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Genesis Energy's website is new to the Mac Friendly section of the site as we expand websites and services considered. Unfortunately it is being listed for all the wrong reasons and only just escapes being added into the Hall of Shame because of the briefest mentions of Macs in their sideline ISP business. When I was first contacted by a user of this site pointing out the issues with their website, I was reluctant to include it in our list. Why? Because the Genesis Energy site becomes our first entry to not only receive a "Poor" rating for not being Mac Friendly, but also should be one that PCs users shouldn't be happy with either!

Rating - Poor

When a user contacted me about the Genesis Energy main page, I first checked it with Firefox and Safari. Take a look at the main page and click on the "Register" option. Most likely, you'll be directed to a page with nothing on it, with the exception of a banner. No text, no errors or warnings.

Looking more closely at the page, I realised another issue...and sure enough, testing on a PC proved my theory. If you look at the site on a PC and use Firefox (version 2 in my case) you are once again faced with the blank page when attempting to register. It was only when I launched Internet Explorer...not my browser of choice under Windows, did the register option actually work.

This is appalling web design. Not only is the site platform specific, but it also appears to be browser specific if you wish to register and use the site.

I'm staggered to find sites like these around, particularly for such a large company. What's worse is that no attempt is made to warn you or provide you with a meaningful error such as "IE 6+ is required to view this page, that makes me suspect the developers have done little or no testing...or at least, taken the approach "Well it works for us on the one browser we used, so it must be good"

One user who also tried to get into the site via an alternate route comments...

Although the site is OK in that you can get to the home page you cannot access your account information unless you're using a PC it would seem - due to browser incompatibility.

If you try to access your account you get this: "MyAccount is designed to run with Microsoft Internet Explorer. You should be using IE5.5+".

As the user rightfully points out, Microsoft quit making a Mac version of Internet Explorer at version 5.2, so for us "5.5+" is meaningless. The user also comments...

Why not create a site that at least uses Firefox or Safari? For a company that big, in a major metropolitan area the number of Mac users must be significant enough to warrant a little extra effort on their part.

Absolutely right. And let's not forget, Genesis are not only a power company. They have also gone into the ISP service via their 'infogen' business.

So out of curiosity, I took a quick look to see what they said about Macs in their technical support pages for connecting to infogen...

Question: What do I need to get connected to the Internet?

Answer: For Dial-up access your PC should have a minimum 486 processor, have a modem (built-in or external) and have a minimum of 64MB of memory. You also need a telephone line.

If you're using an Apple Macintosh it should be a PowerPC or iMac.

For Broadband access your PC should have a minimum 1GHz processor, have a DSL modem (connected to your PC via USB or Ethernet). It's recommended that the PC has 256Mb of RAM. You also need a Telecom telephone line and, depending on your chosen installation option, you may require filters.

If you're using an Apple Macintosh it should be a PowerPC or iMac.

It should be a PowerPC or an iMac? They can't be the same thing then I guess? Is an iBook OK in their eyes? What about an Intel Mac? OK...I'm being to picky with that last statement because well, Intel Macs have only been on the market since...hmmm...January 2006, so maybe they've not heard? But still, "PowerPC or iMac" is a very vague term to use.

So where does this leave us?

I have no doubt that Genesis Energy's site deserves to be added to the Hall of Shame for such a shocking way to provide basic functionality such as as registering to so few people...unless they use a certain browser on a certain platform. However despite the fact that their website does not serve Mac users at all, their saving grace (and hence why they receive the slightly better "Poor" rating) is the fact that their 'infogen' pages at least mention Macs, albeit slightly confusingly and with little detail.

Once enough information is received from infogen users and that page is moved off into its own Mac Friendly ISP page, I'm sure that Genesis Energy will be moved to the Hall of Shame if no changes are made to their site. I hope someone at Genesis might take the time to actually realise that there are more browsers out there than Internet Explorer...and maybe, just maybe...a little later they might realise there are also different operating system :-)