email to verify your signature is appearing correctly:

 

 

 

That's it!  Not too difficult, but if you have any problems or questions contact Binkley IT Consulting.  We can help.