Internet Explorer 8 Delayed Until 2009

Barence writes "Microsoft has confirmed that Internet Explorer 8 will not be officially released until 2009. According to a blog posting on the Internet Explorer 8 development site, a release candidate of the browser will be released in the first quarter of next year, to be followed by a final release at an unspecified date. This news comes on the same day that Google is considering bundling its Chrome browser with new PCs. Will the IE delay and Google's tactics help to steer users in Chrome's direction?"

Comments

how

[ionix5891]

does a company with so much cash and resources is unable to release a good browser is beyond me

must be all the bureaucracy or some sort of internal politics

IE does so much harm to microsoft's image, are they just blind in the Death Star to notice the bad will being generated?

Re:how

[kandela]

Yeah, how long will it take before Google gets it right?

Re:how

[ionix5891]

google are a marketing company they dont have to get it "right" technically, they just have to make it appear that they got it right

Re:how

[cp.tar]

Yeah, how long will it take before Google gets it right?

Dunno. How long before Gmail gets out of beta?

Re:how

[jellomizer]

They give it away from free and still have a huge majority of the market share.
So...
1. They don't have any financial motives to make it excellent just to keep it from being left behind.
2. As long as they keep the majority in market share developers will still develop and test with it.

All the changes and features are basically keep up features with some easy to program "innovative" stuff just to keep it on the radar. If you have done any software development you need to realize it is difficult to have a clean timeline of code especially with scope that Microsoft needs to have (Works for all Systems, Business and Personal Use, Good Security, Huge Flexibility...) In general Microsoft hates saying no to its customer so they often end up creating applications that meet all the customer request but fail to do what the customers want.

This is part of the Apple popularly surge. Apple likes to say no to a lot of good features. As they realize if it is implemented the majority may suffer to make the minority a little bit happier.

Re:how

[lukas84]

You're not looking at the whole picture.

IE does a lot of things right, which no other browser does.

Centrally managing IE in a Windows Environment is a breeze - everything can be configured using Group Policies, a powerful tool that automates application customization.

Deploying and upgrading IE is also easy, as it utilizes the same Windows Update infrastructure that is already in place - using the free WSUS product in small businesses, or WSUS/SCCM in larger businesses.

IE also allows powerful intranet applications and custom security zones that can also be configured centrally - yes, this feature has been the source of many a security problem, but businesses don't buy computers because they're secure, but because they solve business problems.

Firefox, Opera and Chrome seem to have little to no interest in being used in corporate IT environments, where automated deployment and central management is key.

Re:how

[TheRaven64]

Developing a browser seems very expensive. The Mozilla foundation spent $20m last year alone. I'm not sure how much Apple, Nokia, Google, Adobe, and all of the other WebKit contributors have spent jointly, but I'd imagine it's a lot.

Re:how

[mfh]

must be all the bureaucracy or some sort of internal politics

It's definitely part of the recipe for these kinds of projects. The main thing we see in big projects that are beyond a first or third iteration (like IE) is that most of the original team is gone and most of the original vision has changed, either for political reasons or for necessary course corrections, and both of which must be true for IE. Nobody on the IE team shares the exact same vision for IE. Many fragments of the IE userbase have likely caused conflicts between team members from design to production. Conflicts cause issues in every aspect of development, but also they cause turnover.

We know people were promoted out of the IE team, and promoted out of the company. In a case like Microsoft, it's been years since the first iteration, and IE has gone through so many revisions that there is a high likelihood for spaghetti code and feature creep to crush project fluidity. They have rewritten the whole thing, how many times now?

While team members wielding political weapons must be crushed on sight by worthy adversaries, it doesn't happen enough because people are afraid of repercussions. Unless you are Steve Ballmer, then you throw a chair and hit the wrong person.

Re:how

[RAMMS EIN]

Having a lot of money isn't necessarily going to speed up development. Developing complex software (which MS Internet Explorer is) takes time. You can use money to hire more developers, and that can speed things up, but, after a certain point, having more programmers will actually slow down development. You can use money to hire better programmers, but that has its limits, too. The same goes for buying faster hardware and better development tools. At some point, you just can't make things go faster, no matter how much money you have.

Re:how

[kandela]

Ok, modded as a troll it is. However, not so long ago we were calling microsoft evil for the way in which they proliferated their O/S and browser by having it bundled with new PCs. Now that Google is doing this it is suddenly ok? For me their priority should have been perfecting their browser (and it isn't as good as its competition yet) before engaging in the "evil" aggressive marketing tactics of its competitor. That is what I call 'getting it right'.

And I also agree with someone else who pointed out 2009 is only 6 weeks away. That's not so long for the successor to a browser that is still very competitive. Microsoft 'have it right' in this instance: make sure the successor is air tight before replacing a solid product.

Re:how

[sveard]

Microsoft 'have it right' in this instance: make sure the successor is air tight before replacing a solid product.

Internet Explorer 7 is NOT a solid product, and I'm sure Internet Explorer 8 will NOT be "air tight".

Also, Google bundling Chrome is surely different from what Microsoft has done with Windows and Internet Explorer, no?

Re:how

[diegocgteleline.es]

In the past, Microsoft was able to catch up and kill Netscape -or any other competitor-, no matter how "complex" it was to build the software needed. Why they can't do it anymore is a mistery for me.

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

Centrally managing IE in a Windows Environment is a breeze - everything can be configured using Group Policies, a powerful tool that automates application customization.

Microsoft leveraging the fact that it owns the OS.

Deploying and upgrading IE is also easy, as it utilizes the same Windows Update infrastructure that is already in place - using the free WSUS product in small businesses, or WSUS/SCCM in larger businesses.

Again, leveraging the fact that MS owns the OS and IE.

IE also allows powerful intranet applications and custom security zones that can also be configured centrally - yes, this feature has been the source of many a security problems, but businesses don't buy computers because they're secure, but because they solve business problems.

Well, there you go. The source of security problems. I wonder how long businesses will be able to ignore security before someone starts bringing the negligence suits? Or have they already started?

Firefox, Opera and Chrome seem to have little to no interest in being used in corporate IT environments, where automated deployment and central management is key.

Most of the "things IE does well" that you mention are properly the function of the OS, not the browser. MS is only able to achieve these things because the OS and the browser are still so closely tied, something that just isn't possible on the same level for the other browsers.

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

>Now that Google is doing this it is suddenly ok?

You must be new here.

Re:how

[poetmatt]

There's a difference here. Putting chrome on a PC that automatically has IE (thanks, microsoft) means you have a choice. If we included firefox and safari, even moreso. It is at this point people can then say that they want IE completely removed from a PC. It may not be the same as selling PCs that don't have windows bundled but it is a step in the right direction.

Microsoft have nothing right or wrong in this instance, all they are doing is pushing back development as they are doing a crappy job as always.

Re:how

[lukas84]

Microsoft leveraging the fact that it owns the OS.

Integration is certainly one of the big selling points of Microsoft, but Group Policy is an open platform, there is absolutely nothing preventing Chrome/Opera/Firefox from adding GP support. Heck, there's even a third-party Firefox build out there that implements this to some extent (Frontmotion).

MS is only able to achieve these things because the OS and the browser are still so closely tied, something that just isn't possible on the same level for the other browsers.

Sorry, but many other vendors have got their central management and update of applications on Windows working perfectly well.

Re:how

[lukas84]

Urm, hopefully both?

No, most definitely not. Have you looked at the security setup in most ERP/LOB software packages out there?

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

You make it sound like Firefox is air-tight, when it has issues of it's own. Is there a single air-tight Browser out there, really?

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

You're right. It's excellent in every way; except for rendering HTML.

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

More likely, M$ is waiting until its R&D department ( everybody else ) has finished development of their next generation browsers. Then they can harvest the most popular features of each, include them in ie8, and call it innovation.

Re:how

[dcrooks_ea]

Oh pish-posh, I bet if I hired a thousand programmers, I could create an Algol compiler in less than six months.

Re:how

[springbox]

We know people were promoted out of the IE team, and promoted out of the company.

So, they were fired?
Help! Help! I'm being promoted!

Re:how

[DiLLeMaN]

They didn't catch up only by coding a better browser. Making it a default part of the system surely helped things along too.

Also, the first IE was not built by MS anyway, it was NCSA Mosaic under a different name.

That being said: I really liked IE3 or IE4 on the Mac when it came out. It was simply a better browser than Netscape 2 or 3, which was bulky and slow. Web standards didn't count back then, so all people wanted was a browser that was relatively easy to use, and displayed most of the web somewhat OK. When IE5/Mac came out, it was at that point the most standards-compliant browser out there, IIRC. Too bad they axed that engine rather than use it as a replacement for trident.

But anyway: Microsoft tends to "catch up and kill" competitors by throwing wads of cash around, buying tech and marketing that straight to the top. Having to do stuff themselves often results in massive fail.

Re:how

[RulerOf]

Indeed, I feel bad when people are as ignorant as the GP.

I've never actually looked for it simply because IE6/7 + The IEAK (and its handy MSI's) are precisely what my company needs in order to effectively manage internet usage.

Until I see either some kind of "Firefox Deployment/Software Update Server," a-la Symantec Anti-Virus/Endpoint Protection, or an MSI Generator + well honed ADM/ADMX files for Firefox, it's not showing up on our corporate network outside of the IT Dept.

Firefox and Linux zealots tend not to understand this, I'm afraid. Much like a Linux Desktop OS, better for you != better for everyone.

Re:how

[Kent Recal]

Ehm, you confused google and microsoft there.
Microsoft is the marketing company. Google is a product company.

Google sets industry-standards with their products (search, gmail...) and people flock to them because they are better, not because google markets them anyhow. Seriously, have you seen an ad for google search or google mail ever?
Microsoft puts out crappy products and forces them down the consumers throats through their OS monopoly and aggressive marketing.

Re:how

[Kent Recal]

Ehm, what exactly needs to be "centrally managed" about a friggin' Web-Browser?
Drank a bit much of the MS kool-aid lately, did you?

Firefox can auto-detect the proxy server to use and updates itself over the intertubes.

What more do you need in your "corporate environment"?

Re:how

[drei0003019]

I already hear the phone ringing, my father on the other end, asking me which of the 5 pre-installed internets is the right one. And then there are still 3 browser to remove and one to cripple as much as possible to do no harm...

Re:how

[lysergic.acid]

also, the problem with Microsoft's bundling was that they were abusing their monopoly. they used the monopoly Windows held in the desktop OS market to gain an unfair monopoly in the browser market. this included integrating IE into Windows (making it impossible to uninstall) and forbidding OEMs from bundling competing browsers with their systems. this was a clear case of anticompetitive behavior.

there's nothing inherently wrong or illegal with bundling software with hardware. Nero does it, Apple does it, AOL does it, Microsoft certainly does it, and so do countless other companies. saying that Google is being just like MS by bundling their software is just demonstrating a complete lack of understanding of the antitrust case against Microsoft.

Re:how

[lukas84]

Ehm, what exactly needs to be "centrally managed" about a friggin' Web-Browser?

For example, which extensions may or may not be installed. Or what the homepage is set to. Or, disabling the Phishing Filter or enabling the Lookup-Portion of the Phishing Filter. Enable certain privacy settings by default, or disable them.

Firefox can auto-detect the proxy server to use and updates itself over the intertubes.

A feature which requires local administrative privileges, which is not the case in a corporate IT environment.

What more do you need in your "corporate environment"?

Lot's. You've obviously never worked in one, which is perfectly fine. But don't attack me just because you don't understand a large part of the global IT economy.

Re:how

[poetmatt]

What are you talking about? You can uninstall chrome, and you know what I mean by that comment.

Re:how

[DiLLeMaN]

Apple likes to say no to a lot of good features. As they realize if it is implemented the majority may suffer to make the minority a little bit happier.

Dude, all that counts is that it makes Steve Jobs happy. If he wants Feature X, it goes in. If he doesn't, it's out.

(this was intended +5 funny, not -2 troll -- I'm an Apple fanboy myself, thank you very much)

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, IE7 on Vista IS a solid product by any reasonable definition. (I don't have to cite any sources since you didn't). The halcyon days of drive by download malware are OVER with IE7 and Vista. You haven't noticed that? These days they have to get lusers to click on malware - they can't just auto-load it when you click a questionable link anymore.

Try running the new stuff before bashing it.

That said, I still do prefer Firefox (this post is written in FF 3.04) to IE7 and IE8 - mostly due to Adblock Plus. IE8 has gotten very close to FF otherwise.

Re:how

[Richard_at_work]

I beg to differ - Google is the very epitome of a marketing company, and your post is a damn good example of why. Googles products are you, not Gmail or search, you. Googles customers are its advertisers. The fact that you think Google is a product company proves that their marketing is second to none.

Re:how

[msromike]

It's the best browser that has ever been distributed for the average computer user to use. IE 8 will be better. That's why they use numbers at the end of the name to let you know there is a better one out there.

Firefox may be superior in some respects and not in others. I use both. When IE won't render a page correctly then I go use Firefox. Works well for me.

I am not sure what part of IE 7 is not solid. It never crashes and it displays web pages, media content and downloads files. What more is it supposed to do?

Re:how

[JackieBrown]

No, you are the one who brought up firefox

Re:how

[uassholes]

But he's right about microsucks.

Re:how

[uassholes]

IE does a lot of things right, which no other browser does.

Bwaaah haaw haaaa haaa.

Stop it, you're killing me!

Haaaa haaa haaaaaaaw. Choke, snortle.

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

I see ads for Google all the time on T.V. It's called product placement.

Re:how

[uassholes]

Insightful and funny too. Where are those damn mod points when you need them?

Re:how

[Tubal-Cain]

Until I see either some kind of "Firefox Deployment/Software Update Server," a-la Symantec Anti-Virus/Endpoint Protection, or an MSI Generator + well honed ADM/ADMX files for Firefox, it's not showing up on our corporate network outside of the IT Dept.

Good thing Firefox is open source.

1. Make your own FF server
2. Sell server package to enterprises
3. ?????
4. Profit!!!

Re:how

[Richard_at_work]

What more do you need in your "corporate environment"?

Considerably more than auto detecting the proxy server and updating - you really seem to be missing the point.

Some very good examples are default Favourites, very helpful in a lot of corporations (have you ever got the shit job of having to add a new favourite to a thousand PCs?), default Homepage, again very helpful, default popup blocker and security settings for known good websites that you have no control over but need to use, and local browser security settings for when you don't want your employees from setting their own proxy server or otherwise mess with the browser setup.

In short, everything you need to be applied to every one (or a majority) of your desktops - you can either have your PC setup bods do it manually, or you can just ghost a new machine and let the central management server do it. I know which I would rather do.

From the sound of it, you haven't had to deal with an corporate environment with more than a dozen or so desktops. Believe me, central management becomes extremely handy when you are dealing with a thousand desktops in multiple locations (or even 100 in one).

On the other hand, Firefox does have an Active Directory GPO template available for doing many of the things corporate admins require.

Re:how

[mfh]

Yeah the concept of being "promoted to customer" is synonymous with "being fired" -- especially in retail but it also applies to pretty much any company where you would end up using the product you were working on (many MSFT products are used daily by everyone). The customer is always right and is therefore your boss!! You can also promote yourself by taking a job with the competition.

Re:how

[uassholes]

No, it had nothing to do with technology. IE has always been inferior. Bundling it with Windblows is what killed Netscape.

But there's no "mystery", they're still a brutal, cut throat, win at any cost company that's totally uncaring about the advancement of computing; only making money through domination. For a recent example, look at the "Office Open XML" vs. "Open Office" farce: http://www.groklaw.net/search.php?query=office+open&keyType=phrase&datestart=&dateend=&topic=0&type=all&author=0&mode=search

Re:how

[uassholes]

Do people still use ie? Unbelievable!?

Re:how

[causality]

What are you talking about? You can uninstall chrome, and you know what I mean by that comment.

In my experience, knowing (or having the ability to know) what you meant does little to nothing to stop people from setting up a straw man that sounds similar to what you were saying and then talking about how wrong you were when they proceed to tear down that straw man. My favorites are when I anticipate this and go out of my way to explicitly clarify what I am saying and what I am not saying and someone proceeds to argue against a claim I was careful not to make. That people can do this and sincerely believe that they are right and that they really told me off is amazing.

An example of my own experiences with people who refuse to really listen to what you're saying and decide to respond to it anyway are here and this one is a particularly good example.

This is from http://www.thunderbolts.info/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=1171, which is a completely unrelated discussion. Yet, I believe this paragraph applies:

I've repeated on this forum a few times, if anyone wants to posit there [sic] own self-consistent framework I will follow it for the purposes of discussion with that person. My experience with communication is that people do not take this kind of care. As a result they read someone else's words but, instead of learning something new, they simply think of what THEY would be thinking if THEY were using those words. Nobody actually learns anything new (something that wasn't already in their head). Everyone stays stuck in their own head, although they have the illusion of communication because they unknowingly think/say the same things in many many different ways

Re:how

[pizzach]

At some point, you just can't make things go faster, no matter how much money you have.

Pft. That is just a sign that they aren't being inventive enough. The obvious solution here is to create a new programming language that will facilitate and speed up of IE developement. In fact, they should call the magical languge CIE (with available CIE++ and CIE-sharp bindings). [/bad joke end]

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

>>This is part of the Apple popularly surge. Apple likes to say no to a lot of good features. As they realize if it is implemented the majority may suffer to make the minority a little bit happier.

This notion is intellectually bankrupt. Apple did not gain an extreme popularity boost because it catered to the whims of some small subset while ignoring the feature requests of a broader use base.

Apple gained a huge popularity boost because it started spending money on marketing.

Re:how

[raddan]

Actually-- Firefox is quite easy to manage centrally. We use the same Microsoft tools that we use to manage our Windows domain; all you need to do to set policy in Firefox is modify the user.js file. Firefox even supports SSO with Kerberos and NTLM, and has the same "trusted domains" concept that IE has. Sure, there's no MMC snap-in to do this, but that does not make it hard to do in corporate environments.

Re:how

[Keeper Of Keys]

but businesses don't buy computers because they're secure, but because they solve business problems.

Urm, hopefully both?

Unfortunately, the GP has it right. Amazing as it may seem, many companies still don't seem to realise that web browsers, along with email, are the top vectors for malware.

I agree with the person who suggested Firefox/Chrome should provide methods of group managing their browsers, as surely this convenience is the main reason certain companies have an IE-only policy, rather than any security concerns (which, if added to the equation, often result in overzealous settings such as all javascript off all the time). How cool would it be if, as IT infrastructure person, you could configure everyone's NoScript whitelist from one control panel, for example?

Re:how

[lysergic.acid]

um, i was agreeing with you. i was saying that the GGP doesn't understand why the antitrust case was filed against MS.

Re:how

[Keeper Of Keys]

Ehm, what exactly needs to be "centrally managed" about a friggin' Web-Browser?

For example, which extensions may or may not be installed. Or what the homepage is set to. Or, disabling the Phishing Filter or enabling the Lookup-Portion of the Phishing Filter. Enable certain privacy settings by default, or disable them.

NoScript whitelist?

Re:how

[davidbrit2]

To borrow the old emacs line:

IE is a great OS - what it needs is a decent web browser.

Re:how

[Kent Recal]

Well, nice word-games you're playing there but no, I'm not google's "product". They didn't make me.
Google's products are Gmail and Search, they created them and I am using them.

Google is using a fairly novel approach to monetize their products but I don't agree with you swapping the definition of "product" and "customer" for them.

Re:how

[lukas84]

Firefox can do it. That wasn't the point. The point was central management.

Re:how

[Kent Recal]

Well, ofcourse you have a point. The Firefox integration could be better and MSIE has better integration (obviously - it's coming from the OS vendor).

What I was trying to say is that pretty much everything you need can be done with a bit of elbow grease and it's a one-time investment.
The larger your deployment the more likely do you have the ressources to make that investment. And the more likely will you benefit from using Firefox over IE because of better security and indeed better customization options (XUL, Chrome, Addons) in the long run.

I'm talking a bit tongue in cheek here as I know that stuff first-hand (having supported large deployments and knowing a few people in the biz of *really* large deployments). Reality is that indeed, many large enterprise deployments use MSIE. Not because it is in any way superior but rather because IT is outsourced to a MS-contractor...

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

Kids miss the point... they've never done more than fix their neighbours PC. Once they get into managing forests of domains, they might understand the necessity of having centrally manage at least 80 different options in a browser.

Re:how

[chromatic]

I'm not google's "product". They didn't make me.

Google didn't have to make you to sell your eyeballs.

Re:how

[David Gerard]

No, he's quite correct. Google get money from their advertisers. What they sell the advertisers is your attention.

Search and Gmail are not the "products" that Google actually sell* - they're bait to lure in the products that they sell.

* OK, they do sell Gmail for your domain as a product. But the vast majority of their income is selling your eyeballs to advertisers.

Re:how

[blind biker]

The GP only said that Google's products are so good that they don't need marketing. You may disagree, but you may not corrupt the meaning of the post with poetic metaphors "Google products are you".

Re:how

[Kent Recal]

Well, ofcourse you and GP are correct in a way, I just have a problem with the twisted terminology here.
Yes, google basically sells my attention-span to others but imho that doesn't make *me* (as a person) their product.

I'm still a customer because I choose to "pay" google with my attention in exchange for using their products.

Re:how

[Richard_at_work]

What I was trying to say is that pretty much everything you need can be done with a bit of elbow grease and it's a one-time investment.

Again, I'm going to have to disagree with you (and not just for the sake of being argumentative!) - its not a one-time investment, its an ongoing investment in the upkeep of the corporate desktop you are managing, as things *will* change throughout the life of the desktop. As I said above, central management of settings is a godsend when you need to roll out a small change to a significant number of desktops - thats not a one-time investment, thats something that may have to be done weekly or more often depending on local requirements.

If you are expecting corporations to have an essentially static desktop, then theres a bit of dellusion going on IMHO - adding favourites to someones browser is something I don't even think about these days after it gets approved, as its a simple edit of one list and bingo, it gets rolled out to a thousand machines without any more effort.

Thats what we are really talking about.

I'm talking a bit tongue in cheek here as I know that stuff first-hand (having supported large deployments and knowing a few people in the biz of *really* large deployments). Reality is that indeed, many large enterprise deployments use MSIE. Not because it is in any way superior but rather because IT is outsourced to a MS-contractor...

Most enterprise deployments use MSIE because it is required elsewhere - I know ActiveX and other integration features get the bad rap here (and quite rightly in nearly all regard), but its those very features that make it so endearing to corporations - there are so many things you can do with the integration features that it makes it worthwhile to suffer the downsides of MSIE while getting the benefits.

Re:how

[Blakey Rat]

They have a good browser; Expression Web and Visual Studio use it when designing/developing web pages. I'm sure it's not even close to optimized, AFAIK it has no script engine attached to it, but as far as render quality goes, it's top-notch.

The problem is that IE has to be backwards-compatible with thousands of intranet applications. Firefox was able to dodge that bullet, since: 1) it was released after most of those intranet applications were already made, and 2) hardly anybody developed intranet applications for Netscape, anyway.

Considering that, I think IE7 is a really good product. The funny thing is that if MS ditched IE development, the whining here would just change from, "MS has a old browser!" to "MS refuses to support our intranet apps!"

Re:how

[Richard_at_work]

The basic fact of the matter is that Googles income is not being made off of the users of their tools such as Gmail or search, but is instead being made off of services being sold to third parties which will be exposed via those tools.

Its not a word game, its the basic truth - you, the end user of Gmail or search, are not a direct contributer to Googles income, but you are infact an indirect contributor. Google is selling exposure to *you* to third parties.

They just use nice shiny offerings to entice you to play ball.

The minute you stop paying directly for the services, and start paying indirectly for the services, is the minute you become the product - if Google was not relying on income from advertisers, Google would otherwise be charging *you* for usage.

I also wouldn't call it a fairly novel approach - people have been doing it for years.

Re:how

[LingNoi]

Just because a product is free doesn't mean you're not a customer.

Re:how

[LingNoi]

Which would still make you a customer if you're selling your attention, you're still a customer.

Re:how

[LingNoi]

Google sell an OS? What the fuck are you blubbering on about?

Re:how

[LingNoi]

Just point the firefox conf to a location on the network. It's not that difficult.

Even Windows group settings allows you to parse settings over the network when a user logs in. You're just talking out of your ass. I bet you've never even looked at trying to set it up so you're just assuming you can't do it.

Re:how

[cliffski]

Nope, it's called backwards compatibility. As a coder, it's a real bitch. Lifes so much easier when you can start from scratch.
I'm glad they are delaying it, it seems that browser updates happen way too often as it is. As most people are only using the basic features of their browser, they probably wonder why the hell they need a new version so often

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

You just edit the user.js file via group policy, you people shouldn't be managing networks if you can't figure out simple shit like configure firefox over a 500+ rollout.

Pathetic, Microsoft fanaticism because you are too ashamed to admit you know nothing apart from a few Microsoft products.

Re:how

[David Gerard]

No, you're more like "cattle to be milked."

Re:how

[Keeper Of Keys]

I was talking about central management... of NoScript. If certain js-laden sites (Gmail, for example) are deemed ok by the sysadmin, they could be whitelisted; everything else blacklisted. IIRC IE group policy doesn't have this fine grain control of javascript.

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

Copying some files around is not the same as full Group Policy support. And it still doesn't solve the update problem, which is the main dealbreaker IMO.

Re:how

[hairyfeet]

Download the "blue e" icon and have it be the icon for the shortcut to Firefox. You'd be surprised how many folks still thinks the "blue e"=Internet. Last year I had to argue for a good 20 minutes with a lady who thought that since she had the blue e she must already have the Internet. I had to finally bring her around and show her the modem from my ISP and tell her she couldn't get to the Internet without that "special box" that she would have to get from the cable or DSL company. Damn, working Windows repair sometimes just sucks the big wet titty.

But at least thanks to FF with Adblock and ForecastFox I have customers bringing their family and frineds over to have thier machines worked on and "Oh, by the way, could you stick that nice Firefox thingy that gets rid of ads and shows you the weather? Thanks" so it just goes to show that give them a nice flashy carrot and sometimes you won't have to whack them with the stick ;-)

Re:how

[reynolds_john]

Well, so far from Google I get maps, email, groups and a kind-of crappy office suite that is only usable online plus photo management(Picasa). In order to use any of their services, I need some kind of software installed, which they don't provide, or sell. Or, I can go buy a smart phone and use some of their basic services.

If I check on Microsoft's area, they basically offer all of this (email, office suite, picture management, maps, myriad of dev tools) plus a ton of other products and services. Have you seen what they actually provide? The comparison between the two can only take place between about 5 products. After that, Microsoft seems to have much more in their arsenal.

http://www.microsoft.com/en/us/default.aspx?pf=true&group=All+Products

Re:how

[LingNoi]

I have no idea what you're talking about because I download all my gmail emails into evolution rendering your whole argument pointless.

What other people do is of no concern to me.

Re:how

[David Gerard]

Oh, well, a single exception definitely disproves the general use.

Re:how

[darkmeridian]

It also sucks at user security. But do you really want to be the intern who goes through every computer in your institution changing settings and making sure no one changes them?

Thought not.

Re:how

[LingNoi]

lol, butthurt because you lost the argument.

Re:how

[fredrik70]

rubbish, ie ran in circles around netscape 4.x, which sucked, pardon my french, donkey cock. Yes bundling ie helped a lot, but to say that ie 4 and 5 were worse than ns 4.x is not true. THere's a reason why the mozilla guys decided to scrap the whole 4.x code base and start from scratch with the gekko engine.

Re:how

[Kent Recal]

Well, you can spin it any way you like, it's still a word game and frankly, stupid polemics.
Google is selling my attention span and, at worst, some demographic data about me. That is only a tiny fragment of me as a person and far from your "selling souls" speech.

Furthermore I, as a person, am free to opt-out of google's evil soul selling practices, just like everybody else.

I signed up to their services using fake data and an anonymous e-mail forwarder, plus my Firefox has adblock installed.
So as far as I am concerned I get to use their services for free - without revealing any personal data and without looking at a single ad.

Re:how

[msuarezalvarez]

Judging by your material, you shoud should probably shoot for +3 funny at the most... +5 funny is waaay out of your reach just yet.

Re:how

[drei0003019]

It's not that bad with him, that I had to hide FF behind the blue "e", but yes, I already did that in hopeless cases when doing tech support for 200 not quite computer literate social workers 2 years ago :-)

But I have serious doubts that there are many people out there who would start up a new PC for the first time, look at the bizarre parade of a compass, an "e", an "o", an earth-cuddling fox-like creature and a multicolored ball and think: "Ah, feels good to have the choice!".

Re:how

[Hucko]

Most customers I know buy things.

Re:how

[RAMMS EIN]

Browsers were quite a bit less complex during the first Browser Wars than they are now. Also, it wasn't just that Microsoft put out a good browser (really, it was, at the time), but also that they bundled it with their (then even more ubiquitous than now) operating systems, and that Netscape put out a number of, shall we say, ungood releases.

Now Microsoft faces competition in the browser market not just from other companies, but also from the open source community, which produces a number of good browsers. Also, the competing browsers often aren't as dependent on desktop web browser success as Netscape was: the open source browsers will exist as long as people are willing to maintain them, Apple has various income streams that don't depend on their browser, and Opera puts their browser on a lot more than Windows desktops alone.

Re:how

[Richard_at_work]

Ok, now you are just taking it way way too far and essentially just making stuff up - I said you were a product, and I proved that. I never ascribed any moral stance to it, and I certainly never gave any 'selling souls' speech (I have no issues at all with what Google are doing, I use Gmail freely myself as you can tell from my email address).

Re:how

[Kent Recal]

Sorry but the only thing you proved is that you're apparently having a problem with your language.
Look up the term "product" in a dictionary, maybe that helps you to realize that your definition doesn't match the definition that everyone else is using.

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

Nokia bought Trolltech, so they spent around $150M, I guess.

Re:how

[gad_zuki!]

I hate it when people ignorant of managing large lans act like everything is super easy and their home software solves everything. Its like the guy at work who thinks we should dump all custom software and just go with "quickbooks, because it works for my personal stuff at home." Or "switch to macs because theyre kewl!"

Ehm, what exactly needs to be "centrally managed" about a friggin' Web-Browser?

Almost everything under internet options can be configure with group policy or at install time via IEAk7.

What more do you need in your "corporate environment"?

A signed MSI at the very least.

Re:how

[gad_zuki!]

ot because it is in any way superior but rather because IT is outsourced to a MS-contractor...

A counter argument to that is that its superior because the vendor provides all these admin tools for large deployment. It may be the case that FF is good for home but IE for business, especially when so many business sites really dont support FF and the legacy aspect of activex.

On top of it, a competent admin locks down the browser and doesnt give the user local admin rights. That setup makes IE pretty damn secure. Its tough to destroy a windows installation when you cant write outside of your own user profile and have no access to any system settings.

Re:how

[Richard_at_work]

From Websters -
Product Prod"uct\, n. [L. productus, p. pr. of producere. See Produce.] 1. Anything that is produced, whether as the result of generation, growth, labor, or thought, or by the operation of involuntary causes; as, the products of the season, or of the farm; the products of manufactures; the products of the brain.

The only thing my definition doesn't seem to fit is your narrow one that you are trying to foist on other people to win your own perceived 'argument'.

Get over it - the user is the product Google sells to advertisers through exposure to adverts. Google creates that product by offering other things to users - the specific userbase for its advertising service is a result of Google specifically engineering it into existence, hence it is a product of Googles labors.

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

Just like any other advertisement outlet, their customers are the ones paying to have their ads displayed (on buses, TV, flyers, etc).

You don't pay Google, you're not their customer. You're merely the end product (eyeballs) being sold to the ones paying.

Their search engine just happens to be a way to lure you into seeing more ads to make them more money. It's like luring cows to be milked *willingly*...

Re:how

[hairyfeet]

Actually my customers think the FF logo looks like a tadpole. And Seamonkey is the "blue bird" which took me a while to figure out as folks would bring in their machine and ask that I put the blue bird on it too. But I know what you mean, sometimes you just have to trick them for their own good. Otherwise you would go insane after having to fix the same IE driveby download mess for the 400th time because they refuse to listen and keep going back where they shouldn't. You would NOT believe how many of the "porn codec.exe" infections I had to clean up a couple of years back from dumbasses going right back and doing it all over again. It just proves the whole dancing bunny problem is all too real.

Re:how

[Ed Avis]

Deploying and upgrading IE is also easy, as it utilizes the same Windows Update infrastructure that is already in place

Is it possible for third party apps such as Firefox to use this service?

Re:how

[MMInterface]

That's called a marketing product. Marketing companies generally sell them. Your the one using the twisted terminology by defining MS as a marketing company, and Google as a product company when both companies obviously fit both descriptions. Basically you were just using the terms to package your rhetoric.

Re:how

[dword]

But who would want a Safari or a Fire Fox? What the devil is a Chrome? Let's just Explore the Internet.

You can put as many browsers as you want, just make sure you name them right so the people will know what to use.

Re:how

[lukas84]

There is functionality in WSUS that would allow for 3rd party updates.

However, i do not know how complete it is, and if it would work for Firefox.

Re:how

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of the centralized management is something that any vendor can take advantage of. Any good enterprise-ready Windows software is configurable by group policy and installable by SMS.

Re:how

[prozaker]

not chrome either

Re:how

[icsx]

You're not looking at the whole picture.

IE does a lot of things right, which no other browser does.

Yeah, a lot of BAD things like fucking up compatibility, usability and ignoring standards. All the things you listed are secondary compared to its main idea - to show websites. They are building IE to be something megalomaniac thing that just wont work without a whole bunch of other programs and software.

Re:how

[icsx]

New Outlook 2007 uses Word as rendering instead of IE. First of all, i have to ask WHY but i guess delayed IE 8 explains it. Microsoft doesnt even want to use their own older browser theirselves.

Re:how

[jez9999]

For example, which extensions may or may not be installed. Or what the homepage is set to. Or, disabling the Phishing Filter or enabling the Lookup-Portion of the Phishing Filter. Enable certain privacy settings by default, or disable them.

As far as I'm concerned, these are all features. Why the fuck should a corporation choose this stuff? Judge me on my work output, not on how I use my web browser.

Re:how

[lukas84]

As far as I'm concerned, these are all features. Why the fuck should a corporation choose this stuff? Judge me on my work output, not on how I use my web browser.

Most of the users have very little knowledge about the computer/OS use from day to day. A standardized setup minimizes troubles and keeps support cost down.

Usually, most of these rules do not apply for people from the IT dept.

Re:how

[poetmatt]

heh an interesting aspect of the name I didn't think of. Maybe we should have a browser named journey, at least it'd be better than the band.

Re:how

[WuphonsReach]

The halcyon days of drive by download malware are OVER with IE7 and Vista. You haven't noticed that? These days they have to get lusers to click on malware - they can't just auto-load it when you click a questionable link anymore.

Assuming that you run IE7 as a limited-user account, the same is true of WinXP.

It was even true of IE6.

But if you run ANY web browser in an administrator-level account, you WILL get hacked sooner or later by a drive-by piece of malware.

(Been there, fought the battles, have the scars. On the upside, it finally convinced upper management to let us lock down the machines like we've wanted to for five years.)

Re:how

[badkarmadayaccount]

*closes text editor* Just finished the shell script.

Re:how

[KhipuX]

Err.. I beg to differ too. If Google didn't have Gmail or search they wouldn't have anything to offer users.... so Gmail and search are the products. Secondly, the products have to be good for the user to 'advertise' them.

Re:how

[Walter Carver]

IE also allows powerful intranet applications and custom security zones that can also be configured centrally - yes, this feature has been the source of many a security problem, but businesses don't buy computers because they're secure, but because they solve business problems.

Aaaaand isn't security a (business) problem?

Re:how

[lukas84]

Only in the next quarter ;)

Ummm....

[jellomizer]

This is not massive news as it is Late November in 2008. Meaning if IE 8 was release it would have to be released within 6 weeks. Heck it would need at least that much time in the RC levels just to make sure things are kinda going smooth.

Re:Ummm....

[cp.tar]

This is not massive news as it is Late November in 2008. Meaning if IE 8 was release it would have to be released within 6 weeks. Heck it would need at least that much time in the RC levels just to make sure things are kinda going smooth.

Yeah, well, 2009 is a year that is going to be but a day shorter than this year. And the date of IE8's release is as of yet unspecified, which, if our past experiences with Microsoft are in any way significant, means that we have about a year before release. At best.

Now taking bets: which will come first - IE8 or Win7?

Re:Ummm....

[jellomizer]

I would say IE8.

Internet Explorer tends to be released slightly before the OS is. Remember integrated browser. That means in order to make sure all the new features of the OS are completely integrated they need to make sure the browser works first.

Re:Ummm....

[ByteSlicer]

they need to make sure the browser works first.

That hasn't stopped them before...

Bloatware delayed until 2009!

[davidfree]

"Google Chrome is a browser that combines a minimal design with sophisticated technology to make the web faster, safer and easier" Now who want to be that IE8 was going to be the complete opposite of this. I expect to see usual MS bloatware, slow, buggy and non standards compliant!

Nothing new

[Monoman]

This is how MS marketing operates.

1. Hype what you are working on like it is coming out any day now in hopes to avoid customers switching to a competitor.
2. Delay
3. Back to #1 until product is ready for testing
4. Release :-)

Chevy is doing the first two steps with the Volt because they can't compete with hybrids ... or is it out now. Oh wait, gas prices are down now so people don't care about fuel efficiency right now.

Re:Nothing new

[cp.tar]

Yeah. People are all about jam tomorrow.

Re:Nothing new

[Anonymous Coward]

With peanut butter.

Delay means very little

[sleeponthemic]

Chances are, if you're an internet explorer user you're not on the edge of your seat about the next version coming out - because you have no knowledge about it. Furthermore, you've never heard of chrome. Some people in the office go on about Firefox but your browser works just fine - infact, you consider the browser you used in 2002 to be no different than the one you use now.

Re:Delay means very little

[Richard W.M. Jones]

you consider the browser you used in 2002 to be no different than the one you use now.

It's better - it now pops up helpful little adverts to guide me through the internets.

I can't say the same for my internet provider though. It's just so much slower than it used to be ...

Re:Delay means very little

[im_thatoneguy]

Not to mention you can get IE8 right *now*.

I'm running IE8 as we speak. The ONLY problem I've hadwith IE8 is Maps.Google.com which renders completely wrong. (I'm guessing it's because IE8 is rendering it properly and Google still has a bunch of I specific hacks engaged resulting in a bad endering.)

I've been using it for about ?8? months now too. So if they spend 14+ months polishing an already really quite stable beta application then I'm guessing that means their definition of "final" is going to be rock solid.

IE8 is IE 7 done right. I would be more than happy for them to start afresh on a clean foot and not rush out their 'turn around' product too early. And has everyone already forgotten how IE7 got rolled out? RC1 of IE7 became an automatic download. So just because they won't be putting out a final version until later in 2009 doesn't mean everybody won't be using it earier.

Meanwhile I only use google chrome for GMail. Attempting to use it for just about ANYTHING else is a headache. It's a *real* beta product and is no where near where IE8 or Firefox 3 are at.

IE8 in 09?

[OffTheLip]

This seems to be keeping with previous Microsoft release schedules. It's an off by one problem, sort of like buffer overflows.

Re:IE8 in 09?

[sincewhen]

I think it's because they start their arrays at 1 instead of zero ...

Steer in a direction?

[K3ba]

Not likely - the majority of internet users use whatever they were given when they bought their computer, and then even if there are multiple choices of browsers available, will choose the icon that looks pretty (to them). I remember the Netscape vs IE wars...

Google might start having a few more people use their browser if they do get an OEM deal - no sensible OEM is going to publish a beta product though imo.

The vast majority will never find a good browser with good plugin support like Firefox either - sucks to be them I guess.

Re:Steer in a direction?

[AlpinePascia]

"ad capitem", i believe

I propose

[mfh]

A delay until 2090.

Re:I propose

[jellomizer]

That would be bad. Because what it will do. Is insure for about 81 years we will stick with the current web standards.

Re:I propose

[Lennie]

I think by that time people will figure out, IE is old and stupid.

Google not serious about browser

[BountyX]

I suspect that google is not serious about chrome. Specifically, google does not see chrome as a long term product. They are simply chomping at microsoft's market share by introducing another browser into the market. The more browsers that are in the market, the more important standards become (ie's biggest weakness) and the less market share ie will have. If google really wanted to see their browser as a top dog, they would cut their 85 million dollar annual firefox donation. They are not playing to win, they are playing to have MS lose. Futhermore, if IE starts to decline, live services and ms advertising will also decline proportionally. In the end, google can care less about it's chrome, its just a UI slapped onto webkit anyways. The true agenda is to get people to question their browser and try different ones. With lower IE market share, they will see bigger ad revenues. That's more money to invent random stuff with hehe. If microsoft can keep up, then they win again, by creating a better standards complaint expirience. Standards are the opposite of vendor lock-ins ;). Oh google, you must be bored.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[Lennie]

That's not a Firefox donation, it's a mozilla-browser-searching-via-google. If I understand it correctly, even MS gives Mozilla money for the use of the mozilla-browser-search-box.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[Monoman]

And MS shouldn't be either. I can see them including a basic browser to get you going. Notepad and Wordpad are free but if you want something more then you get a real word processing program.

IMHO MS stays in the browser war because they are paranoid they will miss the next big thing. Ever since MS was late to get on the Internet bandwagon they have made sure they get involved with thing across the board just enough. Just enough to have something so they don't miss out on the next big thing .... whatever that might be.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[gladish]

I don't think google is bored. I think they're in "Throw shit at the wall and see what sticks" mode. They've made themselves into a global superstar with their search engine, which in my opinion, is clearly the best for general search, but now what? Cell phones, online office apps, virtual worlds, green energy, web browsers. They even gotten into the business of giving money away with google.org. And not a single one comes close to the success of the search engine. I'm betting google won't ever come close to producing anything remotely close to being as successful and influential as their search engine.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[DiLLeMaN]

If they had been really serious about grabbing some actual marketshare with Chrome, they would've had a Mac and Linux client ready from day one. None of this "Just windows now, but we're working on the other guys! really!" crap. They missed two very vocal groups of users there.

RIght now it's sitting at 1.39% usage -- that's visitors to MY site, IE scores 62% there, Firefox 26%, Safari just under 7%. AFAIK, those are somewhat "common" numbers.

Maybe 1.39% is not that bad for a "new" browser, but it's certainly nowhere near world domination. But I think that was kinda your point, too. =]

Re:Google not serious about browser

[Daengbo]

Google is starting to seriously market their webapps to businesses and schools. The browser is an integral part of that. I'm pretty sure that they're serious about it.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[blind biker]

BS.

It is exactly because Google wants to reduce IEs marketshare that they are committed to Chrome's development. Chrome started from 0 and in no time captured as much browser share as Opera, and Chrome is definitely competitive with the other browsers already!

Your whole post is self-contradictory and it only makes sense with compromised logic.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[blind biker]

Google tries to reduce IE's marketshare - that's the reason they don't need to have a browser for Linux or Mac - on those platforms IE is nonexistent and irrelevant, respectively.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[DarkOx]

I think the parent is correct. I don't think Google cares one way or the other if they become a mainstream browser vendor or not. Its not ever going to be a big part of their revenue. What they do care about is not allowing one company to dominate the client side software stack for the WWW. An open standards based WWW leaves Google free to inovate in the form of its web offerings. They can offer any new technology or services they can develop and market to consumers and or advertizers.

If they allow Microsoft or anyone else total control of the software stack such that rest of the commercial ecosytem of the WWW can just ignore the also rans then the vendor of that software stack has a great deal of control when it comes to what the WWW looks like and what you can with it. It also means they can bias the directon of continued development just to harm other organizations they don't like that year. Google does not want Microsoft empowered in that way any more than they already are.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[Anonymous Coward]

from what i read about chrome, i think chrome itself is essentially a firefox donation. the code is all GPL so MS can'tuse it in their browswer, but firefox being open source can. so can konqueror and...well what other full featured, open source browsers are out there? is safari closed source?

Re:Google not serious about browser

[Anonymous Coward]

How about Google maps?

Re:Google not serious about browser

[LingNoi]

Have you seen any of google's latest products that were released?

gtalk, the 3D web browser thing ,chrome ,gmail web cam.

None had Linux clients.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[blind biker]

While I agree with what you said, I disagree that the GP has a valid point. It would be exactly like saying that Nokia is not committed to Symbian, because all Nokia cares about is selling more phones.

But Nokia has been and still is very committed to Symbian.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[vurtigalka]

I suspect that google is not serious about chrome.

I suspect you didn't read this article?

Re:Google not serious about browser

[ajlisows]

        Call me ignorant, but I don't understand why the browser market is one that is so furiously fought over? Surely it can't make that much difference to Microsoft if users use the browser built into their Operating System? What does Google really have to gain by entering the Browser market?

        Could it really do harm for Microsoft to let Firefox/Chrome/Safari/Whatever become the dominant browser with Internet Explorer just built into the operating system for those who don't want to go download a new one?

        Call me clueless but I simply don't get it.

Re:Google not serious about browser

[ion.simon.c]

There's this notion that floats around the tubes that says "Browser-based applications are becoming more and more important as time goes by.". I'm not sure that I believe it, but let's assume that it's true. If most of the folks who write browser-based applications don't spend their time making them function in "other browsers", then MSFT has control of yet another "market segment". You'll be "forced" to run Windows to make those apps work correctly.

I don't know if it would harm MSFT to "lose" the "browser wars". I don't pay that much attention to what they're doing. I do know that use and proliferation of free and open standards are what has made the Internet what it is today. Silverlight really squicks me out. I'm kinda ambivalent about Flash. Adobe has released a free and open spec. The gnash folks mention that -aside from knowing that their work is now totally legal- the spec is useless to them.

This tl;dr, rambling, completely uninformed comment brought to you by me!

Re:Google not serious about browser

[olivebridge]

I suspect that google is not serious about chrome.

i thought the same until i read this.

Funny, but not funny

[Redbaran]

I know we all like to laugh at MS for not shipping a product on time, but as a web-developer, I am not happy (nor surprised). Anything that delays the average web-surfer from having a more standards compliant browser is not a good thing. While I'm sure IE8 won't be as compliant as it should be, it's still a step in the right direction.

I'll never get back the hours and days I've wasted on browser differences and bugs, but the mirage that one day I won't have to waste that time is enough to keep me wandering through the desert with a little bit of hope.

Re:Funny, but not funny

[jellomizer]

Perhaps they will fix the unspecified error when doing an innerHTML change to a span tag. After finding what line of code it was you need to change it to an inline div

Re:Funny, but not funny

[Zaiff Urgulbunger]

Problem is, it's only going to help if IE6's share is reduced. I had high hopes for IE7, but was disappointed it was _just_ a bug fixed version of IE6 rather than a new browser... AND I found I had to support both since both have significant share.

I guess eventually they will have to end-of-life the IE6 product and that should force most of the laggards to upgrade! And I guess IE8 will fully replace IE7 so there should be need to support IE7... right?! One can only hope! ;)

Re:Funny, but not funny

[FlyingBishop]

When I last tried IE8, it seemed somewhere in between FF1.5 and 2.0, with about half the speed. So really, I'm quite content to wait if they're planning on making IE8 pass FF2.0 by a bit.

Re:Funny, but not funny

[sheldon]

On Scott Hanselman's podcast(I believe that was the right one), they mentioned that the rumor mill around at PDC was that the release of Chrome caught the IE team off guard, and they realized they needed to rethink their strategy going forward. Hence the delay.

This may result in a much better browser. We'll see.

We can only hope...

[Anonymous Coward]

They've realized that their current offering doesn't stack up to modern browsers, so they're buying some more time to actually make it worthwhile.

Last time I checked, their beta looked more like an alpha build. It failed to render everyday sites reliably, what's left for doing it in a timely manner.

Here's to hoping they actually engineer some of the showstoppers out of it, instead of just patching it up so that it behaves most of the time...

Re:We can only hope...

[Zaiff Urgulbunger]

Beta 1 was pretty crap. Beta 2, whilst I haven't extensively tested it, does seem much better. If they carry on like this, they'll be able to match browsers from 2 or 3 years ago! :D

I bet it still be

[A12m0v]

horrible at JavaScript, HTML and standard compliance With Firefox, Opera and Chrome why would a sane person even want to use IE? IE still trails almost every other browser in JavaScript performance, try it for yourself. http://nontroppo.org/timer/progressive_raytracer.html

Re:I bet it still be

[jacquesm]

that's a neat little hack you've got there !

Re:I bet it still be

[allcar]

try it for yourself

I can't. It wont run on my platform.

Re:I bet it still be

[MartinSchou]

That's a very interesting piece of code.

Opera 9.61 gets consistantly slower on every new click on the buttons. But if you close the window and reopen it, it's fast again.

Not "100 ms slower" but 2, 4, 7, 9 seconds runtime ... strange.

Re:I bet it still be

[gzipped_tar]

How come? It's a JavaScript program. Any fairly modern browser will be able to interpret it.. wait, you mean your handheld/mobile platform with too limited CPU power?

BTW the second test "full render" is really CPU-demanding...

Re:I bet it still be

[iknowcss]

That's bizzare. I did this in firefox 3.0.4 and it actually took longer than Internet Explorer 7. Not just a bit longer either. It was significantly longer. More comparable to Google Chrome than Firefox. Maybe it has nothing to do with the JavaScript bit but more with rendering the <div> elements?

Re:I bet it still be

[DiLLeMaN]

Oooh, that is nifty. I'm still waiting for someone to code Doom in javascript, though...

Re:I bet it still be

[acidrainx]

He means he can't run the test in IE, because IE doesn't run on his platform.

Re:I bet it still be

[A12m0v]

Did you try it with the latest beta of Firefox with TraceMonkey turned on?
The new engine in Fx 3.1 is supposed to be faster than V8, and V8 is the fastest JavaScript engine right now.
http://ejohn.org/blog/javascript-performance-rundown/

Re:I bet it still be

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's some results from a test comparing speeds of various things including the DOM (which is what the <div> rendering would be using)
Google charts rock :)

Re:I bet it still be

[TrancePhreak]

I had the same timing as another poster. Incredibly longer in firefox than IE7.

Re:I bet it still be

[Anonymous Coward]

I got these times on a basic render:

Opera 9.62: 3.073 seconds
IE 8.0.6801.0: 33.63 seconds
FF 3.0.4: 42.079 seconds

I tried to do a full render. Opera took 52 seconds, but firefox looked like it was going to take over an hour (I stopped it at 30 minutes).

Re:I bet it still be

[cbhacking]

JavaScript-wise, it will still be pretty bad. I'll be surprised if they break 30 on Acid3, though there's hope (nightly builds showed some small improvement there during my summer internship). They've fixed a few of the more outrageous issues, and support more of the standard DOM, but JS compliance doesn't seem to be a big priority. Performance in beta2 is already much better, especially on things like string processing, but without a JIT-to-native compiler, it will never reach the speed of something like Chrome.

HTML- and CSS-wise, it's already quite compliant. IE8 beta 1 passed Acid2 (have you been paying any attention at all? This is old news). Also, IE8 has some features (Web Slices, Accelerators) that no other browser has at all, and others (tab grouping/coloring) that are only available in other browsers through extensions.

I may dump Firefox.

[Anonymous Coward]

I went up to Mozilla the other day for a plugin and what do I find? A login/registration screen! WTF! I am going to have to register with them too just to get a plugin? I create phony logins, but it's the principal. I'm sick of having of this registration BS. What benefit does a website gain from it? Is it an incentive for advertisers? What? It just makes the site a bigger pain in the ass.

Registration is a pain.

Re:I may dump Firefox.

[mR.bRiGhTsId3]

Some plugins are still in beta/alpha/eat your babies revision. They make you register to download those, so you can't bitch at them when it gobbles up all your bookmarks or something.

Re:I may dump Firefox.

[DiegoBravo]

> They make you register to download those, so you can't bitch at them when it gobbles up all your bookmarks or something.

Yet I don't understand the relationship. If I will publish unstable code, the important thing is to clearly state that it is unstable, right?

Re:I may dump Firefox.

[mR.bRiGhTsId3]

I guess they figure fewer people are willing to automatically click through a multi-stage registration page, than to read 1 bold line.

Re:I may dump Firefox.

[DiegoBravo]

Yeah of course, but yet it doesn't make sense...

The point with experimental code is not to be provided to less people, but to the really qualified or with the real necessity ones. And the other way, many unsavvy users with lots of time or patience will go through the registration process.

Maybe a compromise can be archived... do not provide a clickable link to the experimentals-page, but other ways to access: a repository ala subversion?

For people working a lot with internet tech, registration is really a PITA... having to carry lists of more usernames/passwords, creating fake email accounts to avoid marketing spam (not implying that Mozilla does it), losing time, retyping the form because you missed some address detail, inventing more passwords (you will not give your web-banking passwords to every web site), etc... When will understand the web-marketing guys?

Doubt it.

[Conor Turton]

Will the IE delay and Google's tactics help to steer users in Chrome's direction

I doubt it. Although IE has it's issues, Chrome has some real show stoppers and then there's the fact it phones home with shedloads of data about your browsing.

Re:Doubt it.

[Anonymous Coward]

The fuck? Please cite your sources for this. It's open-source, so I don't see how dial-home could in any way work without it immediately being forked and the offending code removed.

Also please specify some of these 'real show stoppers'. Just saying they exists is pretty useless.

SVG engine?

[Midnight Thunder]

Given that IE8 is missing SVG support, are there any open source SVG libraries that they could potentially use to do the work, instead of coding the support from scratch?

Microsoft delays a product?

[Anonymous Coward]

Surprise!

Non-Techie

[Midnight Thunder]

horrible at JavaScript, HTML and standard compliance With Firefox, Opera and Chrome why would a sane person even want to use IE? IE still trails almost every other browser in JavaScript performance,

While IE may be crap, the average person is probably not tech-savie and is not aware of the alternatives or simply doesn't really care if the tool does the job. Don't be surprised how conservative people can be. In many way this is no different than your KDE user using Konquerer or your Mac user using Safari, while not considering the alternatives.

Avoiding the issue

[markdowling]

Firefox has been asked for years for better corporate deployment support. The answer was some wiki pages and a Client Customisation Kit which is currently listed as supporting FF2.

Firefox still ships as an .exe, not a Mozilla branded MSI, despite one being requested in January 2004 (bug 231062). Despite being listed as P1 for FF3 there's no sign of it yet.

There is an MSI linked from Mozilla pages, but it is not a Mozilla MSI. With all respect to Frontmotion for the work they have done, if I'm bringing an MSI inside my firewall it has to say Mozilla on it.

Reaching IE's integration level would be beyond most companies but Firefox's level barely reaches baby steps.

(incidentally for those who wish to mod me down "cuz that post hatez teh firefox", this is being posted with Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-GB; rv:1.9.0.4) Gecko/2008102920 Firefox/3.0.4)

Re:Avoiding the issue

[Kent Recal]

I still don't get what *exactly* you are missing?
A checkbox in your SMS to have Firefox deployed?

How do you treat other third party packages (most of which probably don't provide a MSI either) and why don't you treat Firefox the same way?

I strongly suggest that someone who fails to integrate Firefox (of all things) with a large scale deployment infrastructure better not be responsible for said deployment.
And yes, I have seen Firefox (alongside with IE btw.) in 1000+ seat installations with fully automatic provisioning.

Re:Avoiding the issue

[lukas84]

A 1000+ seat installation means you have lots of resources available. Guys dedicated to packaging software and testing it.

Now think of a 100 seat installation, where you often don't even have one full time IT employee.

Almost no resources - now create your own deployment package, and update it everytime Mozilla releases an update, and deploy that alongside an already existing webbrowser that more or less does it's job?

Why? Where's the business case? It costs hell of a lot time and money, of which you have neither, and doesn't really change all that much about the situation.

Re:Avoiding the issue

[Anonymous Coward]

I think that most large companies wouldn't have the ability to switch to Firefox anyway. Large companies are often too tied down to legacy systems to be able to realise such a change. I think Mozilla have it right. They should continue to take the home market share and leave big business alone for now. You can change the direction of a million ants just by changing the direction of the first few, but you can't easily change the direction of a ship the size of a Titanic heading directly for an iceberg.

Re:Avoiding the issue

[tod_miller]

It is ok to hate firefox now. They pissed away all that google money and gave us firefox 3, which is fail.

MS strategy

[PietjeJantje]

Well, this was to be expected. After all, they have been hanging on to IE6 so long, as a sabotage strategy against the upcoming world of web apps (bad HTML, CSS and no stuff like canvas).

The past year they have been talking the talk, and now they will not be walking the walk.

What next? When IE8 will arrive, it will still not implement stuff like canvas or be on the same level with CSS compliance. It will probably not be an auto-update, and perhaps only available on the latest incarnation of Vista whatever it is called. In other words, IE7 will take over the role of IE6.

Another possibility is that they're planning something big, and all the signs point to it (Silverlight and all). They know they can't play the incapable IE6-IE7 strategy forever, but instead of catching up, they will try to change the game by offering an alternative platform, IE8 + Silverlight + OS ties + media ties, perhaps connected with cloud computing.

Well, whatever, I wish them luck (not!). Last big things they tried on the consumer front were Vista and Live. It will be interesting times for them. Enough said.

Re:MS strategy

[Anonymous Coward]

This comment doesn't seem to take account of the facts:

- IE 7 has been released for over two years, and has been pushed on Windows Update for almost all of that time. I see no evidence that MS is in any way trying to keep people on IE 6. Do you?

- The supported platforms for IE 8 have been described as XP, Server 2003 and Vista, as well as {presumably}, Win 7. Every beta so far has worked on all these platforms. This is all discussed on the IE blog, http://blogs.msdn.com/IE.

- I think how quickly IE 8 gets pushed through auto-update is dependent mainly on how quickly websites adapt to the newer standards-compliant behavior. I think the change IE 8 will make to be in standards-compliant mode by default is a huge win, but it will have a big impact on the rest of the web. The chorus of people complaining that IE isn't standards-compliant will be replaced by another chorus of people complaining that their web sites don't work in IE 8 and demanding that Microsoft revert to the old non-standards behavior. If you don't believe me, just wait ... :-) . But again, every other release of IE has been promptly pushed through Windows Update, I don't see the evidence that this one wouldn't.

- The IE team has been fairly clear on their blog that the goals for IE 8 are standards-compliance including full support for CSS 2.1, Acid 2, and some parts of CSS 3 and HTML 5. These decision were made ages ago, in the early stages of the project. Things like SVG and Acid 3 complaince aren't going to be in this release, which some people complain about, but IE 8 is still a massive step forwards. It's not sensible to cram new features in right at the end of a software project - the IE team should focus on getting IE 8 out of the door and leave these additional standards for later releases.

- We're talking about a few weeks or months delay here, this is not like the browser's been cancelled. IE 8 was roughly scheduled for the end of 2008 {MS generally don't release specific dates}, and now it's been pushed to early 2009. I hardly see this as an earth-shattering change, just the typical delays that most large projects suffer from.

In other words, chill out, sky not falling :-).

Re:MS strategy

[PietjeJantje]

20% is still using IE6. It's not hard to find out why. Your next points can all be categorized under "talking the talk". As long as they won't do the walk, and crap like IE6/IE7 is still on the market, it's just shallow marketing. Considering your last point, same thing, and remember Vista? Overall not the strongest of arguments there, you're clearly defending a monochrome color instead of discussing all possible sides, Mr. Anonymous Coward. More of the same marketing really. So let me ask you this: are you a fanboy, a MS employee, or is it you, Steve, virtually throwing chairs?

Re:MS strategy

[Anonymous Coward]

The main reason seems to be corporate intranet sites which aren't compatible with the more standards-compliant IE7. And the general slowness of corporations to upgrade to newer software. And end-users who never run Windows Update. Hmmm ...

You suggested MS were deliberately trying to keep people on IE 6. That's not the case.

You suggested MS were deliberately going to restrict IE 8 to just Win7. That's not the case either.

IE 8 has vastly better standards support and will be released within a few months. I think that's a good thing ...

Re:MS strategy

[PietjeJantje]

The main reason seems to be corporate intranet sites...

Oh was it? You're just bringing it as you'd like it to be, while completely ignoring the other reasons. Blah.

You suggested MS were deliberately trying to keep people on IE 6. That's not the case.

They did. Among others by excluding Windows 2000 users from the update. Or by not making it a mandatory update. And they did it for exactly the strategy I mentioned.

I conclude you're indeed a MS employee trying to cloud reality. Because MS's fear for web apps and how they try to slow down the inevitable is well known. Of course, you evade that issue.

You suggested MS were deliberately going to restrict IE 8 to just Win7. That's not the case either.

I suggested two possible scenario's, mister black&white of the MS PR department. Hey, I think they're not going to exclude anyone, even Linux users. Of course, running IE Silverlight on Vista will be the vastly superior experience, and will be restricted to Vista because, among others, the latest version of DirectX is required.

Know what the most funny thing of all is? Most people, me included, really don't care anymore. MS has already become irrelevant in a way, and already lost. What the fuck do I care what IE8 will be like? A dying man can kick & scream, ain't gonna change the outcome. So I'll leave it at this, if you don't mind.

Re:MS strategy

[Anonymous Coward]

Win2K has 2% of the market now, even when IE7 was released the share was around 5% { http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_systems }. It's not as significant as you make it out to be. Microsoft can't force people to upgrade their computers, people tend to get extremely angry when they try to do stuff like that.

Your conspiracy theory that MS released a new version of the OS but didn't actually want people to use it continues to make absolutely no sense whatsoever.

Did Microsoft state a 2008 release date?

[Anonymous Coward]

To my knowledge Microsoft had not committed to delivering IE 8 in 2008.

Much ado about nothing

[westlake]

The trend lines for the web browsers are as flat as the Kansas prairies: Top Browser Share Trend, Top Browser Share Trend
"Chrome" is right up there with "The Gimp" as a masterpiece in marketing.
It suggests nothing so much as an ugly, over-weight, tail finned Edsel. Microsoft has "Internet Explorer" and Apple has "Safari," both brand names which capture something of the excitement, the fun and play to be found on the web.

Of the 17 netbooks being offered at Walmart.com this holiday season, at least 12 run XP or Vista. Most priced at $350 with an Atom CPU, 1 GB RAM and a 120 GB HDD. Is it necessary to add that not one Linux netbook "is available in stores?"

microsoft is not in a bad position, actually

[buddyglass]

People are so down on Internet Explorer, and rightly so, that if they come out with something that is "competitive" with the other offerings, even if it isn't superior, it will be perceived as a huge win for Microsoft and likely win back much of the market share they've lost.

I'm basing this on the fact that many people will choose the "standard" (IE) unless there is a compelling reason to switch to something else. Especially corporate environments, excluding companies that are expressly anti-Microsoft (Apple, Sun, IBM, Google). So Microsoft doesn't have to provide a compelling reason to use Internet Explorer; they just have to ensure there are no compelling reasons to use something else.

Re:microsoft is not in a bad position, actually

[alvinrod]

Where are they going to gain back the market share from?

Although it's slow, Linux and OS X are becoming more widespread. It'll probably be a long while until either tears out a significant portion of the market, but they're still growing. There isn't a recent version of IE for either of these operating systems and it's unlikely that there will be any time soon.

The people who use Firefox on Windows are likely to continue to do so unless Microsoft releases a must-have feature that isn't implemented in any other browser. Playing catch-up isn't enough to get people to switch back.

The only thing that it's likely to accomplish is to slow the exodus away from Explorer. I don't think I've seen anyone who's used Firefox, Opera, or some other non-IE browser talk about switching back to IE. Some people might download a new version to try it out, but I highly doubt that they'll stick with it. Even if these people install a new version of Windows, they'll likely install their favorite browser instead of just sticking with IE.

It's not as though I expect IE to disappear overnight, but I don't expect it to pick up any significant amount of lost ground. It's just going to continue to slowly hemorrhage market share to competing browsers. There's no going back. It's only about stopping the bleeding.

Re:microsoft is not in a bad position, actually

[buddyglass]

I use Firefox on Windows, and I'd switch back if IE8:

1. Ran javascript "in the same ballpark" performance-wise as Squirrelfish and Tracemonkey,
2. Supported (or supported a plugin) to do what Foxmarks does.

Better standards compliance would be icing on the cake, but not entirely necessary. I agree with you that MS will continue to lose overall market share, since there's no way they're going to release IE for non-Windows platforms, and non-Windows platforms (esp. OS X) are likely to continue to gain share. I was more thinking of their Windows-specific market share.

Ignore this post

[u38cg]

Mods, please bury this post by modding over-rated; I'm having browser problems. Google might help me

Still no SVG support

[Anonymous Coward]

IE is only 8 years behind.

LOL!

[MerlTurkin]

ROTFLMAO! No one cares!

Should be delayed further!

[Tumbleweed]

IE8, as outlined by MS in various MSDN locations, is a browser that will compete on features very well with Firefox v1.5. FF3, and especially the upcoming 3.1, completely obliterates it in standards support, features, and speed. IE8 - as it is currently planned - is completely pointless. MS should delay 8 until they've had time to add the important CSS3 that is missing, and add a turbo-charged js engine. If IE8 is released as intended, it will merely be yet another roadblock for web developers to easily implement useful features. Hell, FF has had border-radius since, what, 2.0? Even WebKit has border-radius! (the obsolete version used in Chrome seems incomplete to that in Safari, though I haven't fully investigated this yet).

The only deadline they need to meet next year is the release of Windows 7. Keep adding the features we NEED to IE8 until it would impact Win7. Artificial deadlines for IE are completely ridiculous.

Re:Should be delayed further!

[Anonymous Coward]

It isn't true that Firefox 3 and 3.1 obliterate IE8 in standards support.

IE8 beta 2 has better CSS2.1 support than Firefox 3 and 3.1. In particular, Firefox has a lot of problems with position: and display: whereas those already work perfectly in IE8. Firefox sucks at printing, mostly because it doesn't support any useful page-breaking properties of CSS 2.1, whereas IE8 beta 2 supports them all. That means you can actually generate nice printable reports for your IE8 users without having to generate PDFs, which is a big deal in corporate settings. IE8 also has better internationalization support--with Firefox, you still have to download extensions to get proper Asian language support. Plus, IE has much better support for downloadable fonts than Firefox 3.1 (Firefox 3.0 doesn't support them at all); the EOT mechanism results in much faster downloads and will probably have have a lot more fonts available for use than Firefox's mechanism will. Firefox does implement some proposed CSS3 properties (most notably opacity), but IE8 supports about the same number of CSS3 properties--it just supports different ones.

IE8 beta 2 already supports more HTML 5 features than Firefox does.

Firefox does have much better DOM compliance, but hardly anybody uses the DOM nowadays anyway--jQuery and similar frameworks make every browser work the same way.

IE8 beta 2 has a slew of security features that Firefox hasn't even started to implement: process isolation for pages, automatic XSS prevention, and secure Javascript APIs for parsing.

To add, MS has to support MULTIPLE versions of IE

[BUL2294]

I think what's eating a lot of Microsoft's resources on IE is their not-well-thought-out product support roadmap and their refusal to support newer versions of IE on older OS's (in order to help drive demand for the new OS). By the time IE8 comes out, Microsoft will support the following versions of IE...

• IE 5.01 SP4 on W2K
• IE 6.0 SP1 on W2K
• IE 6.0 SP2 (32-bit) on XP/2003 (32-bit & 64-bit)
• IE 6.0 SP2 (64-bit) on XP/2003 (64-bit)
• IE 7 (32-bit) on XP/2003/Vista/2008 (32-bit & 64-bit)
• IE 7 (64-bit) on XP/2003/Vista/2008 (64-bit)
• IE 8 (32-bit) on XP/2003/Vista/2008 (32-bit & 64-bit)
• IE 8 (64-bit) on XP/2003/Vista/2008 (64-bit)

This is an absurd list! Every security hole has to be researched, tested, and patched for 8 different versions of IE! This is further exacerbated by the fact that there are severe differences in the "same" version of IE between different OS's. IE 7 on XP is a very different beast than IE 7 on 2008. Mozilla has 2 versions only--and FF2 will drop off support within the next month. Microsoft should port IE7 to Windows 2000 (which is supported through June, 2010) and retire IE5 and IE6 once and for all. This will cut down the number of code-bases that they need to support.

But that would be too logical for Microsoft...

IE has the slowest Javascript renderer

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets not forget that IE is lagging behind all other browsers in Javascript execution speed. IE also continues to use ActiveX, regardless of all the malware and BOTNETs sending spam via these security holes.

Microsoft is a HUGE company, mostly run by non-technical 'project managers' and VPs. The developers have to go through so many levels of management to make any kind of impact. In fighting between the developers themselves in common, which makes the developement process lag, and very inefficient.

In short, MS is too large even to deal with trival problems. MS needs to not only do a rewrite of their software, for securities sake, but also a remanagement of human resources to cut the politics that only stiffle their own progression, in this ever more competitive IT land scape!

Good luck Microsoft!

In the future...

[LingNoi]

Watch as Bill Gates comes back to Microsoft like Steve did to Apple.

It doesn't matter when IE8 is released...

[slserpent]

We'll still have to keep supporting (i.e. making concessions and hacks for) crappy IE6 on our websites as it will still have something like 50% browser share from being preinstalled with XP.

Re:It doesn't matter when IE8 is released...

[Icarium]

Oddly enough, using IE6 at work renders /. just fine, while using FF at home often leaves me with comments only partially displayed and unable to reply (hitting 'Reply' on FF either just brings up loading text, or allows me to type in a reply only for the 'Submit' button to do nothing).

Re:To add, MS has to support MULTIPLE versions of

[jonwil]

If nothing else, they should drop IE5 right now. IE6 runs on all the platforms that are still supported by Microsoft so there is no reason to support IE5.

Windows 2000 is nearing the end of support anyway (where MS no longer releases security updates) if it hasn't already so Microsoft should just say "no more IE6 security updates, if you want security updates, you have to update to XP SP3 and IE7"

Then all they have is IE7 (on XP SP3, 2003 SP1, XP x64, Vista SP1, Vista SP1 x64 and 2008) to worry about.

will not be officially released until 2009

[neonsignal]

so, to fit with MS naming conventions, perhaps it should be called "Internet Explorer 2008".

Not surprised

[dave562]

The beta of IE8 that I have been using at work is a steaming pile of poo. I tried it for a couple of hours and then switched it to IE7 compatability mode and haven't looked back. None of the Google sites worked (Gmail, maps, etc). Slashdot was a mess. I'm sure I checked a few other sites but there were enough problems with simple page rendering that compatability mode was the only way for me to get anything done.

Nobody else sees this?

[tod_miller]

Firstly, Microsoft are realizing that each Windows needs to lock out some users to ensure it gets adopted. Just like with Office that used deliberately coded breaks in compatibility, and especially using 'going open format' as an excuse for ensuring that even the same person who wrote a document now has trouble opening it again.

This isn't a delay. IE will be launched WITH Windows 7, trying to build their marketing efforts together.

And who bets that IE 8 for XP and Vista will have some 'wow, if you have windows 7, you wouldn't have just accidentally your whole machine!'.

Now, the real juicy part: Are you really going to use a browser that is deliberately holding back the internet, proof that IE8 STILL won't fix PNG's properly, just try animating PNG transparency and sizing in IE 7.0, still causes problems.

Microsoft are big and have enough money NOT TO RELEASE A GOOD BROWSER.

Can't you see that? Sure they could make a standards compliant renderer and add a bookmark toolbar to it, but why the hell do they want to?

They see this as weakening their grasp on developers / software deployments, which makes sense because really, it is drivers and those shitty software apps you get with cheapo peripherals that are keeping people from using linux.

That is why IP interfaces are killing windows.

If you talk over the network, the device handles itself over http, whilst on USB you need to support whatever junk they have written.

Give me http on gps devices, heart monitors, cameras, phones.

Fuck Microsoft.