[Molvis-list] Internet Explorer 7 vs. Chime (messageCallback fails)

Eric Martz emartz at microbio.umass.edu
Thu Nov 9 21:32:06 EST 2006


DOES ANYONE HAVE ANY INSIGHTS ABOUT HOW TO GET CHIME'S MESSAGECALLBACK TO 
WORK IN MICROSOFT INTERNET EXPLORER VERSION 7? (Details follow.)

Internet Explorer version 7 is now available, and recommended by Microsoft. 
It replaces version 6 that has been recommended for several years. You are 
supposed to be able to uninstall it (presumably going back to IE6) but I 
haven't tried this.

My preliminary tests with Chime in IE7 (done in Windows XP SP2) indicate:

1. The MDL Chime 2.6 SP6 installer successfully installs Chime for IE7 
using the Windows Registry. (This avoids needing to manually copy 
npchime.dll, required for installation for Firefox and other Gecko 
browsers.) (The installation test was done with IE7 installed in its 
default location.)

2. Chime sites that do not use messageCallback (and that are compatible 
with IE6) work fine in IE7.

3. Chime sites that use messageCallback (and that are compatible with IE6) 
do not work properly in IE7. Each messageCallback generates an alert "The 
data that the plugin requested, did not download successfully". Chime loads 
and displays the molecule, and Chime's menu is available (after 
left-clicking on Chime, a new requirement in IE7) and works.

I tried playing with IE7's settings a bit but did not find one that solved 
the messageCallback problem.

Since Protein Explorer uses messageCallback to test whether Chime is 
installed, it fails to start. Also, it uses messageCallback very 
extensively, so even if it did start, it will not work. Therefore, people 
who plan to use Protein Explorer should plan to use Firefox if they plan to 
upgrade to IE7. Firefox supports all of PE's capabilities; IE6 does not; 
IE7 will not run PE at all.


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Eric Martz, Professor Emeritus, Dept Microbiology
U Mass, Amherst -- http://www.umass.edu/molvis/martz

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