Slashdot Mirror
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.
I think the truth is just that...
I don't remember the role of the editor including giving personal opinions over and above those stated in linked articles. Why don't editors submit the story with a summary of other people's reasons, then post their own comment?
I do agree with Michael though, it seems fairly pluasible. All the same, it obviously has a competition-killing aspect to it, since Microsoft will tightly control their DRM technology, meaning that DRM-only web sites will probably be IE only, or at the very best IE plus other browsers whose licenses allow embedded proprietary code.
Is it me or is this exactally the thing the DOJ had them in court for so long to prevent? And finally won?
IE will continue to evolve, ...
... etc. ...
As far as I can tell, development of IE's features was iced around 5 years ago. Compare and contrast with Opera, Mozilla, Phoenix
"It's not your information. It's information about you" - John Ford, Vice President, Equifax
It's the beginning of the end for private personal computing as we know it!
Anyone got some champagne?
I think that Microsoft's grand plan to move the world over to Trusted Computing will end up cornering them into a one-dimensional business plan. Anything outside that market will end up thriving. Robust alternatives like linux and Mac OS will become the dominant platform because they will not corner themselves into discreet markets, but rather, will continue to expand.
If this is the last stand-alone version of IE they are betting that their operating system and plan is the *only* operating system and plan. If they make too many mistakes in their Trusted Computing movement they may fail entirely as a company in the near future.
Shouldn't You expect more from your DJ?
1. Microsoft ships their browser for free with the OS, fairly tightly integrated, thus marginalizing Netscape and any other browser on Windows.
2. Netscape et. al. convinces Gov't to sue MS for monopolistic, anticompetitive practices.
3. MS is found guilty of monopolistic, anticompetitive practices.
4. MS is slapped on the wrist by the Gov't and promises to play nice, ships OS update to remove the IE icon from the desktop.
5. {six months pass}
6. MS announces even tighter integration of IE into the OS.
Pity they weren't broken up.
Everybody's jumping to conspiracy conclusions, but here's the simple answer: when you give away browser upgrades for free, but you charge for OS installations, and you think that the browser is becoming more important than the OS, you have to merge the two together.
As time goes by, more and more applications become web-based. These days, consumers are more concerned about the version of their browser than the version of their operating system. When you try to hit your favorite web sites, check your web-based email, etc., it doesn't matter whether you're on Windows 98 or Windows XP: the browser version is what matters. They know they can't simply start charging for browsers, so the way to fix this issue is to only do new browsers with new operating systems, and blur the line between the browser version and the OS version.
Bottom line, Microsoft wants to get consumers more interested in OS versions again. If consumers see a web site that says, "Sorry, you need Windows 2005 to view this site," then they have a much higher chance of opening their pocketbooks than if the web site says, "Sorry, you need IE8 to view this site."
What's your damage, Heather?
It is completely laughable and sad that Microsoft was found to be an illegal monopoly for this very reason, and now they are integrating IE and Windows even further. The government really showed Microsoft!
No matter what your opinion is about the anti-trust trial or anti-trust laws in general, this is a clear display of how the Bush administration favors big business and selectively enforces laws in the favor of big business. The DOJ forced a "slap in the wrist" settlement against MS, and now MS and co. don't fear doing again what they were found guilty of doing before.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
I wonder what this means for IE on the Mac?
The community may bitch, but MS is doing the design. Why would MS's reaction to community bitching be the communities fault and not MS's fault?
You have a strange concept of responsibility. (Troll?)
Congratulations! Now we are the Evil Empire
Why? Online banking works just fine today. 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. Most features and services are designed to cut down on customer service calls.
Is it technically possible? Yes.
Would the Root certificate provider sign this virtual implementation? Almost certanly not.
You could virtualize it at just about any layer. But the whole point of palladium is to ensure the whole thing is running on 'trusted [by the content provider]' hardware.
Why aren't you encrypting your e-mail?
I have to admit that I'm a bit confused by this. First of all, it's a two-sentence statement in a chat room, so there is very little information to go on.
My question is, does this mean that end users will have to upgrade their OS to receive a new browser version? If this is the case, that's a huge blow to web developers. There are still a lot of things that IE6 supports poorly or not at all: transparent PNGs, CSS2, etc. I'm not seeing any indication that Microsoft is concerned about the continuing development of their browser AT ALL.
IE6 has really stagnated, and since Microsoft and AOL settled, I firmly believe that AOL will stop paying developers to work on Mozilla/Netscape. If both IE and Mozilla stagnate, the people who lose are developers whose platform is a web browser. I'm concerned that the stagnation of both browsers may stifle the innovation of developers who wish to deploy applications to standards-compliant web browsers instead of to a specific platform. (This means that those of you who don't use Windows should be VERY concerned, because if web browsers stagnate now, developers will continue to develop for a single platform instead of to a standards-compliant web browser platform. Microsoft doesn't seem to be interested in extending IE's functionality -- instead, the company seems to be pushing developers to make IE plugins, which creates lock-in.)
The Web has only been around for 10 years, and has only really taken off in the last 6. I don't think browser innovation is at its "zenith", and I certainly don't believe that DRM is the only thing left to add to browsers. It concerns me that Microsoft (or at least that Microsoft spokesperson) seems to think this is the case.
Simpli - Your source for San Jose dedicated servers and colocation!
Tell that to a web designer. They'll laugh in your face.
Mozilla is fast, stable, mostly bug-free (and what bugs it has are fairly straightforward to work around) and very standards compliant. The last is important: it means I know what will happen if I write certain code.
Wish I could say the same for IE. Even its bugs have bugs. (Though admittedly it is not as bad as NS 4.)
'Sensible' is a curse word.
MS will have to worry about offices making the decision now. As much as integration helps future sales to MS-only shops, it stifles sales to shops that use mixed products. If I owned a business, such integration would make me wary of buying into a complete MS solution for fear of future commitment.
*Backs up the truckfull of troll food*
/. isn't the only guilty body, every bitchy tech writer of the times is), saying how IE had too many priviledges.
I've always said it, and I always will, the community's incessant bitching about how insecure microsoft is has led to attrocities in design.
If security was designed in from the start, the design should be elegant and transparent to the end user.
Example: Windows file protection - to avoid DLL Hell. DLL Hell was pure and simple bad user habits (running in Administrator mode etc etc). So they made a system that completely bypasses security, and disallows everyone on your system from changing files... even administrators. It's a travesty, that's what it is.
That actually was a response by MS to programmers who felt like using a specific API in a specific DLL, of felt they could just over-run Microsoft's designs willy-nilly. Remember, the most pervasive Windows out there is still the 9x series, not NT and it's modern kin. Most users are root whether they like it or not.
Well, here we see another travesty: because of simple HTML script exploits, which under normal circumstances (ie, if you weren't running as admin) would have very little consequences, Moft has come up with another travesty, has introduced 'state' into what should be stateless... And as a result, I just can feel the hours and hours of headache that is now set upon us programmers, for the rest of time.
Two issues:
1 - Once a machine is compromised as any user, there are other ways to elevate privileges. IOW, runnig as admin usually has little or no effect to a serious cracker.
2 - If the security mechanisms are properly designed, you won't be spending "hours and hours" dealing with security. If you are, Microsoft will have done a piss-poor job (again)
I can clearly recall posts on slashdot, (but to be fair:
What is supposed to be and end user application is an integral part of the OS. Sounds like a recipie for exploits to me. Unless of course they implement stringent secutiry mechanisms.
All I have to say is BULLSHIT... IE has as many priviledges as the user running it - and as such, just as many, not any more than Mozilla running at the same user level.
But Moz isn't part of the OS. BTW, IIRC, IE (specifically MSHTML) is loaded into memory before a user logs on. That means that that part of the browser requires system level priveleges. Mozilla's "turbo" mode (whatever it's called) requires you to log in first. See a diffrence?
Now, because of that bitching, we have a 'lowered priviledge set'... something which isn't based on users... it's a whole policy scheme... It's introducing complexity where there is no need for any... Yadi yada... *Sigh*...
Security is never easy, but it need not be complex. The one thing MS usually does well is make life easy on thier drone^H^H^H^H^Hdevelopers (right, Mr. Ballmer?), so you may have an easier time that you think. Unless you're so used to security as an after thought, that it does become a pain. IMHO, that puts you squarely in the "Part of the problem" camp.
Boo on everyone.
No, shame on you for not wanting to have to do any work at all in order to have secure code.
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
"Be the change you wish to see in the world"
- Ghandi (i think)
It's naive to think that editorial opinion is confined to editorial pages. Astute readers can detect it everywhere, including in the mere selection of which stories to print out of the myriad candidate stories. This is true for newspapers, magazines, and (of course) cable news networks, who wear their editorial bias on their sleeves, right out in plain view. Those who have been paying attention know that the journalism industry has realized that it's just a business, and they'll offer up a trough full of whatever the people are willing to consume. It is not a branch of government...just a business. It's silly to criticize slashdot for not living up to standards that even "real" journalists don't live up to these days.
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
Bond of trust? What fairytale world are you living in? Is copyprotection a bond of trust? How come there are all these shitty CD's being released that won't play on computers? Is that the bond of trust you are talking about? How about the news that moviegoers are going to be metal-detected when going to see Finding Nemo? Is that trust?
-- Having a Creationist Museum is like having an Atheist place of worship
Now that is an interesting point. MS got AOL to back down on the browser wars by giving them what amounts to a permanent license to IE for next to nothing. Now they're saying that there won't be an independant IE anymore for AOL to license or use. So AOL gets stuck with a out-of-date browser, or has to force its users to keep on the Windows upgrade treadmill. It also looses any chance of ever competing with Microsoft, and can now be killed any time Microsoft feels like it. (Through the old "Windows isn't done until Lotus won't run" tricks)
Wow. Those Time-Warner executives who're calling the shots are so much more business-savvy than the AOL ones who were in charge before. Why is it that whenever a company starts doing something criminal and anticompetitive, other companies start lining up to get their heads chopped off?
Is that what I have? So "standalone installation" is Microsoft code for "Well, we'll let you delete it (it goes in the recycle bin and all) but it instantly comes back"?
If WinXP wants to protect its help system, that's fine. But the IE frontend shouldn't have anything to do with that. And even so, there's no excuse for Outlook being undeletable. It doesn't show up in the Add/Remove applications window, even under "Windows components"
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
Huh? Bank of America's online banking works just fine with Mozilla running on Linux.
Our previous bank was IE-only, and their online banking was through (insecure) IIS servers.
Banking is a competitive business. If your current bank doesn't support your choice of browser and/or operating system, find one that does.
- Robin
Host: Rob (Microsoft)
Q: when will IE get transparent PNG support?
A: Ian, I'm sorry, I can't answer that question for you
With this:
Host: Brian (Microsoft)
Q: Why is this? the anti-trust? (no further standalone)
A: Although this is off topic, I will answer briefly: Legacy OSes have reached their zenith with the addition of IE 6 SP1. Further improvements to IE will require enhancements to the underlying OS
It would seem that MS has painted itself into a corner with the feature set of IE. They seem to rely on the OS for so many things the browser does (like alpha blending, or the lack thereof). I wonder if the OS development team has oversight of the IE development team. There really isn't much reason that the IE team wouldn't be able to build a feature like alpha blending independant of the OS (lots of apps like Photoshop do this), unless they have been told not to deviate from the OS feature roadmap. Why else wouldn't the IE Program Manager be able to answer a question about PNG support? Sometimes it seems like the IE team is really just a department of the OS team, which is something that MS could not legally admit from what I understand.
US Democracy:The best person for the job (among These pre-selected choices...)
There are essentially two security models developing in the world of computing right now: Microsoft's .NET/Palladium/Hardware based model, which is Windows-specific; and Sun/IBM/Etc.'s Java/Liberty/Software based model, which in theory should be OS-independent, but ultimately MS will try their best to prevent it from working on Windows, and so will likely only function in the Linux/Unix realm.
Each passing day, MS brings the world closer to their MS-specific security model. As much as all of us want to avoid having to pay the Microsoft tax when we use technology, if left to their own devices, MS will attempt to erect a virtual toll-booth within as much aspects of technology as possible - be that the internet, PC's, or digital devices.
As developers, hardware specialists, what have you, we need to do our best to adopt, promote, and develop open-source technologies today, to prevent MS front owning what is now public domain tomorrow. "If we don't take action now, we'll settle for nothing later; if we settle for nothing now, we'll settle for nothing later." RATM. It might sound trite, but it applies to what is happening in tech right now.
Wasn't that what MSFT was sued for in the first place? They bundle the browser with the monopoly OS in order to stamp out competition? Haven't they learned anything?
Well I guess they have ... they have learned that they can get away with it.
The real problem you're discussing is one that has been noted many times: the internet kills anything successful.
Basically, the promise of the net is everyone's a publisher, and can make something kewl, and show it to everyone.
The problem is if they do a good job of it, they get popular. Bandwidth bills go up. They can no longer afford the site, because banner ads don't get you shit. Unless you're a lowest common denominator genius like stile (but there's only one stile).
So, they either die, get bailed out by a benevolent donor, or get bought by someone who cares about all the page hits.
So slashdot purely existing as a "great tech news site" was not a long term option. Because being great means being attracting attention, and attraction attention costs YOU money on the net, not your consumers. This inversion is not necessarily the panacea it was thought to be 10 years ago.
Personally, I'm quite content to go on loving to hate slashdot for the forseeable future. Gives us gov't workers something to bitch about at coffee break.
You are missing the point. :-) If Microsoft has their way, there will only be one browser. Detection and customizing your web page for more than one browser will be moot.
As opposed to developing a windows application where you have to work around windows versions, service packs and library versions installed? For example, a client requirement was to make an applications title bar flash when a query was completed. I had to write code to support Win9x,WinME+NT4 and Win2K+XP.
It's one company with one product, but many versions you have to code against. So it's sure as hell not moot.
I thought it was something in the SSL negotiation. If there's hard crypto involved in the browser identification step, you won't be able to fake it. That's where I'd be going if I were Microsoft, for sure.
Then, even if you do have "clever people" circumventing your access controls, you can still keep industry from adopting the circumventions. (Individuals might not care about the legality of their actions, but nobody is going to write a business plan around an obvious DMCA violation).
Repeal the DMCA (at the ballot box or at the point of a gun, I don't care how you do it), or live with its consequences.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
What it boils down to is that at some point they have to show you the data.
Nope. Micrsoft's DRM plans are truely midboggling. That's why you're going to have to buy new "palladium enhanced" hardware. With the new DRM the only way you ever "see the data" is on the screen. If you're lucky you can photograph it.
load some future drm-enabled webpage in winbloze on home network with linux box running ethereal, follow tcp stream, cut/paste code into file and view in mozilla, an open source drm-free environment.
Nope. You can copy the TCP stream, but it's all encrypted. Paste it into Mozilla or any other program and you have nothing but garbage.
It's some read hard-core shit. You hack into the monitor cable to grab the video and you find that's encrypted too. The video gets decrypted inside the monitor itself.
Hell, you hack into the keyboard cable and that's fucking encrypted too. Are you starting to get the picture? They have gone off the fucking deep end. The entire machine is one big fat lock.
You load up a program to snoop the raw data in ram and you find the ram is divided up into seperate vaults. There's no such thing as flat memory.
If you patch any of the system files all the DRM systems lock out. Considering that it's one big fat DRM machine I'm not even sure it'll even boot. If it does boot you won't be able to do much more than run Minesweeper, solitare, and notepad if you're lucky.
The machine will also only fully function while you are actively conected to the internet. Some of the functions periodically ping a cryptographicly authenticated time server. If your net connection goes down, or it doesn't get an authenticated response for any reason any time-relevant DRM stuff immediately locks out. That lock up can include programs, audio/video files, application data, even freaking e-mail. But don't worry, you can still play minesweeper while you wait for your net connection to come back up.
Microsft wants DRM to be invisible and ubiqutous throughout the system. People are suposed to take it for granted that everying is DRM'd. DRM content won't have an flashing DRM labels on it. You'll just find that all sorts of features like SAVE AS are missing. And it's not just that the feature is missing from the program. The machine is physically incapable of copying the file. How's that for nutz?
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.