Conditional comments
Written byPhuoc Nguyen
Created
06 Sep, 2022
Conditional comments have the same syntax as an HTML comment (
`<!-- -->`), but they only work on the Internet Explorer browser (IE).
Despite the fact that the technique isn't used on the web nowadays, I still keep it here to remind us of what we had to deal with many years ago.The content inside the comments are only available on IE 5-9, and are ignored by other browsers. In the older versions of IE, starting from IE 10, the syntax is disabled.
<!--[if IE]>Only IE sees this<![endif]-->You are able to add some constraint to restricts the IE versions, for example:
<!--[if IE 8]>Only IE 8 sees this<![endif]-->
<!--[if gte IE 8]>Only IE 8 and higher versions see this<![endif]-->
<!--[if lte IE 8]>Only IE 8 and lower versions see this<![endif]-->The special characters indicating the IE versions are listed as following:
| Character | Description |
|---|---|
`gt` | Greater than |
`gte` | Greater than or equal to |
`lt` | Less than |
`lte` | Less than or equal to |
You can apply styles or fixes for a given IE version such as
<link href="styles.css" rel="stylesheet" />
<!--[if IE 8]>
<link href="fix-ie8.css" rel="stylesheet" />
<![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 9]>
<link href="fix-ie9.css" rel="stylesheet" />
<![endif]-->The
`styles.css` file contains the styles working for modern browsers whereas `fix-ie8.css` and `fix-ie9.css` files provide the fixes for IE 8 and IE 9 respectively.Questions? 🙋
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Phước Nguyễn