RSSMicrosoft Windows Exec Talks IE, Firefox
By Nate Mook | Published November 15, 2004, 10:53 AM
Editor's Note: This is part one of a two-part interview. In part two, BetaNews asks more questions including what browser interface Schare himself uses; surprisingly it's not IE.
With no major updates to Internet Explorer scheduled until Longhorn arrives in 2006, Microsoft has found itself having to evangelize the current merits of IE while competition heats up from newcomers such as Firefox.
Gary Schare, Director of Windows Product Management at Microsoft, sat down with BetaNews to discuss the future of IE, including the possibility of tabbed browsing, Mozilla's "free ride," and why Microsoft feels it is better equipped to handle security.
BetaNews: There's been a lot of talk that no standalone release of IE will come until Longhorn - that is a completely separate downloadable release. Therefore Microsoft is exploring ways to issue updates through add-ons, like third party developers do. Please expand on this.
Gary Schare: First and foremost, before Microsoft even gets to adding things to IE, there are hundreds of software vendors around the world that are adding value to IE today. We had done a relatively poor job of making people aware of that ecosystem of add-ons so it was hard to find the really interesting ones.
If you went to the download page on the IE web site, you'd see security patches and that's about it. So what we've done last week is put together a Web site as part of Windows Marketplace that gives you a view directly into the IE add-ons. Ranging from toolbars that plug-in to IE to completely new browsers built on the IE platform like Maxthon, Netcaptor, Avant Browser, and many others. That in and of itself is news to a lot of users of IE, who have maybe heard of Google Toolbar or the MSN toolbar, but beyond that weren't really aware of all the neat stuff that's out there.
That was our initial effort, to say "Hey we have to promote this stuff better and really help these developers who are doing all this great work reach out to more users." But it also opened our eyes to the fact that this is an opportunity for us, as a company, to use that mechanism as an added value as well. And if you look at MSN toolbar, they've done numerous revs of that over the last year or so, and they are seeing great success and plan to do more. It's proven to be a successful mechanism for them to get functionality out to users.
BetaNews: Are we talking about top level, or more in-depth features? For example, a tabbed browsing type option and more advanced CSS support, or would these additions lie on the interface level, such as the toolbar?
Gary Schare: It's more the latter. For architectural reasons, it turns out you can't just add tabs via an add-on into the IE app itself. You can get tabs by running a different app like those other browsers that build on the IE platform, so it's a nice option for people.
We've looked at whether you can add tabs through a browser helper object or some other way of extending IE, and it turns out you can't. Then of course the Web developer stuff is also that core platform changes and wouldn't be deemed an add-on. The challenge there, as we have been kind of public on our blogs when discussing with Web developers, is backward compatibility.
We could change the CSS support and many other standards elements within the browser rendering platform. But in doing so, we would also potentially break a lot of things. We have to strike the balance of what's okay to break and what shouldn't we break, and how do we roll this out in a way that does a clean break, if you will. Right now we're aiming for Longhorn for that because we think it affords us the opportunity to say, "Okay a few things have changed, if you want your apps to work with Longhorn you may have to make a few changes." Versus just blanket upgrading the installed base with some new features, and "Oh by the way we broke a bunch of stuff."
And that is actually an interesting discussion in and of itself, with respect to some of the other browser competitors, who haven't had enough browser share in the past to have to worry about those things. Once you start to get enough browsers out there, and people start to build sites that work with them, then you're kind of restricted and hamstrung in terms of how you make changes.
That's something I think the Mozilla guys have had a bit of a free ride on, until now. Every time they ship a new version they break all their extensions and break a bunch of things because they were in beta. Now they've got a product out there that's a 1.0, and people will look at it as "Okay this is 1.0, I'm going to count on this and I'm going to expect some backwards compatibility for some time forward."
And that has not been the hallmark of open source software in general. If you go look at OpenOffice for example, that's one of the things that has not proven out.
We're committed to that, and we get criticized for it on some dimensions. They say "You're not innovating as rapidly," Well that's true, but when you have actual customers who rely on your software you have those tradeoffs and we’re very diligent on how we make those tradeoffs.
BN: The press has been covering the Firefox 1.0 release, and I'm sure the timing of talking with folks and getting the word out about IE wasn't purely coincidental. How does Microsoft feel about Firefox now that it's out the door, and especially with all of the media uproar about the browser wars starting again?
GS: One of the hallmarks of Windows is this very, very broad ecosystem of developers who build on the Windows platform, and that has been one of the things that has made Windows so successful over the years. So from one standpoint we're happy to have even more developers adding value onto the Windows platform and giving users a choice of software to pick.
Sometimes developers build things that Microsoft doesn't do, and other times they build things that compete directly with things Microsoft does do. In this case, it's something that competes with something we offer.
We think the end of the day IE is the better choice, from the topics we've talked about around security and around innovation. There's other elements we haven't even touched on yet around site compatibility and around enterprise management, centralized control and security settings, single log on for enterprise domains, the sort of things that are critical for people to think about. So we do think IE is the better choice, but we are happy that our customers do have a choice, and competition does drive things forward so it's a good thing.
BN: Recent press reports have mentioned IE market share dropping, even though it holds a strong lead at 93 percent. Where does Microsoft see its market share by the end of 2005? Firefox developers are hoping to reach 10 percent by that time. Do you see usage dropping as more people look for alternatives?
GS: It's hard to make a prediction of where things are going to go. Given our publicly stated strategy of the next major release of innovation is in Longhorn, somewhere between now and say 2006; what we have today is SP2 and all these great add-ons from all these third parties.
There's going to be some class of early adopters that go check out the new thing and may or may not switch back depending on what their experience is. We think that getting the first set of early adopters is a lot easier than getting the next set, and then crossing over into the mainstream is pretty difficult. But these guys do have a lot of energy and they're certainly pushing hard and they stated their goals. We'll have to see what happens.
BN: One of Firefox's biggest advantages is quite a vocal community of supporters. The team raised over $250,000 for a New York Times ad. This is one area where Microsoft has not made a big effort with IE - to evangelize the browser. What does Microsoft plan to do in this area? Any full-page New York Times ad for IE planned?
GS: It's a good question. We definitely feel right now that the level of understanding of IE in SP2 is not where it should be. The installations of SP2 are frankly going great. I don't know what numbers we're public with right now, but I know its over 100 million a couple weeks ago.
Again, if you compare how much Firefox has gotten out there, talking all about the 5 million downloads of the preview release, at the same time we did like 100 million of SP2 with the new version of IE. We do operate on a slightly different scale, a different order of magnitude frankly.
I have to agree, we do have more work to do to make people aware of the value they're getting in IE today, what they get in SP2. Whether that means an ad in the New York Times is hard to say, probably not likely from that perspective, but we are putting in a lot of energy. Every OEM system from a PC maker now with XP will ship with SP2 and it's important from a security perspective that people get there. Forget about browser wars and browser competition, its just to be safe - to be as safe as possible; you can never be 100% safe, but to be as safe as possible getting SP2 is the right thing to do.
Continue to the second part of this interview.
Well, Gary didn't defend himself much as far as IE but he sure was promoting SP2 and windows. Ok, there is a GREAT majority of people who use Windows. Windows is their's (our) baseline for PC computing. We already know this and understand this fact. But I think the main topic was about IE not Windows and SP2. I, too, have SP2 installed on my computer but do I use IE even if it was updated with many bugfixes? No. Why? Because I prefer to use Firefox for it's simplicity and easy of use.
Out of the many boasts of SP2 the one that sticks out to me is how he compares the amount of downloads Firefox has to the downloads of SP2. Yes, SP2 has hundreds of millions of downloads and the update does apply to IE but that still doesn't mean that people are using IE. Unless you've already uninstalled IE, it's on every computer running windows up to SP2!
I'm glad that Betanews did this interview with MS but I'm not impressed with how he defended IE but rather try to redirect out attention to "how great" SP2 is.
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Maxthon is AWESOME !!!!!!!
Maxthon is AWESOME !!!!!!!
Maxthon is AWESOME !!!!!!!
Maxthon is AWESOME !!!!!!!
Maxthon is AWESOME !!!!!!!
Maxthon is AWESOME !!!!!!!
Maxthon is AWESOME !!!!!!!
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Come on GUYS !!!!!!
IE intergrated with SP2 and Yes the patches is a GREAT browser, the only reason you hear about so many Security Problems is that so many people hack it. Just wait till Firefox has been out a while, once it starts to get popular it will be hacked, then Security Issues will Appear.
As for Microsoft letting other people do their work for them, well I think it's great that so many addons are been created by other people I mean talk about choices. Microsoft DO do alot of work on windows and such and the amount of time that went into SP2 was unreal the Beta Tests seemed to go on forever.
As for Avante Browser, Maxthon and Firefox......Time will tell again this is just a personal choice for people. And I agree with what was said People will choose a browser on what they can see, if it looks nice they will use it. They need to know about secutiry and vulnrebillity.
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WebSpeedReader is even better!!!!!!!!!! Check it out: http://WebSpeedReader.com/
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You wrote:
> IE intergrated with SP2 and Yes the patches is a
> GREAT browser, the only reason you hear about so
> many Security Problems is that so many people
> hack it. Just wait till Firefox has been out a
> while, once it starts to get popular it will be
> hacked, then Security Issues will Appear.
They will and are already there. And fixed faster since Firefox is open source.
But then people already warned about IE 3.0 in 1996 as Netscape's Navigator had more users. by this time the IE already had more bugs than Netscape.
About that time the problems started and did not end yet; became worse.
As for "hacking software being out for a while": the Apache web server (open source) is wider spread than the ISS by Microsoft. And you can recall from the past which one had more security problems in the past.
I think you be of the safe side in past, present
and future not to use the Internet Explorer or it's add-ons. Time will tell.
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This is the most lamest Excuse I can see of what they are doing. They can't improve it themselves. They rely on others to do the work they should be doing. From government to businesses, IE is the most unsecure browser available. From spyware to adware installs to security lapses. Due to all the security problems and their lame excuses of why they take so long to patch things up, compared to Mozilla, we have been given a directive from the state IT department to commissioners, "Find an Alternative Browser by the end of the YEAR" I agree with their decision.
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I'd say that they are useless. It is the reason. so they need those excuses. Linux will get more users each year. don't matter that they say. We'll see it. the users get frustrated with their excuses. Personally I won't use IE any more. only when I go to update Windows. I get more features with Firefox than with IE. I feel more secure, etc. why I need to care about a Browser with some security holes when I can use a secure Browser? Bah. I've been using IE during much years. It is the time to switch. finally I get a wonderful browser. maybe isn't perfect 100%. but can you say that IE is a perfect browser? only in their Minds.
FIREFOX 1.0 for everyone!!!
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Then what is going on with Microgarden Webtools?
http://www.microgarden.com/webtools/index.htm
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It's an add-on. Microsoft itself cannot do add-ins. The add-on is more a different browser using MS' (broken and dangerous) rendering engine.
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I would like to see IE 6 SP2 Standalone released for Windows 98/ME/2000 that includes all the Windows XPSP2 security enhancements. I don't include 2003 Server since I'm sure it will get those features with SP1.
I couldn't care less about tabbed browsing... although I acknowledge its merits, I find any MDI interface annoying, so whether Microsoft offers it or not is not that important.
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Same thoughts here...
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GoodThings2Life: Wrote: so whether Microsoft offers it or not is not that important
" Let me laugh before I reply you " hahahahaahahahaha.
Ok...
Why I should worry about a lot of patches?? Then it is important a software with more problems than with good features. Then whether Microsoft say it. it is a sacred comment and you have to obey them? what about spyware and adwares? Microsoft sells their product with a lot defects, problems, bugs etc. Then whether Microsoft doesn't care about this point. it is perfect for you ?
Hmmm Maybe you don't know nothing about those problems.
GOD FORGIVE THEM. THEY DON'T KNOW. WHAT THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT
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IE may offer a loty of patches but at least that means they heck their security...the fact that Mozilla doesn't offerany patches makes me feel that they feel themselves so much better than IE that they choose to trust in the security of theuir browser without looking at it in a critical way thus hurting the consumer when something goes wrong.
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Isoptera4 wrote: IE may offer a loty of patches but at least that means they heck their security.
But Of course. whether Microsoft wouldn't check their security then every PC with their systems. Would have some serious problems. A clear sample was the virus "Blaster,Sasser". If they would work correctly they wouldn't need to make a lot of patches. They wouldn't check their code all the time. I wouldn't defend a company that sell us softwares with serious problems and a lot of bugs. But you are right... They check their security.. Why? hahaha it is easy to answer. Money... Money!!! They must care their customers. they pay their bills. I would check it too.
My point is. If the software isn't secure. Isn't complete. Isn't finished. THEN DON'T SELL us it.
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First of all, you have no idea what MDI means. Multiple tabs is *NOT* MDI, but multiple windows in a master window is. And for your information, MDI was something invented my the Evil Empire (Micro$) itself. It goes to show the level of creativity at Redmond.
Industry prefers SDI. Tabs in the same page is a convenient way to have multiple documents open in the same window without doing MDI. MDI will have a master frame that just sits there with many cascading children. A good example is M$ Visual Studio.
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I think that Gary does have some points about IE. IE is an integrated part of Windows and it excels with backwards compatibility. It's free with windows, and everyone has it.
From the perspective of someone who has been with Firefox since it was named Phoenix -- It's nice to always have a standard that lacks features that gives reason for applications like the Mozilla Suite to develop.
I think it would be in the best interests of both camps to study forums like this one. I agree, Firefox's themes & extensions breaking is a rather irritating thing -- not so much for a user like many of us here who understand the reasons --
Perhaps Mozilla should follow Microsoft's example with the Windows XP Upgrade -- which identified hardware devices that would not be compatible with Windows XP. With adding a feature like that and perhaps a "Welcome Screen" for new users that would show new users how to configure Mozilla, install Extensions, install Themes, and take advantage of Tabbed Browsing.
Someone earlier in this discussion mentioned that tab-browsing was a superflous feature. I'm a web developer, and I know that I could not get by without tabbed browsing. It has allowed me to function much more effectively -- especially with sites that feature web-based administration tools. (And I don't like to use my mouse all that much) - tabbed browsing keeps the taskbar clean and is more effective then grouping icons.
Anyway - M$ has made a very good move with sprucing up their IE website. If anything, it would make sense for them to make IE's page as colourful as the Windows Media Player page -- and it wouldn't help if Mozilla either followed suite or beat them to it.
Yes, Moz's site is nice -- however, it's still not where it needs to be. I can't quickly access the information that I want and feel as if it does not effectively highlight all of the main reasons the I love the browser suite so much!
And as far as CSS breaking. Give me a f'ing break. They could easily allow the CSS upgrade to be available and allow backwards compatibility by either detecting a website's W3C Specifications or allowing a user to run the site in 'compatibility mode' or something similar. I don't think that proper CSS implementation is going to disrupt the Internet as much as adding insanely unintelligent pop-up blocking has.
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"...disrupt the Internet as much as adding insanely unintelligent pop-up blocking has."
Not only that, but ineffective. Pop-ups and pop-unders florished under IE SP2 within days of release. So now you not only have pop-ups, but you have a "pop-up" and an annoying sound telling you how to block pop-ups.
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for some companies (such as the one i work in), compatibility is more important than any extra features, etc. That's why our IT dept only officially supports IE, and doesn't support netscape, mozilla, firefox. There are a lot of web tools, pages, that when using firefox doesn't work correctly. I know, since I have both installed on my workstation. So we're glad that IE has maintained this backward compatibility with every new update/patch they come out with, even though it keeps slowing the browser down. I'm not saying mozilla sucks, because i really love the tabbed browsing, but as good as it is, it just isn't ready for the business corporations(yet). my 0.02.
And i know the IE bashers will come and chew me out now.
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Thats right... businesses DO use IE... this is why is it so important for businesses to start switching over. ActiveX (which is the incompatibility you are talking about) is a serious security issue. As I'm sure you are concerted with security as much as compatibility or more you would see that firefox is the better option. It just takes more work on the IT department's butt to implement and keep current where as IE is dumbing down people and allowing so many "updates" and "features" that it becomes a huge security hole in itself. ActiveX needs to die today.
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totally agree
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I agree. ActiveX has been proven unsecure for years. Is everyone Blind? Do they like being unsecure? I just don't get the IT community. Our IT shop is tired of it. We have defended IE for years, but enough is enough. Stop the talk and show some action.
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And where do most of the compatibility issues come from?
IE's sloppy rendering and web designers coding for that sloppyness, instead of to standards.
In most cases, if a site does not work in Firefox, or Opera, or Safari, or whatever, it's because of the coding on the site being non-standards and developed and tested in IE only. Not because the browser is deficient.
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M$ invested and created ActiveX in-order to shut out
3rd party browser such as Netscape off the market. They integrated I.E tightly with Windows so that other browsers won't be able to take advantage of the OS as much as I.E could. But their great designers forgot an important principle of software design when they created ActivX and tied I.E to Windows core, that of segregating components which do different things. Technically it is *huge* blunder to tie an application to the core of your OS. Nobody other than M$ does that.... And why they did it ? In order to make it appear that I.E was the *one* browser to use if you wanted to work on Windows and work with the Net. They designed, but they overdid it and not it is biting them on their backs.
Lesson from this ? Don't forget principles of software engineering to influence the market and shut out competition. However M$ has been doing it for years and that is they way they work!
Where do I want to go today ...? Well I want to go to Firefox and OSS, not Redmond for above reasons.
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"We had done a relatively poor job of making people aware of that ecosystem of add-ons so it was hard to find the really interesting ones."
"One of the hallmarks of Windows is this very, very broad ecosystem..."
Ecosystem? This is perhaps one of the worst choices of wording I have ever seen. Ecosystems have nothing to do with software; the closest thing you can relate ecosystems to related to computers is the extraction and deposition of materials during computer manufacturing, and their effects on the ecosystem thereafter. I hope this individual was not paid for this interview.
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I think Microsoft does a great job with IE. Sure.... Flame me if you want, but the only reason that Firefox, Mozilla, Apple and other browsers have less security problems is because they have (much) less users.
As for features.... how many of you actually use any Firefox extensions? Tabbed browsing? Much ado about nothing if you ask me!
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I use the tabs on FireFox at least 1,000 X a day. I, however, use both IE and FF, both are great and both have draw backs!
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Tabbed brosing is but one is twelve features I use. Tabbed browsing in tself is not an extension, however, there are extensions to enhanced the tabbed browsing.
If you've ever tried the other extensions such as mouse gestures, gmail notifier, or foxytunes you would very much see the benefit of extensions.
Go a try them out... I reccomend "All-in-One Gestures" most of all. Speeds up browsing so much!
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What is scary about this comment is he's admitting that the millions on Windows 2000, still supported and in use, (and a decent OS,) are basically screwed from now until Longhorn if they don't wish to go to XP SP2. The only option now for people with windows 2000 is to use FF or Opera if they wish to browse and stay secure, there are scripting issues that are known and wild on IE under 2000 SP4 and all hotfixes. The other alternative is to have users users and not admins, but most setups don't use this.
All in all it seems like a real opportunity for Firefox and open source developers to pick up the scrap heap for Microsoft's uncaring attitude.
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quite frankly who cares, pretty much anyone still running win2k will be using firefox anyway :)
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"... Every time they ship a new version they break all their extensions and break a bunch of things because they were in beta. ... and people will look at it as "Okay this is 1.0, I'm going to count on this and I'm going to expect some backwards compatibility for some time forward." And that has not been the hallmark of open source software in general."
So this guy, along with Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer, always say that Open Source Software does not provide backwareds compatibility. That every new release of an Open Source software, say Mozilla Firefox, breaks the current software release. Well, I got painful news for you: VB.NET. Visual Basic .NET is a completly new language that only looks like VB6. That's about the only backwards compatiblity you get from the .NET platform. Now, who knows what has happened, or is happening, to all those poor programmers and companies who invested thousands of dollars in VB6 and the related technologies (ASP, COM, ... ). This is how Microsoft provides backwards compatibility.
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...and its not so much that firefox breaks compatibility with extensions as much as it just wants a current compatibility version number from the extension. LOL... lets get the facts straight Mr. Schare. No disrespect, but its true that compatibility with extensions isn't broken just precise in its expectations of their programmers.
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There is a VB6 Upgrade Wizard to upgrade old code. As for ASP, it should die anyhow, as ASP.NET is so much better. And COM is still compatible with .NET. I'm not sure what your point is.
I think the problem is not the new language, but the "developers" who are too dumb to learn it. If VB6 developers cannot learn the new syntax, they should not have been "developers" in the first place.
Oh yeah, I used to be a VB6 developer. I've moved on to C#.
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Sure there is an Upgrade Wizard, but try to upgrade anything with it and see if it works. It is just an extremely simple upgrade wizard created by a third party and paid for by Microsoft. I'm not a "dumb" developer. I don't just program in VB6. I make a living out of Programming and it would be a very sad life if I were only programming in VB6. Chances are, you don't make a living out of just writing code or you didn't invest any time and money in those old news innovations. If you were, you would know 5 years ago, MS advertised COM and ASP as if they were a new religion with millions of followers. Many companies, including the one I work for, invested heavily on these now deprecated technologies. Now that Microsoft has introduced the newer technologies, the only thing we can do is to throw away our existing code base and start all over again with the new stuff because there really isn’t a way to upgrade 6 million lines of code.
And don't act like C# is something that MS came up with all on their own. If you think C# is great, try Java, which is at least cross platform and not a complete rip-off of an existing innovation.
Now I just don't want to say that C#, ASP.NET and the whole .NET Framework are not well designed products. The .NET Framework as a whole is truly a useful tool that has a bright future. But let's not forget that we are talking about Backwards Compatibility here. All the MS guys are raving about how the Open Source software is not backward compatible. Even if there is some truth in that statement, the kings of backwards compatibility should at least try to be backwards compatible themselves, which is not the case with VB.NET.
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GS:
"Again, if you compare how much Firefox has gotten out there, talking all about the 5 million downloads of the preview release, at the same time we did like 100 million of SP2 with the new version of IE. We do operate on a slightly different scale, a different order of magnitude frankly."
Gary Schare made this statement but I guess doesn't realize that we don't have a choice but to download SP2(If you want the most up to date security patches). People that have downloaded FireFox actually made conscience decision to download it. You can't compare the two!!!
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SP2 is the most up-to-date security patch for Windows XP. Sorry, but that had to be pointed out.
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My point exactly. You didn't have a choice to not download SP2.
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SP2 is Windows most up-to-date security fix. Do you "not" want the most up-to-date OR just to install a few things and ignore other major security leaks?
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"That's something I think the Mozilla guys have had a bit of a free ride on, until now. Every time they ship a new version they break all their extensions and break a bunch of things because they were in beta. Now they've got a product out there that's a 1.0, and people will look at it as "Okay this is 1.0, I'm going to count on this and I'm going to expect some backwards compatibility for some time forward.""
At least they don't pad the browser with so much backward compatibility junk that it bloats the browser and eventually starts acting quirky. I would rather have an extension making use of the latest release code features, functionality, and stability rather than still kicking on old methods.
"Again, if you compare how much Firefox has gotten out there, talking all about the 5 million downloads of the preview release, at the same time we did like 100 million of SP2 with the new version of IE. We do operate on a slightly different scale, a different order of magnitude frankly."
Do you really think people download SP2 just for the latest IE browser? Give me a break...
"And that has not been the hallmark of open source software in general. If you go look at OpenOffice for example, that's one of the things that has not proven out."
I can't believe how this guy talks down about open-source software. He deserves a swift kick in the you know what.
"For architectural reasons, it turns out you can't just add tabs via an add-on into the IE app itself. You can get tabs by running a different app like those other browsers that build on the IE platform, so it's a nice option for people."
Options are great. I would personally like to know their percentage of users who want tabbed browsing. If there is a large majority then why not just FIND a way to implement tabbed browsing? You could always HAVE the option to disable tabbed browsing if you like within IE options. Supply and demand - that was like freshman high school stuff. If you say the IE dev team cannot do it then there is something seriously wrong with the picture. Someone commented it plain enough - laziness.
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well said! :)
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I am a collage student, and I spend a fair amount of time going to peoples computers that end up infected with a large amount of Spy ware and Viruses (usually the prior).
Since the semester has started, I have upgraded a large number of computers to SP2 because the school recently started requiring it for computers to connect to ResNet.
When I first saw SP2, I thought that it would save a lot of problems by preventing ActiveX installations, and other holes that allow spy ware to install on peoples computer as they browse the internet.
I still do not know how all the stuff gets in, because I myself use FireFox, and it appears that IE does not run ActiveX any longer, however, it still happens.
I do not think that protecting computers from ActiveX is what is needed, ActiveX support needs to be removed from the browser completely.
As for there plans to integrate .NET with MSIE, I can smell problems from here before I even know much about it... no doubt there will be easy ways for these programs to install on the local computer and start annoying the user, and making them call me.
It is time Microsoft gets the idea that the internet will not get much better by just adding support for more active content; it will just make everyone’s lives more complicated.
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ActiveX Controls & .NET Framework DO have security settings in IE. You just need to configure them properly. There's no point taking out the technological support when security is just a click away. If you have hundreds of computers to configure then use a batch.
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That's because a highly overlooked method of installing spyware is bundling it with "free" programs... AOL installs Weatherbug which is not spyware in itself but does bring with it a lot of baggage. Furthermore, Kazaa, Ares, Piolet, etc etc... all the file sharing applications install the garbage and those items in turn install even more. Not to mention there's no telling what kind of backdoors they open that other spyware tools can take advantage of.
SP2 goes a very long way of preventing the accidental stuff... but if users are still downloading CRAP software by their own choice and free will, then they are still going to get these spyware problems if they don't take time to actually READ the instructions during installs.
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You make a leap of logic that truly astounds me. By your logic, then, everyone is stupid and downloads spyware because they really believe in the "free lunch" system. In other words, they really believe that Hotbar and FunWebProducts (two of the biggest) are going to spend millions of dollars advertising their "free" products only to philanthropically give them away. There is no cure for stupidity and based on your logic then, they should all be using AOL because they know nothing at all about computers, spyware, malware, etc. . It is a wonder how they managed to bungle their way on the Internet in the first place (or do they use AOL?).
Whatever happened to common sense?
The motivation that Mozilla currently has will diminish when it has reached its saturation point. Once they stop growing what reward will they have? Cutting into Internet Explorer's market share now motivates them; and they are, no doubt, chortling with delight. However nothing beats the motivation of financial gain (all those idealists should now wince).
Open Source will never flourish just like communism will never flourish, because it is human nature to be greedy (sorry again idealists).
That is not to say, I would not like to see it flourish. One may think that it is so contemporary to condemn the rich, powerful and successful and to cheer on the underdog. But, alas, it is not. It is as old as history itself. It has always been so. In all of history, this inclination to denigrate the rich and acclaim the underdog never changed the baser instincts of humankind; it has never precluded a select few from dominating the many. The rich and powerful continue to dominate and I truly doubt that Mozilla/Firefox nor its clones will amount to more than a gnat on Microsoft's nose,at least the foreseeable future.
The more functionality that Mozilla adds to its browser(s) the more vulnerable it will become. The more people who install it, the bigger the target it will become. The bigger target it becomes the more flaws and security issues in it will be exploited (this has already started). If you do not believe that serious security flaws will be discovered in it, you are very naive.
You cannot assume (as many do) that because it is not Microsoft it is perfect. That is illogical. But there is not much logic to be found in ideology anyway. To hate Microsoft is cool. To like Microsoft is not. Anything that is not Microsoft that performs adequately will be hailed at the coming of the Christ; a giant-killer. It's human nature. Evidence of this is ubiquitous. David and Goliath anyone?
(An aside)
As to the use of the word 'ecosystem'. The word was properly used. The definition of 'ecosystem' is: "a system formed by the interaction of a community of organisms with their physical environment." Gary Schare's use of the word 'ecosystem' was apt.
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"However nothing beats the motivation of financial gain"
Mozilla is a non-profit organization
"Open Source will never flourish"
There is greater selection of Linux operating systems than any other OS. Maybe it isn't flourishing but evolving(?)
"The more people who install it, the bigger the target it will become."
The more people who use it the more people there are who can fix it.
The more people who can fix it the faster it gets fixed. This is a timeline for a 36 hour fix to a browser (NOT IE).
http://www.sacarny.com/blog/index.php?p=104
Yes we know that more security flaws will be discovered. It's also possible that they will be discovered without an exploitation first.
Questions; Do you work for M$? You haven't used firefox have you?
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C'mon guys. Open IE, open options dialog, click Security, click Custom Level button below, make ActiveX run = disable.
Simple isn't ? Don't blame Msft if you guys are dumb. Unfortunately more and more NON-educated users in Internet, and then compaining complaining....
Mozilla is ok but have many other issues, MIME, unicode, support for charactersets like Arabic still far from perfect, etc
Opera is good, probably best browser around imho.
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All this talk of improvements to IE is well and good, but it doesn't amount to a hill of beans for those of us chained to the 98/SE/ME OS range.
Thanks to Dubya's "No Child Left Behind" initiative, many school systems have had to cut tech money drasticly to meet new mandatory requirements. That's left us with no hardware upgrades and no OS upgrades. Unless you're one of the priveleged few who's system reaches critical mass and dies, you're stuck with an aging machine and un-cared-for OS.
For my system, IE isn't an option anymore. Since the announcement that IE would no longer be upgraded for all platforms, all repaired systems here have come shipped back with the latest edition of Netscape, Mozilla, or Firefox set as default browser. I've heard of other systems doing the same.
Failure to support, update, and upgrade IE across all in-use OSes is a big mistake. We're hooking children on alternate browsers now out of necessity, not out of preference. I'm not sure how long it'll be until we see new rigs with a decently modern OS in the classrooms in my system, but until then we're pumping out kids who go home and start downloading what they use at school. And right now, it's not IE.
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While I agree somewhat with your comments, look at it this way--Microsoft still provides critical updates for IE 6 SP1 on Windows 98, Windows 98SE, Windows Me, and even Windows NT 4.0 Server (NT only supported until end of this year), until sometime late 2005 if I recall. EVEN WINDOWS 2000 AND XP WILL NOT HAVE MAJOR UPDATES UNTIL 2006, confirmed in this article. By then Windows 98 will be well past its end of life. Heck it's been 6 years for Windows 98 support, don't get me wrong I love windows 98 but heck isn't it time to move on? If you can't update your computer, just don't get on the web. Stick with Windows 98 until 2015 if you want. Just don't expect it to support a 12 GHz system with 512 GB of RAM!
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12GHz with 512MB RAM, heh, let's not be irrational. 8GB RAM?
Windows98 is a good OS when you configure it. Don't expect to go only with stock standard hackable settings. Install a firewall, restrict the children from messing with settings and from downloading certain files. There should be no problem. Just so long as future OS' support HTML 4, POP3, SMTP, FTP. The basics for childrens' computing.
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Do NOT start a political war here... We are discussing technical merits of IE and FF not GWB or other's political aspirations. Besides, state governments, local governments and citizens (who won't pass tax levies) and school districts are just as responsible for budgets concerns as the federal government leadership.
Your point on 98/ME Support is well noted, however. Please remember however that 95 Support is long gone, as is 98 First Edition... 98SE is fading fast, and I believe ME has about a year or less to go... so somewhere along the lines, priorities may have to be set in your district(s).
Sorry to be so blunt, but unfortunately that is the way the cookie crumbles.
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It shows amazing chutzpah to ascribe some of MS's worst faults to their adversaries. Specifically, I'm referring to this quote:
"Okay this is 1.0, I'm going to count on this and I'm going to expect some backwards compatibility for some time forward. And that has not been the hallmark of open source software in general. If you go look at OpenOffice for example, that's one of the things that has not proven out."
Is he hoping that we have simply forgotton all the versions of MS Office that introduced new file formats which were incompatible with previous versions? Does he think we didn't care about all the phone calls and emails to other people to try to exchange documents in commonly-editable formats? Finally, we're offered a glimmer of hope when OpenOffice commits to an xml-based format that anyone can write software to interact with, while MS continues to obfuscate data created by their software, and he has the gall to make this statement? This isn't the pot calling the kettle black, this is the pot calling the kettle a pot.
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Be careful what you say... There was only ONE version of Office that did this... Office 97, and yes they learned their lesson (hence the comments today). That is why 97 and all versions since also offer the ability to save back to previous formats as well.
The exception to all of this is Access... and even Access has several methods of converting between versions.
The point being made by Mr. Schare is that there is a very fine line walked in determining what to offer... many of us want compatibility with everything... many others want new features. When you try to offer both, it makes complications. Microsoft does their best to balance things while accepting that backwards compatibility for those in the majority who are slow to upgrade/expand is a priority for now.
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"no standalone release of IE will come until Longhorn" - Huh??
This is bad news and a big mistake. And to say that it's not possible to make IE a tabbed browser I find VERY hard to believe. This all seems like pure corporate laziness to me. In fact I'll go further - it's sheer stupidness. Without innovation comes stagnation, and to say wait for Longhorn is the lamest excuse I've heard yet. And the piffle about why IE can't become a tabbed browser is frankly unbelievable. There is no doubt that unless someone somewhere at Microsoft changes their mind, Microsoft are definitely and without question going to lose more of the browser market share. And what's even more important is that their reputation and the reputation of IE will suffer even more. And so on and so on - it'll become a vicious circle. Instead of plugging security holes in the existing versions of IE, Microsoft need to code a brand new browser that can replace the version that ships with XP. I think you guys need to talk to the guy who codes 'nLite' and see what you can do to produce a completely brand new browser that will install and replace existing versions of IE. IE at the moment is a dinosaur that hasn't evolved since about 1999. Wait 2 years for a new browser? I don't think people will Gary, I just don't think people will.
http://www.keyserproject.com/
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Yes I agree. It is a big mistake. but It didn't surprise me. their story of mistakes. Is Making us think against them. I think that they're killing IE with this attitude. :S
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What if Firefox appears on WindowsUpdate?
Then it installs Firefox into users' machines and creates a desktop icon? Then Microsoft will see the real fight happening. Let the users decide which browser to use.
Since the above does not happen and will not happen, IE will stay dominant.
For most users who just want a browser to surf, and check web emails, IE is more than enough. They would not bother downloading Firefox or even hear of it. Come on, a lot of users do not even know how to install software.
Before IE got bundled together with Windows, things were different, users have to know how to download Netscape and to install them so that they can have a browser to use.
Don't you all agree?
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Now why would Microsoft have to put Firefox on it's update site? If the person cannot install software how could their choice really matter in the first place?
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WindowsUpdate uses ActiveX controlls anyway, FireFox cannot and will not support it anyway (lol)
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Let Microsoft take the responsibily of Mozilla Firefox and it's mistakes? With all the updates to be developed it would be too much to have to pay a MS Tech to load yet another update. And all the users with Auto-update would be downloading Mozilla Firefox all the time.
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Thank god for that
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So many naive people.
I'm amused :)
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Windows Update using JScript+WBEM (WMI service) on your PC. Updates dialogs and downlod dialog is well integrated into IE. Mozilla just can't support it.
BTW, WinUpdate is product of another good company http://www.shavlik.com/products.aspx
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ActiveX is evil!
ActiveX is bad for your computer!
ActiveX is the biggest virus written ever in the disguise of a feature. Software monopolies such as M$ keep fooling gullible users & developers with "innovations" such as ActiveX, which break standards and software compatibility.
it is time to make a switch from the proprietary Windows world to the free OSS world.
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1. Microsoft has been out there for years with IE
2. This gives hackers, crackers and all those other kool guys more time find breaches and hacks.
3. FireFox is new on the market.
4. In time these hackers and crackers will exploit FireFox.
Conclusion: At least Microsoft has implemented a solution / fix to these problems, WINDOWS UPDATE
oh no, oh no........Headlines
Headline 1: FireFox releases FIREFOX UPDATE
Headline 2: Microsoft sues Firefox: We patented the UPDATE process
Headline 3: FireFox not free anymore after Bill is awarded hefty compensation for FireFox patent breach
Headline 4: More People Turn to Radio as hobby: Internet Browsers are too expensive
Headline 5: 5 Days before Internet Closes
Headline 6: Archaeologist discover ancient communications : Internet Browsers
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Err Microsoft _own_ Shavlik. [shakes head]
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