Why do people/companies still use Internet Explorer?

On my full-time job, I was working on an app where I had to use the JavaScript includes() method.

The app was sent for UAT, manager applauded the effort of whole team.

After an hour, the user complained about not being able to submit a form.
I checked, it was working.
But the user was using the app on IE and it failed because the includes() method is not supported by IE and the default browser in that company is IE, so almost all of the users have to use IE and our app has to be compatible with it.

It was a quick fix, but the overall impression was negative.

We see and hear negative things about Internet Explorer, but still, it is being used, specially in corporate sector.

Did you face any such incident due to IE?

Comments

[tovare]

I think IE 11 is an industry-wide pain since it hasn't kept up to date in recent years, also, Microsoft's pledge to support it for the lifetime of Windows 10.

I recently surveyed 500 E11 users with a poll asking if they had other options, and I found that most users had a different browser already, about 7% borrowed a computer from a friend and 7% was locked in by their IT-department. I did have 20% in other reasons (which I didn´t explore, but I think since I exemplified such as Chrome/Edge/Firefox some users of other browsers like Opera might have selected that option. some in others had windows 8.1 but many with windows 10)

So, I think the answer for IE11 traffic is: Mostly happenstance and old computers. It will give some users some pain if you drop it completely.

The IE11-users was single out by triggering hotjar with

<script language="javascript">
if (window.msCrypto) {
    hj('trigger', 'ie11')
}
</scriipt>

[Mehmood]

Nice survey!

[Vikram Kadiam]

This is because of legacy applications which are built decades ago and they are still supported to avoid any potential disruption to business processes. Apart from that from my enterprise experience what I can see is many other factors also play a role for this legacy support like

1. IT of the company doesn't care about embracing change or new apps/features/technology due to the existing policies and company directions.It's a huge overhead to change any. 2.Legacy apps have to be supported till the business process is live. 3.Big companies have few tie ups with vendors and they provide few add on values in terms of softwares or licences to use certain apps for less cost than competitor in the market. 4.Mindset change ! i.e to embrace change which is mostly lacking in business users who actually use old software/apps. They just really don't care till it solves their purpose.

Only way to get out of this loop is companies like Microsoft/Google and others should come up with less LTS or provide free/less cost upgrade policies, then only change can happen.

In software industry everything is tied to money ! Things change only if doesn't cost you extra or you don't have an other option ;)

[Mehmood]

That's true, I guess we as developers have to be careful and take into account all the browsers before using any special method/function.