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IE6 SP1 Will Be Last Standalone Version
mokiejovis writes "Program manager Brian Countryman stated that "as part of the OS, IE will continue to evolve, but there will be no future standalone installations. IE6 SP1 is the final standalone installation." See the Microsoft TechNet article." Several of the people submitting this story have come up with elaborate theories about why: killing competition, etc. etc. I think the truth is just that Microsoft intends to integrate DRM very tightly with their OS and browser, and they're aren't going to try to backport that to, say, Win98, so they just aren't going to release new versions of their browser for old, DRM-less operating systems. In the future server-side browser detection may be more about detecting whether the browser supports the DRM your "web service" uses than what version of Javascript or CSS the browser supports.
on a previous story
AC comments get piped to
>Does this mean Microsoft will just abandon all of their users still running older versions of Windows?
Yes. They already have for windows 95. Windows 98 isn't far down the road, as is ME.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
They're referring to IE6 SP1 as a version number, like Mozilla 1.4 RC1. They aren't referring to the service pack itself.
And yes, they will abandon older versions of Windows. Do they still support Windows 3.1?
No, it means that the new features will be implemented the same way Windows Update does it for integrated aspects of the OS now: it will be downloaded and installed onto the system. What this means is that you will not be able to JUST get IE, but instead only get it through Windows.
"Stumble before you crawl"
Seriously. Isn't this a bad move for them to make regarding the anti-trust suit? Doesn't this kill their whole "freedom to innovate" mantra?
In any case, it doesn't really matter. Strange that Microsoft would virtually abandon a project that could have much work done to it, and yet try to push along new OS/Office versions which really have much possible improvement.
Maybe they are realizing that they can't compete with the Moz group, and are deciding to go in through the back door, back to their old tricks.
I wonder what this means for IE on the Mac?
If I get it right, MSIE 6 is already not available as a standalone application for MacOS - it has only a "sort of" presence as a part of the whole MSN for MacOS X package.
Hmm, I never figured out how to easily make IE6 and IE5 work on the same machine.
As a web designer, this worries me. How am I supposed to test my sites from here on out?
The way I do it is to use Wine on Linux. You can just have multiple fake windows directories, and switching between different installed versions of IE becomes a matter of switching a symlink.
Of course, if in future IE is not available as a separate upgrade, that approach won't work terribly well.
Opera, Konqueror and Mozilla supports more DOM modules than MSIE 6 SP1.
On MS website, they clam that.
This is not true....According to Microsoft own claims, through the document.implementation.hasFeature() method, Microsoft Internet explorer 6sp1 claims that it do not support DOM Level 1 HTML, but the DOM Level 1 XML returns true on the support question.
But...the node-type constraint, which is defined by the Node interface is not defined my MSIE6 SP1. In other words, Microsoft do not support ANY DOM modules at all.
Oh, so just send in a lot of Mail to M$... You all know that MSIE have full PNG support[2] since MSIE 4.... Thats what they promisted[3].----
Mike Menk
Grimstad,Norway.
[1] http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url= /library/en-us/dndude/html/dude03262001.asp
m l
[2] http://osys.grm.hia.no/html-repguiden/sshoot/
[3] http://www.petitiononline.com/msiepng/petition.ht
Go to This school's online student services with Mozilla/Firebird/Opera/Konqueror/Lynx. Note that faking the user agent string doesn't always help. The best part is that the actual page and its services work perfectly with Mozilla/Firebird/Konqueror. I assume several other institutions have bought this services package (Pipeline), and that there are other services packages from different companies with similar checks.
So, yes, real places still give the 'download or die' messages.
Palladium is specificially designed to prevent a virtual implementation. That's the whole point of "trusted" hardware: the DRM app needs to know that it's running on a specifc, MS-approved device that won't leak its output to a screen-capture utility or through the analog hole.
It achieves this using PKI and digital signatures, so a virtual version would need to forge the Palladium device's signature. That means finding the private key, which is a DMCA violation and, more importantly, practically impossible. It's 2048-bit RSA, which would take trillions of years to crack even using the most powerful distributed computing project.
Right, except that the use of the term editor is not all that unconventional.
The primary duty of editors is the selection and placement of content. There might be an editorial page where an editor can give him or herself the role of columnist extraordinaire, but it's not germaine to the duties as editor.
Slashdot is primarily a discussion forum with links to news stories of interest, with a few choice words to help start the discussion. In this context an overt bias is expected and actually helps move things along.
Uh, actually, he's right.
Why don't you research what you say next time?
It is a fact, as found by a US court, that Microsoft is not only a monopoly, but an abusive one, deserving of severe punishment. The Bush administration got a large sum of cash from Microsoft, and made it go away conveniently.
Where's _your_ research?
This is the most disturbing part of this whole story for me.
::bangs head violently against desk::
This is Telex4's point, in this comment's grandparent. "Microsoft will tightly control their DRM technology..." should not be the most disturbing part of the this whole story, because it isn't part of this whole story; it's the editor's OPINION.
This thread is having a petty argument over whether or not slashdot is a news site and whether or not slashdot's editors are truly editors in the journalistic sense.
1. Slashdot is a news site. They relay news, the same way local newspapers relay Associated Press articles and articles from better papers (NY Times, Washington Post, etc.).
2. Slashdot's editors are editors. Many people read slashdot exclusively, at least for this kind of news, and slashdot's editors are in charge of what stories go through and what their readers are subjected to.
3. Yes, editors do pass subtle opinion within stories in newspapers all the time. There's a difference between what they do and slapping "I think that..." directly after a story. What slashdot editors do DRAMATICALLY changes the articles they post. In this case, it changed a sotry about MS no longer bothering to make new versions of IE work on old Windows installations into a story about the tyrant software villains deftly attacking the open-source world.
Slashdot editors: C'mon, I know it's your site, but just cut it out, eh? I hope you realize how hypocritical you all are when you scold MS/SCO/etc. for spreading FUD.
Time Magazine Interview with Tim Berners Lee, unfortunately, a preview to a for-pay full article. If anyone knows where the full article is, for free, let me know.
In any event, in this article, TBL - creator of the web - discusses what his greatest fear for it would be. In other words, what would harm the web most?
His answer: A "split" internet. Browser A is best used for this site, browser B is best for this one. DRM, thus, is technology that will do - as most of us are no doubt aware - more harm than good. It DESTROYS the ubiquitous nature of how one SHOULD be allowed to access online content. Time, ironically, has designed their site to be used with Browsers X and Y (Netscape and IE).
Online banking today cuts-out everyone with a browser which doesn't transmit "MSIE" in the user-agent.
Speak for your own shite bank. I just tried mine, and its online banking seems fine with Mozilla.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
I recently graduated from Augusta State, and I know the issue has been pointed out to the people responsible for the service. They have taken an "it works well enough stand", and they would rather block access to the service completely rather than allow a student to experience a technical glitch caused by a browser that doesn't like some of their code (a paraphrasing of the response I received after complaining). Several members of the faculty have pointed it out, but they seem unwilling to update the browser detection code. The biggest problem is that it looks for certain browsers to allow access rather than to just block browsers with known problems.
Of course, they were still using Netscape 4.6 when I left this past summer, and Pipeline works with that...
> The banks will cater to the lowest common denominator. If even 10% of their users have problems accessing their online banking accounts, the cost of customer service calls will by HUGE.
Correct me if I'm wrong, I think there are a significant number of banks out there that currently only support IE. It seems to come up here on Slashdot every once in awhile.
Additionally, the number of support calls might increase, but the duration of the call will likely be short:
Customer: Um, yeah, I'm using Mozilla on <insert your favorite OS here> but I can't access the online banking page.
Support Person: Sorry, you have to use Internet Explorer to access our online banking page
Customer: But I'm running Linux!
Support Person: Sorry, we only support Internet Explorer.
Customer: Curses! I'm going to find a new bank then!
Support Person: Is there anything else I can help you with today?
{dial-tone}
I don't know about y'all, but all the banks I have been with could care less about losing a small fry like me.
I did fine in Opera 7.10, but my real question is, hwo can a server know what browser you are if you fake the string? I mean, I've been to sites and had "Identify as MSIE 6.0" on but it still gave me the "not compatible" issue. Is it some feature they check just to weed out browsers? And to what end?
I was baffled by this with Capital One's banking site. I finally realized they were using JavaScript to detect the browser, which is totally independant of the UA string. No browser I am aware of allows changing what JavaScript reports.
JS browser detection is used frequently, but mostly to determine what JS code needs to be used. In some cases, though, the JS then redirects to the appropriate URL (the real site, or the "Upgrade Now" page).
NGWave - Fast Sound Editor for Windows
No browser I am aware of allows changing what JavaScript reports.
Download mozilla sources, look in:
dom/src/base/nsGlobalWindow.cpp
~ line 5830 you'll find:
aAppName.Assign(NS_LITERAL_STRING("Netscape"));
Change it to whatever you want -or- for a less permanent solution, make it read from a file. Recompile.
Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws-Plato