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Microsoft Says Firefox Not a Threat to IE
KillaKen187 writes "A CNET article claims that 'just days after the launch of open-source browser Firefox 1.0, Microsoft executives defended Internet Explorer, saying it is no less secure than any other browser and doesn't lack any important features.' It's also interesting to note that these statements made by Steve Vamos, Microsoft Australia's managing director, come with no knowledge of what Firefox has to offer as he admits not even installing or using Firefox."
The next version of Windows will only allow Internet Explorer to access port 80 remotely... as a security measure.
There are plenty of products out there with features we don't have. We have plenty of features that our customers don't use.
Indeed they do!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
From the CNET article:
English reiterated that features such as tabbed browsing are not important to IE users.
You can mark my word that IE will have tabbed browsing within 12 months from now.
And when *I* dream, I have a pony.
This will probably be offtopic, but during recent presentation on shares source initiative in Ukraine, the Microsoft representative started getting corruption messages from Powerpoint, and had to run the entire PPT file in OpenOffice, which he conveniently had on the laptop. photo1, photo2, the caption says "Microsoft Shared Source Initiative".
He says if consumers wanted more features, they'd tell Microsoft, using the example of tabbed browsing. I would argue that if consumers knew what features they wanted, that would be true - but innovative features have to be created somewhere. Sounds like someone's got a bad case of the NIH syndrome to me ...
It's also interesting to note that these statements made by Steve Vamos, Microsoft Australia's managing director, come with no knowledge of what Firefox has to offer as he admit not even installing or using Firefox.
Did the former Iraqi Information Minister find a new job?
Microsoft executives defended Internet Explorer, saying it is no less secure than any other browser and doesn't lack any important features.
I only hope that the mangement at Microsoft continues to believe this statement for the forseeable future. Nothing could help Firefox more.
Say what you may, I use Firefox on all my ( windows, Linux, OSX, AIX, Solaris ) systems. I have taught other people such as relatives and firends the joy of Firefox, and they too have switched over too the new browser. Firefox is a revolution of people getting what they want from the web back. With a search bar, adblocking and pop up blocking, and support for all the major plugins ( like flash and java etc ...) Firefox is now the most nicest browser out their. And many websites are fixing themselves to work with FireFox.
Still using IE... never had any problem with these so-called "threats" that are constantly and tiresomely reported ad naseum here on slashdot. Never had a problem, never had a security issue, never had a cra
They claim that tabbed browsing is not a feature that their clients want, yet if you go to the windows page at microsoft http://www.microsoft.com/windows/default.mspx they have an option there that says "Want Tabbed Browsing, Search Toolbars, and More?". All those options suspiciously being features incorporated into firefox. Maybe they do see it as a threat after all.
No more of this quote. Please. Ever.
Both sides ignore and laugh at each other anyway. Who wins?
They can just keep repeating that they aren't afraid just to reassure themselves and their business partners. The statement that IE is not less, secure, well, is known false. The security is compromised the same moment they integrated the browser into the OS so tightly. Btw, the mere fact that they react on firefox shows its effect on the market. I think in the future firefox will steadily get a nice share of the browser market, when more and more users learn about its features. IE is just an ancient application, deprecated, and insecure (CERT says so, not me, before someone starts accusing me).
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Browsers come and go, but firefox is making a serious impact here.
I was flipping channels, and saw some news show (damn if I can remember which one) was talking about it briefly. Something like a open source browser being TV worthy is something.
Heck, even a lot of the non-geeks at my work have heard through the grape vine that Firefox is the way to go. They are installing it, and loving it, and spreading the word.
Of course, you were only trolling.
Pretty Pictures!
This guy is a treasure trove of wit, here's another good one I noticed after re-reading a second time:
We take user feedback very seriously. If you have that feedback, then you should feed it back to us because we will feed it to the product team.
It inspires a poem:
Feed us the feedback double-quick!
When we've digested the feed then lickey split
Your browser we'll enance to make it more slick
But keep you safe from all harm? Well that's quite a trick...
Instead look at XAML - it makes buttons you click!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Repton.
They say that only an experienced wizard can do the tengu shuffle.
First MS will lose the small 'at home' and business customers. Once these people are comfortable with the competition, the competition will seep into the big MS customers, for whom the 'small customers' are employees.
No, I'm not going to post this directly to you Steve, as I reckon you will ignore it.
How much more blantant could Microsoft be in saying they are not really an innovator?
"If you don't ask for it - we can't think of it!"
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
XUL is potentially a huge advantage that Firefox (and other Mozilla-based browsers) have over IE.
...)
Using XUL, you can develop full-blown user interfaces that aren't limited to HTML-style text boxes, radio boxes, drop-down boxes and so on. Instead, you get access to trees, grids, menus, groupboxes, SOAP and XML-RPC client access and so on; a sizeable subset of what e.g. VB has to offer. It also understands CSS, so you can make XUL interfaces visually attractive if you're unlike me and actually have the patience to do so...
It's quite easy to develop XUL code as well, if somewhat time-consuming because there isn't yet a good, stable IDE available.
MS knows there's a market for this stuff, because it was developing XAML which meets broadly the same requirements. However a solid XAML implementation is currently a few years away at least, so XUL has a window of opportunity.
In case it's not obvious, here's why you'd use XUL instead of e.g. VB to develop application front-ends:
- easy to deploy to clients (i.e. install e.g. Firefox, and that's it; no mucking around with DLL versions)
- easy to maintain (i.e. tweak the code on a server rather than tweak and redeploy to every client)
- already cross-platform (Windows, Linux, Solaris, Mac, BSD,
- no dependence on ActiveX or Java to give the "rich client experience"
- supports CSS and works with HTML, so competent Web designers should be able to pick up XUL without great difficulty. Someone please please please create an IDE to make this easy!
- works with existing Web servers (e.g. Apache, IIS) without difficulty; after all, XUL is just XML text and Web servers have been serving text since day 1
They say IE is a target because it's everywhere, not because it has holes. Well then, Apache is everywhere. Why don't we hear about a new buffer overflow or mishandled JPG in Apache every two weeks?
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
If Ghandi had been going up against Microsoft, he'd be one of those happy friendly cartoon search agents now, like that puppy or that paperclip.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Too many sites still require IE/ActiveX to function properly. Vistaprint.com comes to mind. I always make it a point to write and/or call when I encounter a site that doesn't work and let them know it's "broken", and that they're about to lose a customer since I refuse to use IE.
On the other hand, when I encounter a site that supports Firefox and encourages its use (Wells Fargo, for instance) I always send an email to whoemver contacts I can find praising their decision to support a more secure browser.
The more people that do this, the faster IE can be banished forever.
Steve Vamos, Microsoft Australia's managing director, says "There are plenty of products out there with features we don't have. We have plenty of features that our customers don't use."
Good job Steve, you just convinced me not to use MS products.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
First a famous quote is used, then it's overused, then you get modded up.
Forget the whales - save the babies.
Microsoft already has teh XUL killer under development - XAML, a very simialr technology.
What needs to happen?
Make a XUL plugin for everything that browses!! But espceially makea n XUL plugin for IE that lets you run XUL stuff inside IE, basically a sort of embedded Mozilla engine. Then work up a few killer apps to make people download and use the plugin.
If a few good uses of XUL can become widespread over the next six months or so, it has a good chance to take a hold before XAML can squash it. And with enough visible support big companies like IBM might jump on the bandwagon.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
As a web developer there are plenty of features I would like to see along the lines of CSS/XHTML/ECMAScript standards compliance. I would say that my payment of sweat and tears with workarounds to these problems more than qualifies me as a customer.
Or standards-compliant CSS rendering. You know, stuff like getting the fucking box model right and implementing at least FUCKING CSS 1 DAMMIT.
Sorry, forgot to take my pills. I'm off to the nurse.
Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?
I've been a long time IE user. Personally I've never had the problems with IE that others have had because I sat down and learned how to setup and use IE from the start. I memorized the operation of every last setting under the Tools->Internet Options dialog and adjusted them accordingly. I learned how to browse as securely as possible while watching what IE does very closely. Of course I'm not your average browser. Almost every setting I could find is set to prompt me, as I enjoy absolute control over things. This also alerts me to how complex some websites are in their attempt to invade your privacy. Just watching all the dialogs pop up for scripting and ActiveX is amazing. Also the hitbox'es, doubleclicks, and adtechs are really annoying.
Yesterday I downloaded and installed FireFox 1.0. I wanted to look at it and find out if it would suit me better since I still consider IE to be a little too proprietary in that it hides what it really does. So I am looking for something a bit more open.
After looking at all the features of FireFox I was amazed at how few things it allowed me to adjust. It doesn't have any of the options I am used to using under IE. Here are a few...
* Changing the temporary cache path?
* No option to clear cache when done?
* Inability to prompt me if I want scripts to run?
* Prompted cookie setting control?
* Inline images are either on or off. Eg, no ability to prevent animations (gif or otherwise) from running.
(This is frustrating. I want to see the original images, but I absolutely hate animations of any sort.)
* No Zones feature so that I can configure certain security options for certain sites.
* Installed security is to save passwords, allow web sites to install software, save form information, and Java is enabled?
(Of course IE is probably even more open, but the point is that FireFox is supposed to be secure right?)
* Many other configuration options are missing that would allow me to be prompted if I want to execute or do something.
I notice that tabbed browsing ends up using even more desktop real estate. I've never needed tabbed browsing before, all my windows appear on my Explorer task bar...just like tabs. I suppose tabs would be useful for people whos operating systems don't have a taskbar enabled shell.
Other that than the above observations I found Firefox to work fine. It didn't crash at all, but was a bit slower to render than IE. Only once did it redirect me to a website I did not type in the URL for. I just shut it down and restarted to fix that problem.
I find that I don't think I'll be switching just yet because of the inability to actively control scripting and the in-line image problem. If those issues are taken care of in the future, I don't know why I would stay with IE. Until then.
+1
One-by-one as I clean machines with spyware and crap-ware of all sorts, I also install Firefox 1.0 onto their machines and if they want I spend about 3-5 minutes showing them the features that would be important to them. I show them pop-up blocking, tabbed browsing and how to install extensions such as Adblock.
I'd say 1 out of 10 or fewer people so far have wanted to go back to MSIE... and the reason is usually because they are just used to doing things a certain way but it doesn't take long to get used to the new one anyway.
These steps are important because my company's goal is to dump Microsoft and any product that depends on a Microsoft operating system. Moving people to Firefox, and getting people to use OpenOffice has, so far, been a welcome improvement for most of my users. (We need to write PDF files from time to time and only OpenOffice does that... sure we could buy and install adobe acrobat... expensive... no point in that when they get what they want for free with OpenOffice.) And once they are all used to seeing OOo and Firefox in their faces, changing the OS from beneath them becomes a LOT more trivial than it would be to go about it the other way around.
Truly, the migration path from Windows to Linux is in the applications... get the apps we need to run under Linux and we're golden. So far, OOo and Firefox is paving the way nicely and presenting a very favorable impression for using OSS in the workplace.
How come the tabs don't respond to the Tab key?
In Windows, Ctrl+Tab will cycle through taps from left to right, whilst Ctrl+Shift+Tab will cycle the opposite direction. Standard Windows behavior.
Why do I want downloaded files to automatically saved to my desktop - what's wrong with "My Documents/Fire Fox/Downloads" so I don't get clutter all over my desktop?
Go to Tools, Options, Downloads, and change the default download directory if you'd like it somewhere else. Alternately, you can have it ask where to download every time.
I do not load "harmful ActiveX controls" but I want to load "useful" ones. In fact as a smart user I wonder how to make them work in FF? If a client of mine tries to use my web form (activex) doesn't see it he will get the shits with me - not his browser.
There are third-party ActiveX plugins if you really want them, but remember not everyone uses Internet Explorer or Windows - if I want to use my Risc PC to browse an ActiveX-based website, I'm out of luck. Beware of alienating a potential audience.
Google is part of my toolbar.
Firefox comes with a search bar built in, not tacked-on as a third party add-on, and supports plugins for virtually any other search engine you could think of. From my browser, I can instantly search Google, Amazon, the IMDB, Wikipedia...
I have the "Features you are used to" because I got used to them in IE.
Virtually every feature you'll use commonly in IE is present in Firefox, many done in a superior way. Granted, some pages fail to render properly in Firefox at the moment, but for the vast majority there are no problems.
Meanwhile, 'Fox has many features that are a godsend in day-to-day browsing. Pop-up blocking? I've found many manage to sneak through in IE 6 SP2, whilst Firefox not only can block popups more consistantly, but also supports blocking images through a simple right-click.
Tabbed browsing is something you have to experience to realise why you need it - if you're browsing along and find something you want to read later, just middle-click to open it in a new tab, still browsing in the same window. It just works.
And tomorrow the stock exchange will be the human race
would be "Steve Vamos, Microsoft Australia's managing director, come with no knowledge of what the competition has to offer as he admits not even installing or using"
Seriously... How can you be a succesful product manager if you're not aware of what the competition is doing?
I can't believe this guy is in the position he's in with statements like that, much less keeping that position after such an admission.
An UNINSTALLER!!!
MS tells lies like every other evil corporation/government? This is a sad truth, but a non-story.
-FL
Trust me, you do not want this behavior changed. You see, Mozilla and IE used to allow this. Then the bad guys figured out that you could ferret out the local filenames things were cached under, load your own malicious code into the cache in an innocuous way, then refer to it as a local resource in a dangerous way. Since it was a local resource it could do things a remote resource wouldn't be allowed to do. So Mozilla drew a one-way wall: local resources can refer to remote resources, but remote resources aren't allowed to refer to local resources directly. They looked at being type-selective, but concluded that if they did someone would always be able to finagle a way to turn that into arbitrary access, so the only safe thing was to block across the board based on the local/remote nature of the protocol.
IE tried to avoid this and be more selective. The result has been a fairly steady stream of zone-escalation exploits for it. To put it plainly, you can't open just one hole.
And frankly, if your page is remote, why are you assuming a local file exists at a particular location? You should be referring to your own resources, not someone else's.
Firts let me say I'm a huge advocate of mozilla based browsers. In my opinion, they're the only group to get it RIGHT.
I've made it a requirement of friends and relatives that if they want me to look at their machine and fix them that they need to install and use firefox as their primary browser.
There is a problem with the whole thing though - many of them go back to IE because one site of another will not work due to IE dependancies. Of all the people I've converted, only a small percentage kept with it.
We've seen a big spike in FF/Moz usage over the last few months, however, if you'll excuse my pessamism, I think this will eventually drop off as people find one or two sites that don't function properly because they were designed only with IE in mind. A good example of this is my sister, who went back because her son couldn't play a couple of yahoo games which explicitly ask for IE.
I think this is the real reason they say Firefox is not a threat to IE - because despite the superiority of Firefox, most people don't care about the benefits of security. They just want page X to work properly, and when it only works properly in IE, they'll run back.
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
If you give a caveman a chainsaw, you'll hear similar complaints...
"Where's the wood handle?"
"There's no leather thong to hold the rock in place"
There's no ROCK!!"
"Whats this handle with the string running through it?"
"The flat thing sticking out is TOO uncomfortable...and I can't make a cut with the big yellow blocky thing at the end"
"And these points on the thin handle...way too sharp and hard on my hands"
Thanks for the responses! The about:config really helped. Who would have guessed, a build-in XML type registry.
:)
As for the answers to certain queries. I'll try to be more accurate in my statements:
* Changing the temporary cache path?
I like storing anything temporary on another drive, not my system drive. That way I can erase the whole thing at the end of my windows session if necessary.
* No option to clear cache when done?
The IE option is to "Emtpy Temporary Internet Files folder when browser is closed".
* Inability to prompt me if I want scripts to run?
I am refering to any scripts, all scripts, whatever scripts. A TV or newspaper isn't capable of running scripts, neither should a browser...in my humble opinion. Yes I love the FireFox Javascript fine-tuning control. I really wish IE had that. Of course I unchecked all the options for Javascript on FireFox.
* Prompted cookie setting control?
Yea, I missed the "Ask me every time" option. Thanks. It wasn't obvious that it was under that dropdown because it is labled "Keep cookies". The word "Keep" gives me the impression that the cookie had already been set.
* Inline images are either on or off. Eg, no ability to prevent animations (gif or otherwise) from running.
(This is frustrating. I want to see the original images, but I absolutely hate animations of any sort.)
Yes apparently FireFox doesn't have this option, even under about:config. The specific IE option is "Play animations in web pages". I have this turned off.
* No Zones feature so that I can configure certain security options for certain sites.
Zones are nice for intranet stuff where you know you are completely in a secured development environment. The restricted and trusted sites are also nice. I think the thing I like about zones is that it completely adjusts every browser setting for each zone. In fact, I would argue that there should be more zones, more user creatable/definable zones. Zones that users can setup and name. Zones are the limited equivalent of sandbox type controls.
* Installed security is to save passwords, allow web sites to install software, save form information, and Java is enabled?
(Of course IE is probably even more open, but the point is that FireFox is supposed to be secure right?)
I don't know about you, but when I end my browser session, I erase everything. I erase history, cookies, temporary internet files, passwords, form data...everything. I even erase the sites in my blocked lists. In fact, whenever I start my browser, I want it to startup as if I had never used it before. In many ways Firefox should have the option to browse similarly, like in Apples Safari browser where the browser does a complete privacy reset when done. I would love that!
* Many other configuration options are missing that would allow me to be prompted if I want to execute or do something.
Obviously I don't want to name them all. Just open up any IE and choose the security tab, then choose a zone. All the promptable settings are there. And yes I can be prompted to prevent active x controls to run. I just wish META refresh was promptable. Arguably it needs to be.
Firefox is a good start. I really don't want to download Mozilla to get more advanced options. I mean what is the point of FireFox then? I want to use FireFox, I just need more browsing control. I do not like a broswer that does things for me. One other annoying thing about FireFox, even though it isn't a biggie...the fonts don't look right on some sites. I hope they fix that.
Thanks for your input. I'm just that much more informed now!
+2
Changing the temporary cache path?
:)
I like storing anything temporary on another drive, not my system drive. That way I can erase the whole thing at the end of my windows session if necessary.
Yes, I can see, this does not exist exactly as this in firefox. You can set browser.cache.disk.enable to false and browser.cache.memory.enable to true. Firefox will not ever make a disk cache, and insted will cache in memory (which it already does during the session) In this way, you lose your cache when you close firefox.
Inline images are either on or off. Eg, no ability to prevent animations (gif or otherwise) from running.
(This is frustrating. I want to see the original images, but I absolutely hate animations of any sort.)
Its the option image.animation_mode, set it to "none" (minus quotes of course) Animated images will appear but not animate, you can also set it to "once" to cause a single animation. "normal" is default animated mode.
Alternate cache storage location I may be able to get for you, it appears it may be an option thats not listed, so I'll need to try testing it abit, but if you leave on only memory cache, there won't be an offline cache to worry about!
For all the talk of the cathedral and the bazaar, there are a lot of folks here who seem to believe in the success of conversions driven by submission to secular authority, personal influence or techno-magic.
Don't tell me how Grandad, your kid sister, your lab rats -- one, a young woman, divorced, with two kids and a job to protect -- have all come to love Firefox.
Don't tell me how clever you've been, the tricks you played that make it all seem so easy.
Instead, prove to me that you can make it out there alone in the cold, cruel world of Windows. 300 million users world-wide. Nine million OEM systems shipping each month with IE6 as the default.
You can laungh IE from Word??? God, no wonder it takes forever to launch the damned thing.
Next they'll be putting flight sims into Excel or something.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
IE is not JUST iexplorer.exe. That is only a small stub file that loads certain COM components associated with Web browsing.
;)
Same with EXPLORER.EXE, it is only a stub that loads the COM controls that deal with file browsing.
There are other COM modules available, such as Network browsers, Picture viewers, and in Win95, there was the easter egg COM module.
the stubs can load any of these COM modules dependent on the content being displayed. Indeed it IS possible to make a HTML COM component based on Mozilla, and the COM/ActiveX component IS available. however, it is stil not possible for the Mozilla COM module to replace IE and its trident engine in this context either.
The point I am making, is that IE is NOT tied to the OS itself, its only tied to the SHELL of the OS.
If you REALLY want to stop IE from starting, even on a Windows XP box, use Program Manager as the shell! It does work.... its progman.exe located in c:\windows\system32
I use progman.exe and Mozilla as the shell on my "guest" account of my XP box, and it works VERY nicely!
Have a nice day!