I worked on a place-mapping chart for some time and created several iterations, and the problem I keep looking for is when I get to IE8, panning for this is a way to slow down and delay.
What I have at this stage, in order to reduce loading time, is creating png to replace my "strokes", since I assume that ie8 wanted to re-render every time I dragged the map.
I also added controls, hoping to force IE8 users this option, but there is still a delay in panning, and if I can have users with IE8 (and, if possible, 7), still drag / pan without controls and response time a bit faster, which would be great.
Here is my current JSFiddle
I'm still a bit green with JS, so if you have any suggestions, that would be very appreciated. (The PS Chrome frame is awesome, but not an option for me)
Update
I removed the original drag and drop function and replaced the code using the jqueryui draggable function. Martin suggested just dragging divs, not Raphael elements. This allows this thing to fly in ie6-8, which is great, but then I came up with the issue of scaling. What I saw before will enlarge my WxH paper element, remaining the same ratio, cutting off my drawing when it enlarged. After I rummaged through Rafael's documentation, I came across paper.setSize. setSize was exactly what I needed so that this project could move and fend off in ie6-8 and pretty much defeat all browsers in its path.
, jqueryui draggable paper.setSize - zoom n 'pan blues.