Is graceful degradation in the absence of JavaScript still useful?

Question

When even mobile browsers have JavaScript, is it really necessary to consider potential script-free users?

Answer 1

If you don't want the page to work when Javascript is off then just have that be the message in html, and if javascript is on, by using unobtrusive javascript you can get rid of that message and make visible the rest of the application.

Depending on what you write for, in terms of javascript version, you may need to degrade if the browser the user has doesn't not have the latest version, so gracefully handling that is also important.

Answer 2

The real question is not whether it is relevant, but whether to use Graceful Degradation, or Progressive Enhancement as your scripting strategy.

Answer 3

It is relevant and it will be relevant even after 10-20 years when javascript might be supported everywhere. making things work without javascript is important development technique because it forces you to keep things simple and declarative. ideally javascript should be used only to enhance experience but your website shouldn't depend on it.

there is clear advantage from maintenance point of view to have most of the code in declarative format (html+css) and as little as possible in imperative (javascript).

Answer 4

My position:

I browse with NoScript, so if I come on your site it will be without benefit of Javascript. I don't expect the full user experience.

What I want, before turning on JS, is to be assured that you're reasonably competent and not malicious, and that I actually want what you're using JS for.

This means that, if you actually want me to use your site, you should allow me to look around, using links. (If I see a site that's totally useless without Javascript, I generally think the designers were incompetent.) You should let me know what sort of functionality I'll get from enabling Javascript, and you should present the site in a legitimate-seeming way.

I don't think that's too much to ask.

Answer 5

Yes. Your web pages aren't just consumed by people: they're consumed by search engines, and crawlers, and screenscrapers. Most of those automatic tools don't support Javascript, and essentially none are going to generate UI events or look at deeply nested AJAX data. You want to have a simple static HTML fallback, if nothing else then so that your web pages are well indexed by the search engines.

Forget the crazies who disable Javascript; think of the robots!

Answer 6

Yes, it's relevant. Mobile browsers in use today do not all have Javascript enabled. It's available on new phones, sure. But there are millions and millions of people like me, who have phones running older browsers, and for all of us, a JS-required browsing experience is just plain broken.

I don't even bother visiting sites that didn't have progressive enhancement in mind when they coded. I'm not technically behind the times. My phone is a year old. But I'm not going to re-up my contract and buy a new phone because of a crippled web experience.