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IBM Backs Firefox In-House

Posted by Zonk on from the adopt-a-fox dept.

An anonymous reader wrote in with the link to a CNet story describing IBM's adoption of the Firefox browser for internal use. From the article: "Firefox is already used by about 10 percent of IBM's staff, or about 30,000 people. Starting this past Friday, IBM workers could download the browser from internal servers and get support from the company's help desk staff. IBM's commitment to Firefox is among its most prominent votes of confidence from a large corporation."

21 of 296 comments (clear)

  1. More companies should follow suit ... by smoyer · · Score: 1, Interesting

    my company has far too many "IE Only" applications. :(

    1. Re:More companies should follow suit ... by no+soup+for+you · · Score: 2, Interesting
      my company has far too many "IE Only" applications. :(

      I think this is THE defining problem of current Microsoft developement shops. For the last three's of years I've had to tell the manager's "Let me develop a cross-browser app, you'll see... you'll see". Which was followed by the response, "I could care less about cross-browser."

      Flash forward to a month ago --- "I couldn't sell this if it was IE only on Windows!"....

      ... take a bow

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      If you blog it...
  2. Great Reference by boeserjavamann · · Score: 3, Interesting

    What could be better than Big Blue backing up Firefox? And why not? OS is already a Thing for IBM. Just look at the IBM-sponsored Eclipse Foundation. Congrats Firefox!

  3. Probably a greater effect than at work by SteelV · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Once these employees are using FireFox at work, there is a good chance that they'll start to use it as home, as well (once they get used to it, and if they like it more than IE which usually seems to be the case). Then they can tell family and friends (I've personally only convinced a few people to switch, but those ten or so have told others, and it spreads).

    Personally, I prefer Safari over FireFox (I don't need too many extensions, just a simple browsing experience) but when I'm on a windows machine I only use FireFox.

  4. About time by M3rk1n_Muffl3y · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I work at a major investment bank and just yesterday they decided to send a memo around saying that Firefox is not to be used. I wonder why that was? No, really does anyone have any suggestions.

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    1. Re:About time by alw53 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      These organizations probably get a price break from M$FT in exchange for blocking users of anything else.

    2. Re:About time by ch-chuck · · Score: 2, Interesting

      because they have a seriously long position in M$ft?

      --
      try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
    3. Re:About time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Because unlike IE, FireFox allows yoo to completely delete all browsing history it saves on your PC. Maybe your corporate snoops are addicted to looking at your secret MS .dat files that save every URL you ever went to.

  5. Tech Support / Costs by RailGunner · · Score: 4, Interesting
    I'd personally like to see an estimate on the costs savings of switching to Firefox from IE. It costs IT departments a lot of (wasted) money cleaning up desktops that have been compromised by a malicious ActiveX control.

    Since I'm sure some bean counter had to approve the switching, it seems to me that some cost analysis had to be done, and they realized Firefox would have a lower "TCO".

    I'm sure getting away from being dependent on a rival's product factored into the decision, but I'm pretty sure cost factored as well.

  6. Re:Surprising no one... by Spiked_Three · · Score: 3, Interesting

    You obviously have not been around very long. 20 years ago IBM would gladly sit at the table and argue why proprietary systems were better. Sure, they are singing the 'open source' and 'open standards' line now, but it IS NOT tradition, nor should it be thought of as anything more than a phase they see as the way to make the most money at the moment.

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  7. Firefox on eComStation by user_ecs · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I use Firefox on the eComStation operating system. Best browser on the best OS. www.ecomstation.com

  8. Will Firefox make it to the systems as default? by bogaboga · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Will Firefox make it to the computer systems IBM ships as the default browser? That will even be better. Can IBM flex muscles here? I doubt. The surest way of denting IE's share is by governments ordering PCs specifying that the browser installed should meet all W3C standards that the browser supports 100%. I understand that in procurement, specifying a product name is not allowed, so mentioning Firefox as the browser is a non-starter.

  9. Re:Good example? by Zlorfik · · Score: 5, Interesting

    As an IBM employee, I was shocked how virtually every internal app worked with Firefox right from the get go.

    That's when I knew this browser was for real in terms of being an IE replacement.

  10. They have a massive Linux migration underway by winkydink · · Score: 2, Interesting

    They've publicly announced they want to put Linux on every desktop. What browser do you think they're going to use? lynx?

    --

    "I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey

  11. Didn't they announce a transition to linux too? by nietsch · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Wasn't it about a year ago that IBM top honcho declared that all of IBM would switch to using linux? Now that would be a impressive feat if they pulled that off.
    10% of IBM employees pales in comparison to that. But the PR spinmeisters hoped you would have forgotten that already, i guess.

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    This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
  12. Re:Firefox runs *very* well under OS/2. by cens0r · · Score: 2, Interesting

    How come firefox shows it is using multiple threads when i look at it in my task manager if it is not already multithreaded?

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  13. Welding Technology Corp did this in 2004 by kihjin · · Score: 2, Interesting
    News: Friday, June 25, 2004 by -------

    There is a critical flaw in Microsoft's Internet Explorer web browser (the thing you visit web sites, or browse, with). There is no patch for it yet, and major commercial web sites are being cracked by bad guys to put code on them that takes advantage of this flaw, without the visitor's knowledge.

    Until there is a patch for this problem, WTC team members MUST do one of the following:

    Disable Internet Explorer's JavaScript (or "Active Scripting," as they call it). (Instructions below.) Or...

    Use either Mozilla or FireFox, if you have it installed (See below) or...

    DO NOT USE your web browser

    WARNING: Our firewalls CANNOT protect the desktop PCs from this threat. Team Members *MUST* take one of the above listed actions
    The memo goes on to explain how to disable the active scripting, and also explains downloading FireFox.

    It's good news that IBM followed suit, of course. But, I can only wonder what took them so long. :)
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  14. Approved on some USAF Networks by jascat · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I use Firefox every day on my computer at work, which is on a US Air Force network. It is approved and I do my best to encourage the users I support to use it. Since I am IT Support, I sure as hell provide support to them.

    Another poster mentioned TCO for using Firefox over IE and while I can't provide numbers, I know I rarely see a system with spyware/adware who's user primarily uses Firefox.

  15. Re:Support? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Other IBM'ers will probably pop up to mention this, but it's not "just a browser" for us. Nearly every internal application is web-based. Payroll, benefits, commission tracking, bonuses, IRS form submission, expense tracking, travel reservations, all of our internal technical and sales information (called XL), our forums, blogs, knowledge bases....I could go on.

    When you use this as a reference, remember that IBM isn't just picking a browser, it's picking an application framework. Support, in this case, is MUCH GREATER, MORE INTENSE, and it's clear IBM thinks the costs work out.

    - proud to be blue

  16. Re:Good reference case by leonbev · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Ha, are you serious?!? IBM's has thousands of employees that are secretaries, accountants, and upper level managers who haven't done anything technical since green screen terminals were on everyone's desk. Fortunately, the learning curve for Firefox is VERY low, or IBM would have never considered deploying it.

    Besides, most of the IBM techies have already installed Firefox on their own computers, and stopped using IE months ago. This deployment probably geared towards everyone else in the company who can't or won't figure out how to install the browser on their own.

  17. Re:Really? by Greyfox · · Score: 2, Interesting
    That web page says on that web page (See second bullet item) that it's opimised for IE6 and suggests that you use IE to browse the site.

    I wouldn't know personally, since I don't do Windows.

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