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Internet Explorer 7 To Be XP Only
WindozeSux writes "The new Microsoft browser, Internet Explorer 7 will only be available for users of Windows XP. However, due to the fact the that a large amount of Windows users do not own Windows XP, IE7 is expected to boost the amount of Firefox users. From the article: 'Improvements in Firefox, along with IE 7 restrictions, could lead to a dramatic increase in the open-source browser's market share, according to Dotzler.'"
No IE7 For 2k, Now In Extended Service... posted by ZONK! More proof he doesn't read things he approves.
This is getting scary.
] $/])for@F;$_="$s[-1]\n"'
We must fight against the Mozilla organization, for it distributes a "gateway OSS", which leads users down the path towards more powerful OSS, such as perl and emacs, which can be downright dangerous, leading to all sorts of permanent afflictions such as repetitive stress syndrome (featured in the well-known film, "Ctrlfinger"), as well as a gluttonous addiction to loosely typed programming languages. Over time, they tend to turn into "hackers," exploiting and even distributing OSS from their basements. This is just the first stage.
In Stage II, they join nefarious communities, with alien names such as "comp.theory," even wasting weeks and weeks to learn foreign languages just to communicate in locations such as "ruby-dev". They also begin typing in tongues. Just the other day, at our clinic, I walked across one addict with a window open, or I think it was a window -- the screen was all weird with footprints and insignia all over it, and in it he was writing material which looked like text yet did not read like text. It looked like he was trying to express something with a violent combination of chomps and chops and splices!
At Stage III, they begin idol-worship -- of demons and penguins, displaying their idols in public with stickers on their laptops. They begin to find pleasure in strange, alien activities, like changing their keyboard layouts around so that nobody else can use them, and buying calculators that read in input in some backwards order, with no equals key, and then they become fanatics who insist that everybody should learn this backwards method! If you ever see somebody lend out a calculator and then smirk when a borrower innocently walks away, you know they have reached Stage III.
At Stage IV, they wonder how to emulate their freshly bought calculator on their computer, in one of the tongues that they have learned. Those who have spent weeks of using the powerful and addictive OSS called perl begin to write "rpn.pl" in progressively smaller scripts, using that violent abortion of chops and slices. First, they make one that works in twelve lines, which is unhealthily short already. Then they naturally levitate towards three lines, two lines, one and a half lines, exhibiting some obsession towards achieving their goal in less than 80 characters. Some succeed, but only after several nervous breakdowns and complete distachment from spouse and family. Some begin their ramblings with references to primates, as seen in one quotation I've seen,
perl -ape 'eval(("\$s[-2]$_=pop\@s",q[push@s,$_])[!/^[-+*\/
If they succeed, this usually means that Stage V has been reached. It is believed that they begin to realize that they are seriously damaged, because they rather suddenly start mumbling about the "brainfuck" they're enduring. This realization dies away quickly, as they type out long meaningless random strings.
Occasionally, they manage to come out from their mental ruts, but only for short periods of time. These spells give our researchers a rare glimpse at what happens to their minds, as they make repeated references to things that don't exist, except perhaps in their hallucinations. They still have connections to their dreamworld. For example, I mentioned to one patient about how my niece got an A++ on a recent examination in school. And the patient replied, "She got a B? Well, better luck next time." He must have misheard, or so I thought, so I answered, "No, she got an A++," enunciating the A + + slowly. And the patient smiled knowingly, responding: "Exactly. I hope she gets an A next time." I gave up on that conversation.
There are further stages of this terrible affliction, but they would be too graphic to list here. My point is, this "Firefox" isn't just a harmless OSS that causes minor but and temporary impairment; it is the first step of a path towards destruction, and we must fight its spread with all our resources.
I doubt this will cause a 'dramatic' increase. The kind of people not running XP aren't the kind of people who care about upgrading their browser either. They will probably stick with IE5/6 whatever they are currently using and continue to be oblivious to the options available to them. Those people who are even following IE7 or even care, are the kind of people who are already using Firefox/Opera/etc anyway.
"a large amount of Windows users do not own Windows XP"
I'd say that a large amount of the Windows XP users also do not own Windows XP...
...making the browser part of the OS is a Bad Idea. If it was "just an app", it could (probably) easily be made to run on Win2K. Since it's in bed with the OS, upgrading the browser now requires an SP-level update to the OS.
Dumb. Very dumb.
MS realized that the last IE as well as the last OS (prior to XP) had some major security problems. Making all software back compatible is only going to make them more susceptible to similar problems. Going forward, and considering the fact that it has been over 5 years since the release of XP, it is thus wise that they are restricting it to XP only. In the IT industry, if you have not upgraded in 5 years (user programs, OS, Apps etc - not mission critical infrastructure), then there's something lacking and left to be desired. The software industry is constantly evolving and so should you. Who here run pre-2.0 kernel on their Linux boxes? I am sure some of you do, but not many.
I don't remember anyone suing RH for cutting the support for RH 9.x and before, or not releasing a binary of a new product for the RH platform.
for the last time people, I am "frodo from middle eaRTH", not "middle eaST".
But how long will it be before M$ discontinues IE7 updates for users of XP given that that OS is almost 5 years old? I am still not so happy with Firefox on Linux mainly because it looks a bit ugly as compared to its windows counterpart. I am sure work is being done in this department.
Microsoft would be open to so many lawsuits that they would actually notice.
On what grounds? Were there any lawsuits when IE 6 SP2 was made available only as part of Windows XP SP2?
Part of the reasons MS's product releases take so long and are so complex is their obligation to be backwardly compatible with all previous versions. And they've done a great job of it. (I have software that was written in 1994 for Windows 3.1 and it still runs fine on XP.)
Cutting the cord and telling Windows user's they must have XP is tough love, but will likely result in a more stable product and faster maintenance releases.
This approached worked great for Apple when they went to OS X.
Sam
Guess it sucks for you LOSERS who only use Linux. My copy of XP, with IE 7, is sure to make me a hit with all the ladies! Look at all the advantages of IE 7 over Firefox. 1) Better security 2) Tabbed Browsing 3) More compatibility ... wait...
DOH!
But it's still better, because I SAY SO! mIcR0$of+ ru135!
All my liberal friends think I'm a conservative, all my conservative friends think I'm a liberal.
This isn't good news for the web in general. One of the better things to come from XP was IE 6.0, which brought an improved CSS model to both XP and 2000 at the time. If the improvements in IE 7.0 are restricted to Longhorn only, it could be a very long time before reliance on older methods can begin to fade out. I'd like to believe a lot of the users will move to Firefox, but due to its already high levels of publicity, I'm unsure as to just how much of an unaware market remains for a 'better browser'
Business Voyeur
....they'll release versions of Internet Explorer 7 for Windows 2000 and Windows ME as well. Heck, they should release IE 7 for Windows 98 and Windows NT 4. There are still tens of millions of users (like myself) still using these older versions of Windows, who don't feel like "upgrading" to XP, and who won't have an updated Internet Explorer browser. However, the latest Firefox is readily available for every Windows version that supports Win32 except for Windows NT 3.x. If Microsoft truly cared about trying to steal Firefox's thunder, they should port Internet Explorer to a few older versions of Windows. I don't know too many people who would spend $100+ for an operating system just for a browser.
Well, it doesn't look like I'm giving up Firefox on my Windows NT laptop. Long live Firefox!
The predicted mass conversion to Firefox is flawed reasoning. IE 6 users aren't going to say, "Oh my gosh, IE 7 for XP is out! My IE 6 on 98 is now worthless! Oh horrors! I'd better download Firefox pronto!"
They'll just ignore the announcement and keep on using IE 6.0, 5.5, and 5.0, just as they have been for years.
Didn't we already know that IE7 would be XP only? Also, why would that boost FF numbers? There are users still using Windows 98 and IE4. Why haven't they switched to FF? Why would those who haven't updated to XP or to FF all of a sudden start using FF when IE7 for XP is released??
...you understand every single word of that. I enjoyed that quite a bit, especially the "A++" part.
I think most people (though not you) find dropping support for a 5 year old OS pretty reasonable.
... a large amount of Windows users do not own Windows XP ...
No wonder Bill Gates is complaining about software piracy. All Windows user should own a legal copy of Windows XP.
The saddest part about the entire thing isn't that they will do this, that is inevitable, this is Microsoft after all. The saddest part is that they know the reprocussions that will come, they know the lawsuits that will be filed, they know all the pain and torment they cause us all. But why, oh why sweet god do they continue? Because everyone keeps buying.
Thus, MS is screwed no matter what they do:
If they choose door #1, they will ultimately destroy themselves trying to secure the versions of their products that run on a fundamentally insecure base. They know this.
If they choose door #2, the A group users will continue to use their existing platform for as long as possible. When MS's lack of support finally burns them, they will jump ship and migrate to Linux/Mac (which are more than capable for light E-Mail, Web, music, the occasional document, etc) because their old PII is incapable of running XP, let alone Vista. The group B users will probably grudgingly upgrade and keep an eagle eye out for any escape route. They know this too.
Ultimately, because of this effect, MS will see a huge loss of market share because thier current business strategy (Provide the minimum quality of software needed to keep users from jumping ship) fails in the face of mature competitors (Linux, Mac, Solaris (?)). Then they will be forced to clean their platform up and take their place alongside other vendors. Competition is wonderful.
Microsoft undoubtedly knows all of this, and is trying to delay it as long as possible by trying to find a less-unacceptable mix of options 1 and 2. Eventually, they will have to start weaning users off of old platforms. This is it.
"Nobody owns XP, it's licensed, like most software."
Oh, yeah, that made a big fucking dent in his point.
"Derp de derp."
You can say that the Linux browsers are backward compatible but I would like to see you take modern v ersions of Firefox or KDE and the like and build/install it on a distribution from 1999/2000. Can you imagine the library differences or the effort you would have with upgrading all of the RPMs in a version of RedHat from that era. Now, since you are charged for most of the commercial Linux distros when you are told to upgrade the distro for the sake of getting modern libraries you are in essence being told to upgrade to get a modern browser and modern versions of all of the software. This is totally ok but when MS wants to depricate their OSes in the same way you hear "they are charging $100 for just a browser upgrade." You are not paying just for a browser upgrade but an upgrade to all of the latest versions of everyting in the OS and you are paying for the security and bug fix updates for years and years. MS is a company and they put out a good product in modern windows and office that is worth paying for. I love and I use Linux but I get disgusted occasionally by such bias, double-standards and MS-can-do-no-right additude.
Actually.... Windows XP has been Pwn3d several times.....
The network I admin is all Win2000 machines. I've already started putting firefox on some of them and the money and time it's saved me and my company on maintenance is very measurable and it's no small amount.
Now I have justification to replace IE on every machine with firefox, since inevitably some sites will become IE7 only and Firefox has done pretty well in rendering even these IE only broken websites.
This may even help justify not ever buying XP and waiting until the next windows release.
MS just lost a big sale and saved us a ton of money!
Don't you know?
Mods don't read before they submit their moderations. Heavens know I never do... O_o
XP is newer, but not necessarily better. Windows 2000 is one of the best and probably the most stable operating system that Micro$oft has ever produced. There is no compelling reason to switch a well functioning Win2K system to XP. Again, If it's not broken, why does it need to be fixed?
Now if IE fuckes up a computer, and someone gets pissed off enough, they can sue Microsoft, saying the user PAID money for a product and trusted that product.
Actually, you didn't pay for IE. You payed for Windows, and IE came free with it. It was a cunning move Microsoft made back in the day.
In fact, It was a good move on Microsoft's part to make IE free. Since IE is based on NCSA Mosiac technology, MS agreed to pay a small quarterly license fee plus a share of the profits from IE to NCSA. Since IE has been free for the past decade, all NCSA has gotten has been the small quarterly license fees.
NCSA thought they had a good deal, but ended up getting the short end of the stick.
Frink: Nice try floyd, but you were designed for scrubbing, and scrubbing is what you shall do.
In fact, It was a good move on Microsoft's part to make IE free. Since IE is based on NCSA Mosiac technology, MS agreed to pay a small quarterly license fee plus a share of the profits from IE to NCSA. Since IE has been free for the past decade, all NCSA has gotten has been the small quarterly license fees.
NCSA thought they had a good deal, but ended up getting the short end of the stick.
I thought Microsofts whole argument when sued for anti-trust and asked to seperate IE from the OS was that IE is so bound to the OS that it is impossible to remove IE from Windows.
If that is true, then IE is not free. It is part of the operating system.
If I was NCSA, I would find a good law firm and sue Microsoft. How many people would have purchased windows the past 10 years if it did not come with IE? It was part of the sale. It is not like Microsoft sold windows, and then had IE available for download, or on a second CD with 2 or 3 different browsers to chose from.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
See?! Tequila makes me funny!
Edward@Tomato - /home/Edward/ man woman
man: no entry for woman in the manual.
"Qua!?"
Okay, I'm naive, but I don't see this. The primary reason that MS IE is the main browser is simply that people aren't changing from the default on their PCs. This isn't going to change simply because a new MS browser is released. I imagine that most of the XP users won't upgrade either, unless it's forced on them as a security upgrade. (Which may very well happen.)
The people running older versions of Windows will merrily keep running whatever dreck was originally installed as the browser on their machines.
What I see happening will be that MS IE 6 will take a hit in market share, which will be taken up by MS IE 7. If there is a significant difference in the browsing experience, people may react to the change by moving to another browser (I have to admit that is likely firefox, though I am not an FF fanbot) but this will not be the common trend. The greater portion of MS IE users will just keep trundling along.
.. paranoid crackpot leftover from the days of Amiga.
Yes, but if you read Microsoft's EULA, you'll quickly see that they disclaim all liability for its use or misuse, the product is licensed AS-IS, the product is not fit for any particular purpose, and they grant no warranties of any kind, explicit or implied. In other words, you can try to sue Microsoft, but it will be dismissed so fast you won't know what hit you.
:-), using Microsoft and most other general-purpose commercial software programs is just like letting your friend store his lawnmower in your shed for $5 or even $500 but under a contract that explicitly states that anything stored in that shed is the renter's full responsibility and that if anything happens to that shed and, consequently, the renter's property in that shed, then the renter has no recourse at all, other than whining on Slashdot or consumer product boards about how bad the shed owner is. (of course, for the sake of argument, this was a contract that had the renter sign and/or initial every paragraph and write out that he/she fully understands that he/she has absolutely no legal recourse and waives all rights to civil and criminal proceedings other than those explicitly granted by law, but I digress again. Perhaps it could even be worded that storing property in the shed constitutes full legal abandonment of said property). So how is that different from open-source software that a company paid no money for?
:-).
:-).
Say someone at Microsoft embeds a cute virus or tracking cookie or something (according to many, they already have in the form of Alexa cookies, but I digress). People may screem and shout Holy Murder all they want, but because they licensed the software and agreed to pay Microsoft for a product that has no warranties and no assumption of wrongdoing on the part of Microsoft, other than, perhaps, defective media on boxed products, then it's tough cookies.
To expand on your analogy
However, not all is lost for the lawnmower owner. Both open-source and commercial vendors typically offer support and warranty services for an extra, typically annual or per-incident, fee. The Mozilla Foundation offers telephone support and probably other options as does Microsoft. If a company is so inclined, it can purchase these support options from the Mozilla Foundation and others. Companies don't have to, but it's there for those who want or need it. And bam, there's the legal obligation to make it all work
Mozilla developers have their collective and individual reputations to keep their software in check. If a process breakdown or malicious intent resulted in an official release of Firefox containing malware and viruses, that would probably spell significant doom for Firefox, especially if it was malicious intent. Same thing with Microsoft, though with Firefox, the Mozilla Foundation invites everyone to see the "man behind the curtain" in the form of source code, minutes, and the like while Microsoft keeps that under lock and key, requiring the Mozilla foundation to be especially careful in what it puts in and keeps out of Firefox.
As a minor nitpick, Firefox does have an organization behind it -- the Mozilla Foundation. And that foundation has interests and a reputation to protect and defend. So, for those who believe that they can sue software creators, one could sue the Mozilla Foundation just as easily as they can sue Microsoft (though, in both cases, the suit would highly likely be thrown out).
Just my $0.02
As another way of looking at it, couldn't an IT Manager that ignores Firefox and insists on using Microsoft Internet Explorer as their organization's desktop web browser be reprimanded for knowingly deploying a product throughout the organization that is known to have significant security holes and an active exploit community, thus knowingly putting their company in harm's way when a known safer, (mostly) compatible, and open-source alternative with the backing of top-tier software companies exists? When combined with organizations th
Wow. Just wow.
There is far more to the law than whether you pay for something. Try asking a lawyer about promissory estoppel, and enjoy.
Microsoft no doubt have all kinds of disclaimers written into their EULAs about not being liable for more than the price paid for the software, etc. So do many other firms. I'm not aware of these ever being tested in court anywhere, which makes me suspect it's clear to lawyers that they are valid (given the obvious scope for massive damages if it weren't, and how long they've been routine for).
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Because moderators are idiots.
Every time I'm trying to be funny, Slashdot mods give me a +5, INTERESTING or INSIGHTFUL. Every time I'm trying to be insightful or interesting, they give me a +5, FUNNY.
So stop loading your browser. Keep it open.
Oh, wait, IE crashes a lot.
Never mind.
By the way, if you'd seriously compare the two, you'd see that Firefox renders pages much faster than IE, which is the primary reason I used to use Opera and now use Firefox. Which is far more important than how fast it loads.
My main irritation with Firefox is memory leaks, which supposedly will be fixed in the next major release.
Compared to IE, Firefox crashes much less often, renders 98% of Web pages correctly, and still works with my bank's security even though they say it's not supported.
The only time I need IE is handling some online multimedia situations where Active X controls are required, and the occasional secure site that doesn't work with Firefox, and the fairly rare site which is so heavily IE-specific that page menus and links don't work at all.
Another advantage to Firefox is its extensibility. If I don't like something about it, somebody else won't like it either and will do an extension to correct the problem. As it is, I only use four or five extensions, all of which are to correct irritations or provide features I used to have on Opera (such as the "z" page back key.)
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
Wrong. Windows 2000's mainstream support was retired on June 30th, 2005. See here.Microsoft will continue to support Windows 2000 for corporations that have purchased the extended support license until 2010.
However, according to this site, Microsoft is going to support IE6 until September 2006. I'm not really sure what that means since they haven't updated the browser significantly in 2 years or so.
IE7 will be bundled with Longhorn, and people will likely continue to use whatever is bundled on their PC's... I don't see IE's dominance letting up anytime soon, despite Firefox being a superior browser (in my opinion).
Karma police, arrest this man, he talks in maths....
I think the man deserves +5 Funny for this very insightful post.
I'm utterly stumped as to why ANYONE would think this will move people to firefox. Let's review: NOBODY is "waiting" for IE7 on 2k. If they're using IE6, it's for a reason. Hell, 2k for "home users" in all reality is non-existant. None of the major vendors ever sold 2k en masse to the general public. Any corporations that are using 2k are usine IE for internal pages, and news flash: they don't give a flying fuck about PNG support, or the latest tabbed browsing, when it comes to internal pages that have Active-X type functions.
IE7 isn't going to change anyone over. Nobody will upgrade "just for IE7", and nobody is switching to firefox just because IE7 isn't available for 2k. If you really believe that any major enterprise will be like "oh, we can't get *native* tabbed browsing for IE, let's spend $10million on a new web system so that we can use firefox with it, you're a crackhead.
Basically anything firefox can do, someone has made an add-on for IE. It may not be native, but I doubt the majority of IE users give a flying fcuk.
Microsoft went this route already with DirectX, which is why nobody who likes computer games runs Win95 (or Win98 non-SE) anymore. You need at least Win98SE to use DirectX 9.0b/c, and they plan to require Win2k to use DirectX 9.0d.
However, this leverage actually has some effect, because a lot of games don't include both DirectX and OpenGL support, and hardware manufacturers have no interest in writing new drivers for old OSes when the DirectX component won't even work on the old OS. So, in order to play the next generation of games, users are forced to upgrade.
On the other hand, in the web browsing arena, any competent web browser gives you the same functionality as IE (if not better), and there are several to choose from. What's more, the current crop of web browsers is not under threat of obsolescence, since web standards don't change nearly fast enough to make that happen. IE7 not working in anything earlier than XP might not create a mass exodus to Firefox, but it also won't cause mass upgrades to XP, as long as IE6 still works.
Note that I'm not saying that Microsoft's original intentions related to either DirectX or IE7 were to coerce users into upgrading. However, I'm sure that once their team of marketing wonks got ahold of the idea, any concerns held by the programmers about unsupported users were quickly cut asunder.
The software industry is constantly evolving and so should you.
What does a business benefit, if their current software does the job? Is a new version of Word going to suddenly make all of a secretary's documents better? Are their spreadsheets suddenly going to command more attention?
And as far as IE7 is concerned, what will it bring to a business whose intranet is optimized for IE6?
None of these increase cashflow; in fact, they will probably reduce productivity with all the Help Desk calls it'll generate when the new software doesn't look exactly like the old.
Most businesses will get IE7 when they buy new machines, not before.
"I might have made a tactical error in not going to a physician for 20 years." -- Warren Zevon
Oh yeah... like it is such a big thing that IEX 7 is for the XP only. What is the big deal? Another product out of Redmond will be buggy at first and soon the updates will be following. So folks will change to Firefox..big deal or.. even switch to Apple with Safari.(the best choice ofcourse) And those still using 98SE/ME/2000? Let them..at least they don't have to worry about those frequent patches/updates..
" Always look on the bright side of life "
That's what happens when it's tied into the operating system. If it was a self-contained browser it wouldn't be that difficult to backport.
No existe.
That wasn't very insightful.
sig?
Unless it relied on security features in Windows XP...
That's pretty dumb; why the hell should it? As I understand it, Firefox doesn't depend on any features of any operating system or any architecture, so long as Gecko has a way to render and Firefox has a way to show itself as well. Yet, it's at least as secure as MSIE (probably including 7!), if not even more so. Though I could be mistaken.
It's not even (entirely) a matter of religion; Firefox really is (or at least seems) operating system independent, so long as the OS has a GUI. It relies on its own security features and just the GUI itself; no more, no less.
But please for the love of $DEITY correct me if I'm wrong.
Um, what security features?
Sick of WoW? Try the thinking man's MMORPG: EVE Online
I mean, let's be frank. There are a *horde* of basic bugfixes that are meant to be in IE7; things which will bring it into compliancy and free an awful lot of people using an awful lot of broken implmentations.
This was supposed to be a real gift and boon to the Web - something Microsoft was finally going to do right. They were going to release a version of IE which fixed most of the glaring bugs, fixed PNG transparency, brought forward a lot of basic technology that all of the other standards-based browsers have.
And now? Now they're not releasing it for the majority of platforms that people are using.
They've just taken that goodwill that they were building on, and chucked it out the window, because now they're giving us just another browser, one which will take much longer to "trickle down" into the main browser population. Their gift of the shiny red apple turns out to have a worm in it.
No, this sucks. In every possible way, this sucks. This decision guarantees a future where our work just got harder. I see nothing good in this decision for anyone but Microsoft; it certainly isn't in the users' best interest, nor in the best interest of the web or the quality of the web on IE platforms. Nobody's going to care about new features in IE7 when they're still stuck supporting IE6, and Microsoft deserves the compatibility it will inevitably end up with.
-- A mind is a terrible thing.
They don't read the content of the posts they moderate because the search system sucks?
Did you read the parent posts at all?
(This adds a very ironic twist to the entire debate, a sort of meta-"lack-of-reading"...
On the bright side, it lightens up my workday, which is veeeery dreary atm...