I'm running into a weird issue that I'm struggling to figure out what's causing the page to break. I have an internal website that's still under development (thus no link to the page) that works great in Firefox and Internet Explorer 8 in IE 7 Standards mode. But when I force it to IE 8 Standards mode the page will only display the title text in the browser tab and an otherwise completely blank page. It seems so broken that the blank page doesn't even have a context menu.
The page generally looks like this:
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta content="IE=8" http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" />
<title>Page Title</title>
<link rel="shortcut icon" href="/Images/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon" />
<link href="/Style/main.less" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
</head>
<body>
<div id="header">
<span id="logindisplay">[ <a href="/Account/LogOn">Log On</a> ]</span>
</div>
<div class="colmask threecol">
<div class="colmid">
<div class="colleft">
<div class="col1">
<div id="title">
<h1>APP TITLE</h1>
</div>
<div class="logo">
<img alt="Application" src="/Images/info.png" title="Application" />
</div>
<div>
<div id="company">Offered by: <span>Company Name</span>
</div>
<div id="version">Version: 0.0.0.0</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="col2">
<div id="menucontainer">
<ul id="menu">
<li>
<a href="/Module1" class="ciApp">
<img alt="module" height="84px" src="/Images/Module1.png" title="module" />
<span>Module</span>
</a>
</li>
</ul>
</div>
</div>
<div class="col3">
<div id="newsfeed">
<span class="welcomemessage">Welcome to <b>Application</b>
</span>
<div>
<span class="newsLabel">New Features</span>
<div class="newFeatures">
<p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Morbi egestas condimentum laoreet. Curabitur urna elit, sagittis vel condimentum sit amet, ullamcorper suscipit diam. Suspendisse non ligula metus, nec ultricies libero. Vestibulum molestie ornare urna, eu posuere ipsum lacinia nec. Nulla facilisi. Curabitur elit ligula, laoreet nec vehicula at, ornare sed metus. Suspendisse gravida mattis vulputate. Class aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos himenaeos. Integer rutrum erat sed lacus eleifend et dapibus nisi mollis. Nulla elementum lacus quis mauris pulvinar in accumsan odio malesuada. Aliquam ultrices, mauris sit amet pharetra euismod, nisi nunc rhoncus est, eu commodo nunc sem vitae risus. Ut egestas ligula eu elit blandit consequat. Donec nunc justo, congue non mollis at, porta non massa.</p>
<p>Pellentesque consequat fermentum sapien at dictum. In pretium varius tellus, vitae blandit sapien cursus quis. Suspendisse potenti. Sed sollicitudin tempus elit et sodales. Vestibulum fringilla tempus elit, vitae convallis massa laoreet vel. Nulla facilisi. Duis dolor leo, lacinia ut ultrices eu, mollis in purus. Donec sagittis, est id tincidunt pulvinar, magna metus pellentesque nunc, eget tincidunt metus tellus sollicitudin tortor. Donec quis convallis nibh. In luctus, ipsum non sodales ornare, mi lectus molestie orci, id dignissim tellus augue at neque.</p>
<p>Phasellus ut molestie leo. Donec egestas odio ut felis lacinia ut interdum diam interdum. Fusce at posuere tortor. Vestibulum cursus elit quis purus porta vitae adipiscing nulla laoreet. Nam pretium orci a sem volutpat nec rhoncus magna viverra. Aenean non orci sapien. Nunc hendrerit sollicitudin lorem viverra porta. Pellentesque ac porttitor elit. Mauris risus sem, dapibus eu convallis vel, posuere in nibh. Phasellus sit amet tortor neque, aliquam volutpat massa. Sed quam libero, porttitor a lacinia in, pellentesque in libero. Suspendisse adipiscing laoreet lacus, eget fringilla felis tristique id. Maecenas lacinia, ante a vulputate gravida, felis libero hendrerit dolor, non tristique ante massa vitae leo. Aenean laoreet porta urna ullamcorper facilisis.</p>
<p>Nam a ligula a quam interdum ultricies. Suspendisse tempor pellentesque augue at sollicitudin. Sed vulputate, erat mollis fringilla rhoncus, nulla quam ullamcorper lacus, vel molestie metus ipsum quis eros. Fusce eget turpis tortor, viverra volutpat leo. Vestibulum in augue in augue fringilla volutpat sed eu purus. Ut varius lacus eget orci consequat eget tincidunt mi placerat. Donec suscipit suscipit enim, eget iaculis diam pellentesque in. Cras ac ante et lorem porttitor consectetur. Maecenas semper posuere magna. Aliquam erat volutpat. Sed at ante feugiat lectus hendrerit semper et ut elit. Aenean scelerisque fermentum justo, at blandit risus interdum eget. Donec a nulla pellentesque erat volutpat gravida. Nunc mattis est ac dolor dapibus viverra. Nulla facilisi.</p>
<p>Donec diam neque, lobortis quis aliquam nec, fermentum ac quam. Cras porta nisi sed massa pellentesque vitae luctus erat porttitor. Sed porta elit ac ligula semper eget volutpat purus adipiscing. Mauris aliquet convallis consectetur. Aliquam vel neque sit amet odio dapibus feugiat. Morbi vehicula porttitor cursus. Cum sociis natoque penatibus et magnis dis parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus. Quisque ut augue at tellus iaculis fringilla ut at enim. Ut sed lorem nunc. Aliquam ac accumsan eros. Fusce faucibus, lacus in convallis commodo, turpis nisi gravida ligula, sit amet semper odio ante sit amet lorem. Integer mollis, nibh vel malesuada imperdiet, purus justo ullamcorper ipsum, sed volutpat velit dui eget felis. Quisque sapien ante, dapibus quis malesuada ultrices, tincidunt id nibh. </p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div id="footer">
</div>
</body>
</html>
You may notice the .less extension for the stylesheet. This is an ASP.NET MVC application and I'm making use of DotLess. I have the HttpHandler hooked up for it in the web.config. Of course there's some additional info on the page, but (in theory) it shouldn't be causing this issue. I've run the CSS and the HTML through the W3C validators and both have come back as completely valid. I'm trying the arduous task of removing/re-adding elements until it displays, but any insight into what could cause this would help.
EDIT: it appears to be something related to the DotLess stylesheet. The resulting CSS is valid according to the W3C CSS validator.
EDIT 2: Digging further, and making use of IE's Developer Tools to control the styles, it appears that IE is reading a single statement twice even though it only occurs once in the output. Here's the output of the Less file:
a, abbr, acronym, address, applet, b, big, caption, center, cite, code, dd, dfn, div, dl, dt, em, fieldset, font, form, html, i, iframe, img, kbd, label, legend, li, object, pre, s, samp, small, span, strike, strong, sub, sup, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, var {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
font-size: 100%;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
}
blockquote, q {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
font-size: 100%;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
quotes: none;
}
body {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
font-size: 100%;
vertical-align: baseline;
line-height: 1;
width: 100%;
background: #efebde;
min-width: 600px;
}
del {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
font-size: 100%;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
text-decoration: line-through;
}
h1 {
border: 0;
outline: 0;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
font-size: 2em;
margin: .8em 0 .2em 0;
padding: 0;
}
h2 {
border: 0;
outline: 0;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
font-size: 1.8em;
margin: .8em 0 .2em 0;
padding: 0;
}
h3 {
border: 0;
outline: 0;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
font-size: 1.6em;
margin: .8em 0 .2em 0;
padding: 0;
}
h4 {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
font-size: 1.4em;
}
h5 {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
font-size: 1.2em;
}
h6 {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
font-size: 1em;
}
ins {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
font-size: 100%;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
text-decoration: none;
}
ol, ul {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
font-size: 100%;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
list-style: none;
}
p {
border: 0;
outline: 0;
font-size: 100%;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
margin: .4em 0 .8em 0;
padding: 0;
}
table {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
border: 0;
outline: 0;
font-size: 100%;
vertical-align: baseline;
background: transparent;
border-collapse: collapse;
border-spacing: 0;
}
blockquote:before, blockquote:after, q:before, q:after { content: none; }
:focus { outline: 0; }
.bold { font-weight: bold; }
.systemFont { font-family: Arial; }
.labelled { font-style: italic; }
.groovedBorder {
border-color: #adaa9c;
border-style: groove;
border-width: medium;
}
#header, #footer {
clear: both;
float: left;
width: 100%;
}
#header p, #header h1, #header h2 {
padding: .4em 15px 0 15px;
margin: 0;
}
#header ul {
clear: left;
float: left;
width: 100%;
list-style: none;
margin: 10px 0 0 0;
padding: 0;
}
#header ul li {
display: inline;
list-style: none;
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
}
#header ul li a {
background: #eeeeee;
display: block;
float: left;
left: 15px;
line-height: 1.3em;
margin: 0 0 0 1px;
padding: 3px 10px;
position: relative;
text-align: center;
text-decoration: none;
}
#header ul li a span { display: block; }
#header ul li a:hover { background: #336699; }
#header ul li a.active, #header ul li a.active:hover {
background: black;
font-weight: bold;
}
#header #logindisplay {
float: right;
padding-top: .5em;
padding-bottom: .5em;
padding-right: 1em;
padding-left: 1em;
}
#title h1 {
font-family: Arial;
font-style: italic;
font-size: 175%;
text-align: center;
margin-top: 1%;
}
.col1 {
font-family: Arial;
border-color: #adaa9c;
border-style: groove;
border-width: medium;
min-height: 350px;
float: left;
overflow: hidden;
position: relative;
padding-top: 0;
padding-bottom: 1em;
padding-left: 0;
padding-right: 0;
}
.col1 div.logo { text-align: center; }
.col3 {
font-family: Arial;
border-color: #adaa9c;
border-style: groove;
border-width: medium;
float: left;
overflow: hidden;
position: relative;
}
#layoutdims {
clear: both;
background: #eeeeee;
margin: 0;
padding: 6px 15px !important;
text-align: right;
}
#company {
padding-left: 10px;
padding-top: 10px;
margin: 0;
}
#company span {
display: block;
padding-left: 1em;
}
#version {
padding-right: 1em;
padding-top: 1em;
text-align: center;
}
#menu li {
padding: 6px;
border-color: #adaa9c;
border-style: groove;
border-width: medium;
min-width: 108px;
}
#menu li a.ciApp {
text-decoration: none;
font-size: 112.5%;
font-weight: bold;
font-family: Arial;
color: black;
}
#menu li a.ciApp span { vertical-align: top; }
.welcomemessage { font-size: 60.95%; }
.newFeatures {
overflow-y: scroll;
max-height: 300px;
}
#newsfeed div .newsLabel {
color: red;
font-size: 60.95%;
font-style: italic;
}
/**************************************************************************************
This statement appears twice in Developer Tools. Disabling one disables both. Disabling it also causes the page to render. Turning it on and the page disappears again
**************************************************************************************/
#newsfeed div .newFeatures {
margin-left: 1em;
margin-right: 1em;
font-size: 60.95%;
}
/**************************************************************************************
**************************************************************************************/
.colmask {
clear: both;
float: left;
position: relative;
overflow: hidden;
width: 100%;
}
.colright, .colmid, .colleft {
float: left;
position: relative;
width: 100%;
}
.col2 {
float: left;
overflow: hidden;
position: relative;
padding-top: 0;
padding-bottom: 1em;
padding-left: 0;
padding-right: 0;
}
.threecol .colmid { right: 33%; }
.threecol .colleft { right: 34%; }
.threecol .col1 {
width: 33%;
left: 100%;
}
.threecol .col2 {
width: 32%;
left: 34%;
}
.threecol .col3 {
width: 32%;
left: 68.5%;
}
Notice the #newsfeed div .newFeatures identifier near the end. I don't know what's causing that as it's only appearing once in the output stream. Here's an image of it too:
EDIT 3: It appears that even though it duplicates that particular selector, if I change the font-size to a whole number like 61% instead of the current 60.95% (that specific to defaultly match the existing desktop app as closely as possible) it works fine. I even moved the font-size (still as 60.95%) to a more general selector (just the .newFeature one a few lines up) and it still causes the page to break. Still not sure why that is. I've added the full HTML to see what's going on.