Slashdot Mirror
IE9 Released, Media Has Opinions
Yesterday Microsoft released IE9 and since
then we've been getting tons of submissions about it: It's hard to tell if it is
a threat to web development or
the fastest thing on the web
or even a waste of time. You'll just have to decide for yourself... if you are one of the 9% of Slashdot readers who actually uses IE.
So, why do I care about IE?
I'm impressed with the work, but it's still a little glitchy, slower to load and just not as blazing fast as Chrome.
...Microsoft Corporation. Those guys must be Linux advocates, too.
if you are one of the 9% of Slashdot readers who actually uses IE.
I think that says it all...
It's still Internet Exploder
Enough said.
9% of Slashdot readers who actually uses IE
This is definitive proof that personal Ballmer's army is around.
I tried everything I know!
# apt-get install ie9
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Unable to locate package ie9
#
I've been using the IE9 RC for a couple weeks now. I like it better than previous IE versions, but not nearly enough to replace Opera as my #1 browser (IE is #2, Chrome is #3, Firefox is tied with Lynx as a distant 4). Best thing about it is moving the tab bar to the same line as the address bar... I prefer a minimalist UI for maximum screen usage by the web page... at least until I can afford a monitor larger than 1024x768
I agree, who uses that piece of ellipses anyway?
No, we all hate IE, it's just 9% of us are at work, libraries, etc. where they force us to use IE.
SSC
As with any Microsoft product, I will wait at least one year for all the bugs/features/etc to be worked out of the "final" product before I use it in a production sense.
I wouldn't say it's irrelevant in the least. IE is still the leading browser, and it's kind of a big deal when the industry leader has a major release, especially one that addresses many of the issues the 91% of Slashdotters using it has. I'm not a big IE fan either, but I tried the 9 beta and it's a hell of a lot better than I remember IE being. Hell, I honestly think IE9 is a much better browser than Firefox is nowadays, and it's my #2 browser to go to when crap doesn't work in Chrome.
I am part of the majority. Me and 91% of the Slashdoters think that this story is irrelevant and IE is a piece of ... :-)
Anyone else with me ?
While I personally reach for pretty much anything but IE when I'm doing my browsing... It isn't irrelevant. IE is installed on the vast majority of computers out there.
I'm going to have to download and evaluate IE9 to see which bits of software it works with, and which bits it breaks. And then I'm going to have to build a deployment package and roll it out to the folks that need it. Because some essential website somewhere is going to start requiring it before too long.
"Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
I must say, this is an impressive version. I've been using it since beta, and regardless what 'benchmarks' may or may not say, it's perceptually the fastest browser I've used.
Now if there was just a decent ad blocker available, rather than the TPL's that only block 3rd party scripts and images.
Until then I'll stick with Firefox for a cleaner view of the sites I visit.
I'm currently using Netscape 4 posing as IE, you insensitive clod :-)
It is irrelevant for me and most of my institute who happily use Windows XP.
Work forces me
If we're going to write inane headlines, let's at least try to be funny...
1. Include Your Children When Baking Cookies
2. Something Went Wrong in Jet Crash, Experts Say
3. Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers
4. Drunks Get Nine Months in Violin Case
5. Iraqi Head Seeks Arms
6. Prostitutes Appeal to Pope
7. Panda Mating Fails; Veterinarian Takes Over
8. British Left Waffles on Falkland Islands
9. Teacher Strikes Idle Kids
10. Clinton Wins Budget; More Lies Ahead
11. Plane Too Close to Ground, Crash Probe Told
12. Miners Refuse to Work After Death
13. Juvenile Court to Try Shooting Defendant
14. Stolen Painting Found by Tree
15. Two Sisters Reunited after 18 Years in Checkout Counter
16. War Dims Hope for Peace
17. If Strike Isn't Settled Quickly, It May Last a While
18. Couple Slain; Police Suspect Homicide
19. Man Struck by Lightning Faces Battery Charge
20. New Study of Obesity Looks for Larger Test Group
21. Astronaut Takes Blame for Gas in Space
22. Kids Make Nutritious Snacks
23. Local High School Dropouts Cut in Half
24. Typhoon Rips through Cemetery; Hundreds Dead
http://www.beautyofftheweb.com/
Some creative person registered this one letter off domain to link to FF4
People who hate IE currently will still hate it (for some its almost a religion - IE could give them free money and they would still hate it), those who like it will probably still like it (having used some of the Betas I can't see anything that would piss off an existing user). There will still be lots of frothy-mouthed ranting on the internet and those of us who really don't give a shit about who uses what browser will still just pick the one we like and get on with our lives.
While IE use has fallen drastically in the last year or two, that 9% figure is going to include quite a bit of audience bias. Unfortunately for those of us who have to support IE professionally the amount of people using it in some audiences is much higher, and an irritating percentage of those populations will be using ancient versions for some time to come. One of our banking clients (one of the largest in the UK) is planning to roll out IE8 "some time this year". The rest of out clients (including others in the "largest in the UK" category are still IE6 only on company desktop and laptop builds.
IE9 would be good news (afterall, it is far more compliant then any version of IE that has gone before) if people using older IE versions switched to it. Unfortunately this is not going to happen as many people who are still using IE for day-to-day browsing either don't care enough to upgrade (hence aren't already using FF/Chrome/Opera/other, though if IE is pushed as an "important" update MS will catch most if the Vista/7 users automagically) and/or simply can't because IE9 will not run on XP.
It's still insecure. Just because it's faster now and more compliant, doesn't make it something you can trust.
Ie9 is a massive improvement but I'm still a chrome user.
Considering how many people out there still haven't upgraded from IE6, I have to wonder how important this really is.
is the 'pin tab on taskbar' feature (if you have Win7). My company blocks access to GMail, so I have to use the web interface -- now I can have GMail in its own 'application' on the taskbar next to Outlook :)
And yes, I am aware of the Firefox 4 'application tabs' feature -- I've been using my GMail that way ever since I started using the FF4 beta.
Now time will tell which solution fits my needs best.
I am part of the majority. Me and 91% of the Slashdoters think that this story is irrelevant and IE is a piece of ... :-)
Anyone else with me ?
I'm not part of that 9%, but I think that the threshold for irrelevance is much lower than that.
Like, what's Linux's web-browser usage share these days? 3%? It's somewhere around there.
I just tried that canvas bench in the link.
31 FPS in FF 3.6.15 and 302 FPS in IE9.
Beyond that bit of trivia, browsing with this thing is a lot faster and smoother than Chrome or FF.
Of course, it was a no reboot install and I'm concerned that my PC won't boot correctly the next time around or my drive will be filled with malware the next time I click on IE.
I am part of the majority. Me and 91% of the Slashdoters think that this story is irrelevant and IE is a piece of ... :-)
Anyone else with me ?
...
here we go again...
IE isn't irrelevant at all.
It's a major part of why the web works and looks like it does today, and IE affects how web sites work for you with Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Opera. You don't even have to use IE - these news still matter to you! Both as a developer, or an end-user.
The web is usually designed after the weakest link (usually IE, standards-wise), so of course this story is irrelevant.
The browser forming the weakest link is still the weakest, but today got a whole lot stronger than with IE 8.
We can finally start developing for some aspects of HTML5 without having to restort to relying on updates in some sort of cross-browser third party "compatibility library" where it's easier to just not use those features at all. So the features aren't used at all. So even if you aren't a developer, it still matters, since web sites will start working better.
Authors will now at least start being able to take the step to exploit the potential of Chrome 10 or Firefox 4 better while not having to worry about ~50% not able to be supported well.
IE 9 still has flaws, and is still not there with the competition, but it's miles ahead of IE 8.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
My first thought upon reading the summary was, "Nine percent? I'm glad that at least the majority of slashdot users have switched." And then I thought, "Oh wait, look what I'm running..."
I bounce from machine to machine at work, never staying long enough on one machine to bother customizing it. Rather than install Firefox or Chrome on each computer I use, I just use whatever's already there. IE 8 is on every machine, so I find myself using it more often than I realized.
It never occurred to me that a lot of the 9% is probably people who aren't using it by preference, but simply because they're lazy (myself included).
A more standards compliant IE is always to be welcomed. What should not be welcomed is that "more" standards compliant != standards compliant. Things like web workers & WebGL are not implemented in IE9 which is quite disturbing. Web workers have massive potential for interactive sites, and WebGL is critical for games and some kinds of visual sites. What I hope is that nobody bothers to compromise for the sake of IE's inadequacies or egregious omissions in the way they may have done in the past. Design the site to a standard and if a browser doesn't meet the standard send the user off to the "reduced experience" version or to a page to download a decent browser. The days where sites had to bend over to IE's inadequacies should be over.
IE9 Released, Media Has Opinions
No one else uses it.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
IE9 will eat into IE8 and IE7. But IE6 users will still be stuck until their hardware dies. Google Chrome Frame will become increasingly popular at companies that have software reliant on IE6, and employees too stupid to click on a different browser icon. People will complain about IE9 not supporting even 70% of HTML5 features and will have to be reminded HTML5 standard won't be finalized for years. The "why can't I install IE9 on my XP" crowd will dump IE8 for a more modern alternative like Chrome, Chromium, FireFox, Opera, or Safari while waiting for "Windows 8" to be released in 2012. Sadly, it won't be year of Linux desktop again but HP will start rolling out WebOS-based touchpads, phones, and yes, dual-boot desktops (so maybe 2012 will be year of Linux desktop if you include WebOS.)
I might actually develop a website that takes advantage of what the IE9 has to offer, until then I'll be stuck developing for the lowest common denominator between IE/Firefox/Webkit/Opera.
It's running at around 10x the speed of Firefox.
Is IE ten times as fast as Firefox 3.6 or Firefox 4 RC1?
Yeah, I can test the newest versions of every other major browser for Windows. Chrome, Firefox, Opera all run perfectly, not to mention tons of other non-internet related software that I use. Ironically, the browser that comes from Microsoft itself tells me that my Microsoft operating system just ain't good enough for it. What a joke.
I always have at least two computers in front of me on my desk; I use FireFox and Google on my primary browsing/reading laptop, and IE and Bing on the workhorse desktop. So I like variety. I'm keeping a tight grip on my geek card, thank you very much.
I feel this is a bigger issue than might seem at first glance.
We have a powerful plateau situation in desktop tech. Cite "The Economy", social changes and more; the first two generations of former active experimenters are starting to become satiated now that modestly significant progress has been made. If you merge all the disparate threads of "we can't figure out the next quantum leap in OS", the Age of Good Enough, and the hidden walled up cost of moving Enterprise off of XP, for Microsoft to start to pit a browser as a hardware-based deliberate fragmentation will cause a pressure-cooker situation of a type that will simmer slowly until some further factor sets it off.
Let's coin a word: "Rhetorical Luddite". I thought ahead and built a custom quad core XP machine in 2006 that is still middle of the line now. Now it's MS's job to "prove" why XP absolutely must go to make way for the upgrade they'd like me to make. To do that, I currently guess it would take another Killer App of some kind. These little deliberate fragmentations instead are irritating.
My approximate current plan is that Windows 8 in 2013 will be the switch point, if at the same time both a hardware and application super-breakthrough shows up.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Anyone know how to turn off cleartype? There doesn't seem to be an option for it in options, so, registry change?
What are you basing this on?
Download free e-books, lectures, and tutorials at bookgoldmine.com
IE9 is what IE6 should have been, which is related to my major complaint about it: namely, that it doesn't run on Windows XP. Uptake will be far, far too slow without XP support.
The REAL nightmare is when your client want old IE6/7 to load all that state-of-art tabeless layout
In my experience, IE 7 displays basic CSS-based layout with a few minor flaws. For IE 6, on the other hand, you'll usually want to redirect the user to install the Google Chrome Frame plug-in, which uses WebKit instead of IE's built-in engine for sites that opt in to Chrome Frame using an HTTP header or meta element.
Or they browse at work where IE is a standardized across all systems.
I have a feeling at least 5% of these must be behind some proxy servers which mask the User-agent string with IE one.
Ok I admit that the feeling is not speculation, but more like hope.
Otherwise you're SOL anyway.
my job forces me to use Ie7. I haven't used it at home since the early firefox days, and I use crome 1/4 of the time I'm at home. the fact i have to use it at work on our net based apps makes me rage ... especially considering we just went "all windows" this spring (2011) after using a shitton of dos apps (we use SAP now, and I don't remember what we used for the last 8 years ... some sort of inventory program).
At work on Win XP (imagine that) trying to upgrade. . . "To install Internet Explorer 9, you need to upgrade to a more recent version of Windows"
What's the point of Mod points over a long weekend?
Then ask IT in work, libraries, etc. to install Google Chrome Frame. It's a plug-in for IE that makes sites that opt-in look better.
I hate IE and don't use it unless I have no choice.
I am on the other hand a web developer and the fact that Microsoft is finally supporting standards is a fairly big deal. It may not be better or faster or more extensible than the competition, but the fact that the browser which will come pre-installed on most people's machines is not a gigantic pile of suck is something I'm actually quite happy about.
Most people simply aren't going to shop around for web browsers, and personally I'll be a happy man when I no longer have to go through and make significant changes to standards compliant code to make it work properly in IE.
Unless you write websites.
Talk about being closed minded. Kind of like the people that will not use free anti-virus because it can not be good if it is free.
Have you tried IE9? If you are on Windows Vista or seven you probably should try it. If you work on websites you should use it for testing just like you use Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and Opera... You do test with all the available browsers don't you?
I still use mainly chrome and Firefox but I sure as shooting have tried out IE9. It wasn't bad at all just not better than Chrome for my day to day use.
That and it doesn't work on XP which I still use as along with Linux, W7, and OS/X
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
The browser forming the weakest link is still the weakest, but today got a whole lot stronger than with IE 8.
At this point, the weakest link is the wide remaining deployment of the nearly decade-old Windows XP operating system. IE 7 required Windows XP, which kept businesses that stuck with Windows 2000 on IE 6. Likewise, IE 9 requires Windows Vista, which will keep a lot of businesses on IE <= 8 for a while.
i have several people at work who only run 1024x768... but then again it is either that or get e-mails from them in font 16 or some crap like that.
If you deal with visually impaired people at work, the right solution is to increase the system DPI, which will increase font sizes uniformly across all applications. Or are you talking about custom applications known to fail in high DPI?
Searching "update internet explorer" in Bing top hits are for IE6 SP1. Going to the IE9 download page with IE9 release candidate leads to warnings on "certificate errors" and malicious contents. Oh Microsoft, do you have to be that crappy?
I agree, I love Microsoft products, except IE - IE is the biggest piece of crap ever conceived and I hate that I have to use [multiple versions of] it just to make a "portable" website. Windows [except ME and Vista], Office (even the new one), SQL, etc - all exceptional, but IE not only sucks donkey dick, it creates new and inventive ways to do so.
Nothing really, I just wanted to see how content-free a Microsoft bash could be and still get modded up.
If "used by less than 10% of Slashdotters" made something irrelevant, we'd never have stories about "BSD", "Facebook", or "other people's genitalia".
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
...slashdot wouldn't trump about how few corporate users visit their site.
But then that's the Linux attitude all over - not 'our userbase is one hundredth of the world', more 'our userbase has grown by 4000%!'
XP is scheduled to go end of life in 2014. (See http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/search/default.aspx?alpha=Windows+XP) Corporate IT is going to have to start upgrading/replacing XP desktops over the next 3 years to Windows 7 (and maybe Windows 8). Win7's first service pack just issued a few weeks ago. So the whole "wait until the first service pack" crowd doesn't have an excuse anymore. (And we'll ignore Vista. It's best to ignore it. Do not speak it's name lest ye offend the computing gods.)
And at this point Windows 7 is probably a better OS that XP - although it does require beefier hardware and definitely more RAM.
So, yes, the majority of corporate systems are still on XP. But that is going to change over the next 2-3 years. Corp IT isn't going to have a choice, eventually, if they still want security updates/patches. And any IT department that ignores the lack of patches for XP after 2014 is utterly negligent. So time it's time to at least have a grand XP to Win7 upgrade/conversion on your radar, like it or not.
So IE9 (and IE10, etc...) might not be relevant for corp IT right now. But it will be. Don't ignore it.
and the first thing I notice is that the giant "Back" button is cut off at the bottom? How do you not notice that and release a browser with a glaring UI problem?
As the island of our knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.
Yep, I'd like to see the stats on version distribution. It'll be many years until this PC is on IE9...
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
http://www.beautyoftheweb.com/#/highlights/all-around-fast
"Without hardware acceleration, browsers only use about 10% of the processing power your PC has to offer. Internet Explorer 9 unlocks that other 90%. "
Rubbish! Firefox frequently uses 99% of my cpu!
When you say beaten the pants off... How many milliseconds are talking about?
"Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world. " - Asimov.
Says who?
OMG Doesn't work on an OS released 10 years ago. Think about it...
If XP does it for you, keep at it. That said, unlike Vista which was a dog there's no particular reason not to use Win7 in my opinion. It works very well, handles all the bells and whistles like SSD alignment, 64 bit everything including >4 GB ram and so on.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
This fact is hardly breaking news. We've known that it wouldn't support XP since it was announced, probably more than a year ago.
Microsoft is good/evil.
IE 9 is wonderful/terrible.
Opera/Safari/Firefox is better/worse.
The best OS is Windows/Mac/Linux.
Sun rises in East/West.
The sun does not 'rise' you insensitive clod.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
I still got XP pre-installed on a netbook last year.
People keep computers for about 5 years. Almost nobody updates. Ignoring the growth of new form factors of which Microsoft is not part of...or smartphones. The competitors will realease 9-12 versions of their browsers. Internet Explorer is already old on release.
These suggestions always bug me (although it's nothing personal, tepples). I type in the Colemak keyboard layout, and have for years. At my last job they wouldn't let me install the keyboard layout.
"But then how am I supposed to type?"
"We don't care."
"Wait, so you won't let me install an open source script for AHK because it's not safe, but I have administrator access to my machine and we use IE6?"
"Does not fem-pute."
No way in hell they're going to let anyone install Google Chrome Frame. Their heads would explode first.
.there is enough of everything for everyone.
Complain the the manufacturer, not Microsoft. Phasing out XP for good is long overdue.
Let's coin a word: "Rhetorical Luddite". I thought ahead and built a custom quad core XP machine in 2006 that is still middle of the line now. Now it's MS's job to "prove" why XP absolutely must go to make way for the upgrade they'd like me to make. To do that, I currently guess it would take another Killer App of some kind. These little deliberate fragmentations instead are irritating.
I'd say security updates and new features and better support for more hardware. I mean, would you keep running Debian 2.2 on your desktop, which are both released about the same time?
That is just pure awesomeness right there.....
I am part of the majority. Me and 91% of the Slashdoters think that this story is irrelevant and IE is a piece of ... :-)
Anyone else with me ?
No, we are not all driven by blind prejudice. Some of us are actually willing to try new software and new releases, even from companies whose products we didn't use in the past.
Sometimes you just have to use IE for comaptibility, But fro browsing, CHROME!!!!
Maybe try it on a version of windows that wasn't released over 10 years ago...
For most corporations Windows 7 is the driver. Hardware are not offering support for XP on new laptops so as PC's get replaced they are forced to upgrade to Windows 7 - which means you have to upgrade to later versions of IE.
You can't really blame Microsoft for not wanting to continue actively developing an operating system that is 10 years old, much as I may dislike them, they do a good job on backward compatibility and ongoing support.
And then the next step says, "Your computer manufacturer does not provide Windows 7 drivers. You need to buy a new computer."
Also, I haven't found any .deb file nor any repository.
The problem with IE9 is that already it is not as standards compliant or complete as competing browsers. In fact the specifications are still moving. IE9 is old on release and we still do not know when the next release will be it could be years. IE9 is still only available on Vista SP2 and above.
My GWT (google web toolkit) sites are not working with IE9 this morning. Irritation is starting to grow. I sure hope Google releases an update to the GWT SDK soon. It was a pretty serious error to not get ahead of this I think. The RCs and Betas have been around for and they didn't work either.
I like it. I'm not one of these people, so maybe my opinion doesn't matter here, but it runs at least as fast as Chrome on my system and is giving me quite a bit of screen real estate to work with. Having said that, the back button seems cut off by the bookmarks bar, which is really annoying.
How does it feel to be a liar with pants constantly on fire?
"But then how am I supposed to type?"
"We don't care."
That's the time when you should either A. look for another job, or if that's not possible, B. take advice from a lawyer specializing in disability discrimination law.
No way in hell they're going to let anyone install Google Chrome Frame.
If the job in any way relates to a service available over the web, you can claim that you have to make sure the site displays properly for customers who use Chrome. "Either you let me install Chrome or you'll end up turning away customers."
Well then buy them a copy and go install it on their system for them. What, you don't have the time or money to do that? Didn't think so.
I installed it and NOT knowing how to use it, it closed on me three times before I realized it was ME doing the closing!!! Lol, I kept "x"ing the 2nd little box with the name of the site that I was on three time in a row... Oh well, time for me to relearn how to use Windows... or not...
I don't run a supported platform so I can't test IE9, but anything that shrinks the IE6/IE7 userbase is just fine with me. I'm happy that MS is keeping up their focus on browser development ever since Firefox lit a fire under their ass, and Chrome lit a fire under both their asses. What up Opera. Good job everyone.
Twinstiq, game news
They wanted to use new APIs and features that are found in modern versions of Windows, in an effort to make IE suck less.
Use a different browser at work and IE9 at home, if you must.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Stop the presses! This changes EVERYTHING!
I'd say security updates and new features and better support for more hardware. I mean, would you keep running Debian 2.2 on your desktop, which are both released about the same time?
No, but then there has been a "no need to completely reinstall everything" upgrade path all the way from Debian 2.2 and the latest stable release - this is one of the reasons my home boxes will remain on XP for a while yet. The hassle (i.e. cost) of producing and testing a new build is wy many big businesses will be running XP for at least a year more if not longer. Also for me as a home user, why would I spend £100 on a copy of Windows 7 Pro to replace my XP install when I could spend that money on something else that will actually give me a benefit worth spending the money on?
Regarding security updates: yes they would be the key reason to update. XP is set to get them until April 2014 - so if I've not upgraded or switched completely to something else by then I'll upgrade some time before the end of 2013. This is the main reason business users will upgrade/switch, and probably at about the same time too.
Features? I'm not aware of any that I'd pay the money (and time reinstalling) for. Yes there might be some things in Windows 7 that I'd like, but not so much that I'd pay for them. DX10/11? DX9 is working for me right now, and any game that I might otherwise pay for that dares not support XP simply relegates itself to being something I might buy (at a bargain price compared to the price soon after release) in two years time when I have switched from XP. IE9? Much as I dislike IE6/7/8 I can just use Firefox instead of paying to be able to use IE9 without my preferred plugins. And so on.
Just use a user agent switcher... 99% of the time it doesn't even need IE
If you are running Windows, wait 3-6 months for bugs to be worked out and you should install it. Even if you don't use it, C:\WINDOWS\system32\mshtml.dll gets updated with IE 9.
If you run QuickBooks, Nero or a .Net App, you are using IE.
Don't believe me: remove your account's rights to C:\WINDOWS\system32\mshtml.dll and TRY to launch QuickBooks or Nero.
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
Despite what some may maintain based on the general tone of comments on /. not everyone who participates here is a Linux advocate. For my part I'm over in the BSD camp and daily curse the Linux Heretics who are working resolutely to corrupt our great institutions :) Only a fraction of the articles here are so Linux oriented as to not have relevance to the computer and geek communities outside of the Linux realm.
it doesn't support windows 3.1 either so what? windows xp doesn't have direct2d, if you need a browser that supports css3 and html5 use firefox 4 or chrome, if you can't install them because of company policies then you probably don't need them anyway
Almost nobody updates
I agree, almost nobody upgrades the OS. However, IE will probably be made available as a Windows Update option, so people on Vista and Win 7 may upgrade.
And you expected a 9 year old OS that was already past general support to be supported for the duration of your new machine's life? Joke is on you...
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
You obviously have never worked in any large company. It is not that simple you don't just go ask IT to install a plugin.
First you need to come up with a written and documented reason why you need the plug in. What specifically is not working for you. Then you need to come up with a cost benefit analyses. Despite being free, it is not free to a corporation, they have to dedicate someones time, usually there is central software deployment server, they need to build a deployment package then they need to test the deployment on every type of computer in every language. You also need to test all corporate web software on all of those machines to ensure that it doesn't impact business. This includes all websites inside the company and outside. Heck take Brazil for example, before a truck can even leave the facility it much have a receipt and approval from the government. If that truck driver gets pulled over and does not have the documents from the government about their cargo they go to jail, no questions asked. The Brazil site works in IE, however you have to test that whole Google Chrome Frame plug in out with every site required for business. So then supposed this plug in doesn't work and now you are backed up and parts aren't getting shipped. Which when you work in certain industries parts need to be on time to the next destination if not then you now have to pay that factories down time.
Sorry but this is reality. You don't risk getting parts out the door and loaded on to trucks which is your business because some twit says just ask to install this little plug in because I don't like IE. You have to remember a vast majority of the world are clueless sheep who use IE because they know no different.
I am just thankful my company went to IE 7 this year on our brand new core i7 laptops running Windows XP. Finally this year everything worked with testing against IE7. However 30% of the software we have either doesn't work on Windows 7 or we have to pay to upgrade the software which is too big of an expense right now so we are still stuck on XP. We get new PC again 3 years from now, maybe then we get Windows 7 and IE 8.
Don't run on Linux either.
$ wine IE9-WindowsVista-x86-enu.exe
fixme:advapi:RegisterTraceGuidsW (0x6cd15f38, 0x6cd20180, {e2821408-c59d-418f-ad3f-aa4e792aeb79}, 1, 0x33de50, (null), (null), 0x6cd20188,)
fixme:commctrl:TaskDialogIndirect 0x33d970, 0x33d9d4, (nil), (nil)
The same with Windows7 version.
http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
At $DAYJOB, I have a few applications that I use that are IE-only. About a year ago, the corporate IT department finally decided that we could use IE7, between compatibility issues and security fixes in IE7, so I now can use tabs in IE. You're also going to see more corporate IT departments forced to support newer IE versions as they replace older PCs with newer ones that don't support XP, so the waiting game's going to get accelerated.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
At work on Win XP (imagine that) trying to upgrade. . . "To install Internet Explorer 9, you need to upgrade to a more recent version of Windows"
Convince your IT department to deploy Chrome Frame Plugin for IE6/IE7/IE8. It will let you run existing IE-requiring intranet software, while providing the option of better HTML4/HTML5 inside of IE (rendered by Chrome.)
You literally get the best of both worlds. Backwards compatibility of IE6 plus the standards compliance of Chrome. And stupid users don't have to think about which browser start -- they continue using IE like before.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Chrome_Frame
Slashdot thinks I'm running Firefox, because it never sees IE, but that doesn't mean I'm not also running IE.
For many years, I've run both Firefox and IE - Firefox for most browsing, and IE for running work-related connections that need IE, and for browsing the occasional internet site that's not compatible with Firefox. This year, Firefox has been crashing way too often, and Google Chrome has gotten a lot better, so I'm now running about half my browser windows and tabs on Chrome and half on Firefox. (There are lots of sites that also fail on Chrome, and I'd rather have Firefox just crash than Chrome turn all its tabs into the "Oh, Snap!" page, because it's easy to kill off Firefox and restart it.)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Pity Microsoft, finally when they release IE 9, Chromed is ready to go to 11
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Is this news? Will I suddenly be able to use Internet Exploder 9, with bob and clippy on my windoze phone 7? Ohhh and connect it to the xbox too. Kewel. Thanks I'll pass. There are better, faster, cheaper options for me, ones that don't try to spy on me, steal my passwords, try to get me to use bing (and all of the stolen, but with "Linux" filtered out results from Google). Let me see, should I pass..... hmmmmm OK, I Pass! So it goes like this: 1. Paint dries, 2. Grass grows 3. MS releases IE9. All 3 are boring, but at least the first two are news worthy, non-proprietary, and most people give a crap about.
First you need to come up with a written and documented reason why you need the plug in.
A web site supporting certain CSS and DOM behaviors is required to make full use of the web site of supplier X or client Y, in order to continue that part of our revenue which depends on supplier X or client Y. These include at least IE >= 8, Mozilla Firefox, the standalone version of Google Chrome, or IE 6/7 with Google Chrome Frame. Among these choices, the one anticipated to have the least deployment impact is Google Chrome Frame because it activates only for those web sites that specifically request to be rendered with Chrome.
they need to build a deployment package then they need to test the deployment on every type of computer in every language.
If a product will be deployed only to a specific group of employees, namely those that interact with supplier X or client Y, then why spend resources testing it in environments other than those used by that specific group of employees?
She's removing her blouse; her breasts are large and milky white. All you want to do is reach out and touch...
Noooooo!!! My browser just crashed!!
******* Damn you internet Gods ******
soylentnews.org Go there to enjoy the people!
I'm not complaining, just making an observation that, until quite recently, XP was still sold with new computers.
"The web is usually designed after the weakest link "
Since when? The web is designed after the market leader, which now there is none (FF, IE, Chrome, Opera all have a significant share). That's why the web was so broken years ego and you could only use IE. So if IE falls down under 10% it will not matter anymore and Microsoft will be forced to implement the HTML standard very accurate to be used at all.
http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
Complain the the manufacturer, not Microsoft. Phasing out XP for good is long overdue.
Indeed. Windows XP is the equivalent of IE6 - a decade old system that should have been left behind a long time ago, if for no other reason (and I can think of plenty) so at least for the outdated security. It was launched same year as Mac OS 10.0.
Just another prime example of why IE sucks sooo bad! I've been running FireFox beta (now RC) 4 since early Feb. Works great on XP! and I don't have to put up with Google spying on me with Chrome!
What's the point of Mod points over a long weekend?
Yeah, looks like the forced upgrade is coming soon.
I said the same thing when we had to switch from Windows 2000, which is still a perfectly acceptable OS but almost none of the latest products run on it.
I main problem is that because I only run Windows in virtual machines, all these new version take up more and more resources on my host machine (ie. RAM and disk space). I ran Windows 2000 for as long as I could, now I'm running XP and 2003 and it looks like I'm going to have to switch to Windows 7 and 2008 shortly. Ugh, those are going to eat my machine up. Even with terabytes of RAID storage and 8GB of RAM, when you're running 5+ instances of Windows then things start to get tricky.
Windows 7 in particular is crazy resource hungry. I mean it takes up like 15 gigs just to install the damn thing.
Since neither MS nor the manufacturer provide a free upgrade to Win7, I guess I'm stuck until the machine dies. Not really a problem, as long as I don't try to install IE9 on it. For other things I use the machine for, XP works better, so I'm still happy.
No, you don't, because it is only used if the site notifies the browser that it is opted in to Google Chrome Frame - i.e. the designers have stated that it is compatible.. Google employs some pretty good programmers, and they tend to think of things like that. What you are describing is ignorant and underskilled IT departments - a universal problem, but one that has to be addressed or there will be no progress.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Getting rid of XP will soon become important in order to improve market share of "modern" browsers capable of rendering HTML5 / CSS3 reasonably correctly.
Conversion Rate Optimisation French / English consultant
MS announced no XP support for IE9 many months ago or maybe years ago.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
A custom HOSTS file.
"Now if there was just a decent ad blocker available, rather than the TPL's that only block 3rd party scripts and images." - by GrBear (63712) on Tuesday March 15, @09:48AM (#35490740)
See above... & it's ESPECIALLY NICE when you combine it with IE9's "tracking protection" lists (TPLs - because they "blockout" the small frame ads sit in that IE "oddly" still leaves when using HOSTS files, whereas other webbrowsers do NOT have that "issue").
Together, in combination, TPL's + IE's "restricted zones" & popup blocking work GREAT together for added "layered security" and yes, added speed online too.
APK
P.S.=> Some notes on HOSTS files that you may or may not be aware of that lend themselves to YOUR ADVANTAGE online:
20++ ADVANTAGES OF HOSTS FILES OVER DNS SERVERS &/or ADBLOCK ALONE for added layered security:
1.) HOSTS files are useable for all these purposes because they are present on all Operating Systems that have a BSD based IP stack (even ANDROID) and do adblocking for ANY webbrowser, email program, etc. (any webbound program).
2.) Bad news: ADBLOCK CAN BE DETECTED FOR: See here on that note -> http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars
HOSTS files are NOT BLOCKABLE by websites, as was tried on users by ARSTECHNICA (and it worked, proving HOSTS files are a better solution for this because they cannot be blocked & detected for, in that manner), to that websites' users' dismay:
PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT FROM ARSTECHNICA THEMSELVES:
----
An experiment gone wrong - By Ken Fisher | Last updated March 6, 2010 11:11 AM
http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars
"Starting late Friday afternoon we conducted a 12 hour experiment to see if it would be possible to simply make content disappear for visitors who were using a very popular ad blocking tool. Technologically, it was a success in that it worked. Ad blockers, and only ad blockers, couldn't see our content."
and
"Our experiment is over, and we're glad we did it because it led to us learning that we needed to communicate our point of view every once in a while. Sure, some people told us we deserved to die in a fire. But that's the Internet!"
Thus, as you can see? Well - THAT all "went over like a lead balloon" with their users in other words, because Arstechnica was forced to change it back to the old way where ADBLOCK still could work to do its job (REDDIT however, has not, for example). However/Again - this is proof that HOSTS files can still do the job, blocking potentially malscripted ads (or ads in general because they slow you down) vs. adblockers like ADBLOCK!
----
3.) Adblock doesn't protect email programs external to FF, Hosts files do. THIS IS GOOD VS. SPAM MAIL or MAILS THAT BEAR MALICIOUS SCRIPT, or, THAT POINT TO MALICIOUS SCRIPT VIA URLS etc.
4.) Adblock won't get you to your favorite sites if a DNS server goes down or is DNS-poisoned, hosts will (this leads to points 4-7 next below).
5.) Adblock doesn't allow you to hardcode in your favorite websites into it so you don't make DNS server calls and so you can avoid tracking by DNS request logs, hosts do (DNS servers are also being abused by the Chinese lately and by the Kaminsky flaw -> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/082908-kaminsky-flaw-prompts-dns-server.html for years now). Hosts protect against those problems via hardcodes of your fav sites (you should verify against the TLD t
Media have opinions.
I did some snooping around to see if Joe Hewitt contributed to IE9, doesn't look like it.
Their "Developer's Mode" looks like they straight out jacked firebug.
To be fair, Safari and Chrome have similar developer modes. Still surprised me though. Now debugging IE's shitty JS and DOM WILL be easier, it allows operating in IE6, 7 and 8 modes.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
IE is widely used, because ASP.NET development as well as custom information systems development occurs like crazy for those who are programmers out there!
That's simply because IE + IIS + SQLServer are a combination that does the job VERY well for most things and it's already in place, because Windows does own 95% or better of market share worldwide, and, it works as well as having a HUGE # of "prebuilt add ons" in the form of ActiveX controls for intranet programming!
(Yes - it's actually BETTER than "LAMP" based pure stacks on a # of grounds).
The combination I noted does VERY well in:
---
1.) Througput per second tests
2.) Hits per second tests
---
(and, not TOO badly in transactions per second tests either)
APK
P.S.=> I am quoting data from EWeek labs tests done in July 2006 by EWeek... it was on page 35-39 of that issue, & probably can be found online for your reference also, in case you have any doubts... apk
Someone mentioned Opera!!
It doesnt't work on any of my computers unlike its competitors. Firefox, Opera, Chrome and even Safari are multi-platform.
You know, the whole idea of the web is to be able to faithfully render the layout and presentation as intended according to standards. If that isn't happening, I don't care how fast it is. (Similarly, I don't care how fast a car is if it can't drive well on standard roads and on standard tires.)
I'm waiting to hear how well IE9 supports current CSS standards and proposed standards for HTML5.
It was Microsoft's (and other developers) quest for speed that led to it breaking BIOS compatibility and then later the use of undocumented/unsupported system calls in software led to all sorts of compatibility problems that had to be maintained (and still are maintained) in the kernel and OS. Moving forward, I would certainly like to see Microsoft playing well with standards so that Microsoft and non-Microsoft can speak the same languages effectively and compatibly.
It doesn't matter that IE6 is a security risk because the IT department has probably proposed upgrading but due to systems X, Y and Z not working under IE7/8/9 and the costs involved in upgrading/rewriting those business applications the business case has been denied. Sure, that is CYA but the IT department doesn't generally get to overrule the business side that way. That doesn't mean they want to take on other risks they don't see a gain from and haven't got anybody's sign-off for.
You don't mention the size of the company but most large companies have some form of software directory, these are all the approved applications and versions that employees must use. If you want anything not on that list, it's either a huge approval process to get on that list or an exception process that requires lots of sign-off and disclaimers that they don't support anything that software does. Your request sounds like something they'd wisely tell you to forget, because it'd be at the bottom of the pile and probably rejected in the end too.
Pardon me for saying so, but you sound like one of those annoying business users that thinks the IT department is there as your personal hand-holding staff to tune your PC just the way you like it. What you're asking for is more obscure than dvorak and I still haven't seen a person use that. It is a support unit but they're not being paid more than it makes sense from a productivity point of view. If they can cut IT costs with $10k and lower your productivity with $8k, they will. So IT is just there to make most of the people get most of their work done most of the time. Any special needs you have better have a good reason, that you can't work with a keyboard 99.99% of the population does really isn't it unless you have some kind of disability preventing you from using what the rest do.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Using the Tracking Protection Lists, you can get very simple adblock mechanism for IE9 here:
http://easylist.adblockplus.org/en/#easyprivacytpl
It doesn't let you whitelist anything, but if you need something quick and simple, this is the Easylist TPL and it works very well.
The price is always right if someone else is paying.
So you use a keyboard layout that doesnt match the keys on 99% of keyboards made out there and wonder why you cant use it? It has been proven time and again that those alternative keyboard layouts are not any easier to use, or faster to type with. If you think they are.. ask the worlds fastest typers who can type over 200wpm.. they all use qwerty. People who need alternative layouts are convinced they are better by someone who seems to be an authority with no actual scientific backing of the theory then feel the need to complain and wine when they cant have things thier way because they decided to use a non standard layout. You chose to do the wrong thing. You can correct that mistake or live with the problem you will h ave by making it.
do people still use IE?
Wow, that's an Apple-style upgrade path if that's the truth. Case in point: friend of mine has an old G5 Mac and was unable to update IE because he couldn't afford to buy the upgrade for OS X 10.3.9 to 10.4. OS X gave a very similar error message about requiring a newer version to upgrade IE.
IE has always been the fastest at rendering web pages. In firefox you can see individual tables loading and crap.. ie it just boom loads it all... always has.... dont need benchmarks to see its a better end user expereince. Apple-tards will agree "expereince is everything", and Ie is a pleasurable browsing experience... all other browsers seem buggy or slow to everyone i know.
When will MS learn? I just installed IE 9, it asked me to restart Windows 7! Feels like I'm back in '98!
Ah yes. Developers with little to no talent become web developers. Most of us here don't fall into that category.
Yet they plan on getting it working on Windows Phone 7. XP was still sold on machines up until last year, and holds 50% of the market. Not really the same as Win 3.1 that is a little silly.
Getting rid of XP will soon become important in order to improve market share of "modern" browsers capable of rendering HTML5 / CSS3 reasonably correctly.
I think people moving to alternative browsers that support HTML5 / CSS3 correctly is cheaper and practical.
MS announced no XP support for IE9 many months ago or maybe years ago.
Yes they have always tried to tie upgrade releases of IE to the OS which has help back its advancement for many years. It just doesn't work as well in a market of competing better browsers.
Oh crap.
I read other replies to this, blah blah blah MS announced this a long time ago, XP is too old for new APIs, etc.
You're missing the point folks.
As a web developer, I have been looking forward to IE9 as a means of deliverance from having to add style and functionality workarounds for IE6, IE7, and IE8. Designers have been putting rounded corners and drop shadows and complicated borders on everything for a couple years now. This stuff looks great in Firefox, Safari, Chrome, and Opera. And it doesn't show up at all in IE. I have to use GIFs. Not even PNGs --- GIFs, because IE7<7 doesn't support transparent PNG.
There are so, so many people still on XP, and using it happily to get stuff done. We're talking about Presidents and Board Chairs here, the people who pay the bills. They will not upgrade just because there is a new version of IE. So now, instead of supporting 3 versions of IE, we will need to support 4, with all of the same headaches.
So instead of celebrating at long last the release of IE9, I have to go sacrifice a goat and pray that MS will update the rendering engine in IE8 to include an HTML5 mode for XP. Damn you, Redmond!
Maybe try it on a version of windows that wasn't released over 10 years ago...
but sold until a year ago, works well with old hardware, Windows 7 will not work on an awful lot of hardware. Although the real problem is Microsoft Bundling the OS with OEM and the excessive pricing of buying it separately. Then upgrading the OS may be practical, right now its not even with the skills.
I think that is unfair. I myself am not a web developer. Every now and then I will so some coding to help out our web team but it is not my profession. Of course since you are an AC and probably have delusions of grandeur sitting in your first c class I should probably just consider the source.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Happily! Ha, ha, ha!
http://www.acetonestudio.com
Am I the only one who thinks that IE9 is ugly as hell? It is nice to see that it gives you more vertical screen space, but the "everything bar" could look appealing, too, you know.
B. take advice from a lawyer specializing in disability discrimination law.
I'm pretty sure that people using any particular keyboard layout do not constitute a protected class of people. Much less "disabled".
It probably still falls under the scope of OSHA's ergonomics guidelines.
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
They wanted to use new APIs and features that are found in modern versions of Windows, in an effort to make IE suck less.
Use a different browser at work and IE9 at home, if you must.
Uhhhh why not simply detect the version of Windows and enable/disable based on support of features required? It's not hard to do. This is just Microsoft doing what any software company does - making you upgrade so that they'll make money.
Ever done any programming, ever?
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
currently being worked on http://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=24412
Some Dvorak users with RSI claim that their pain became more tolerable after having switched from QWERTY.
People claim all sorts of things that are explained better by the placebo effect. This also could fall under the logical fallacy of post hoc ergo propter hoc. People are amazing at convincing themselves of all sorts of things.
Chrome's shows a security "bug" w/ FLASH in version 10.x:
http://secunia.com/advisories/product/34532/?task=advisories
PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT:
---
Google Chrome Flash Player Unspecified Code Execution Vulnerability
Unpatched. Secunia Advisory 1 of 2 in 2011.
Release Date:
2011-03-15
Secunia Advisory ID:
SA43757
Solution Status:
Unpatched
Criticality:
Impact:
System access
Where:
From remote
Short Description:
A vulnerability has been reported in Google Chrome, which can be exploited by malicious people to compromise a user's system.
---
(Thanks for the information on this, IF you have it, that is...)
APK
"Milk Drinkers Turn to Powder"
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
>"You'll just have to decide for yourself..."
Funny, it won't load on any of my systems (hint: they are all Linux. One even has an XP virtual machine and it won't load in that either).
Guess I will have to stick with one of the other major browsers, all of which are cross-platform (Firefox, Opera, Chrome).
How long until they release the version for linux? I haven't used Internet Explorer since I gave up on Windows several years ago. I keep reading stories about IE getting better than rival browsers, including Firefox. I'd like to install it and take it for a test drive to see for myself. It's still free, right?
1.Netcraft confirms:In Soviet Russia all your base welcomes a beowolf cluster of CowboyNeal overlords. 2.? 3.Profit!!1!
Is it called IE9 because 9 percent is it's market share among slashdot readers? ;-)
I think you're correct about IE6 holdouts being WinXP holdouts. However, IE7 works just fine on XP, and (though I haven't tried it), IE8 is also supposed to run on XP. When I got my current laptop, a year or so ago, Corporate IT was claiming to support XP and Vista, but in practice they were still shipping most new hardware with XP and are likely to jump to Win7 without doing any more Vista than they have to.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
I guess I am one of the 9%, and a fanboy, so, extremely biased. I'm impressed, pretty much sums it up. If you have a Vista/7 box... there's no reason not to have IE9 on there
Uhhhh why not simply detect the version of Windows and enable/disable based on support of features required
The "feature" in case is basic text rendering.
Sure, IE could retain the old code path for XP, and use a new one for Vista and above. But that means supporting more code.
Windows XP is 10 years old. Why do you want a modern browser for your antique OS.
The short story is that IE9 has very very good CSS 2.1 support (probably better than anyone else; being late to the game actually helps with that) and fairly limited CSS3 support. Of course most of the CSS3 modules are still in the pie-in-the-sky stage; the only notable exceptions are Color, Backgrounds&Borders, and Selectors, and IE9 may support part of Backgrounds&Borders.
As far as HTML5 goes, IE9 is somewhat behind the curve on the new stuff, as far as I can tell (about where other browsers were a year ago), but way better than IE8. For one thing, it supports . And SVG, for that matter.
Incorrect. If you're using Quickbooks or Nero, you're using Trident. That's as disingenuous as saying that Gecko is Firefox (it's not).
And not every .NET app imports Trident - only ones using the "WebBrowser" control. All .NET apps import WinInet though (but since that's the HTTP library, not the renderer... and even Chrome imports that).
For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
Well, or you could upgrade because the OS you're currently using is just flat-out obsolete.
No instant search; do you still launch apps by navigating manus or is there just a crapload of icons on your screen?
Really primitive built-in firewall; filtering options are limited and it's incoming-only.
Very painful to run as a limited user, so I bet you're logged in with an Admin account. Read up on the Principle of Least Privilege.
No ASLR means "return-oriented programming" attacks will work; the other major OSes have this too.
No integrity control sandboxing; apps run at the privilege level of their user even if they really should be more restricted.
Video drivers all run in the kernel, meaning anything that goes wrong (and in a piece of code as comlex as a video driver, they do) causes an OS crash.
Memory management algorithms intended for a time when total RAM was measured in megabytes; it's as outdated as "1.5x as much Swap as RAM" on Linux.
Minimal 64-bit capability (and you're not really running XP at that point, it's the Server 2003 kernel, which has very little mainstream driver support).
No ability to restore a file or folder to an earlier state unless you've invested a lot of effort in backup software (the built-in backup stuff sucks, too).
App switching just shows you icons, not thumbnails, much less *live* thumbnails.
Clunky error messages that don't even tell you things like what app is holding a file open when you try to manipulate it.
Relatively poor support for SMP, compared to modern OSes. I bet my dual-core system can boot Win7 faster than your quad-core boots XP.
Do you still use IE to install your updates?
How long can you delay rebooting after you install updates?
Have you ever had a Patch Tuesday where you *didn't* need to reboot?
How often do you get new or updated drivers via Windows Update, vs. needing to download them manually?
Damn, I could go on like this a lot longer too. Seriously, using XP in 2011 is like driving a car from 1980, without the "it's a classic!" appeal.
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
IE6 does support transparent PNGs, but only paletted transparency, not alpha transparency. And for some reason image editors which support outputting paletted transparent PNGs seem to be very thin on the ground.
The overall IE market share is slipping, but a proportion of windows users seem stuck to IE only. Since XP users are effectively stuck at IE8, those that don't already run Firefox or Chrome (or Opera, or Safari...) are not likely to change their ways.
Conversion Rate Optimisation French / English consultant
None of those things mean much to normal users though. Cranking up a word processor or launching a web browser really is the same now as on a ten year old machine, except with some shinier buttons.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I understand why those fucks at MS won't support XP, but they won't support 95? There are lots of places where its still being used! We paid once for it, so we deserve updates all the time.
Great effort in your post.
I'll echo the reply below with the further theme that most of your points feel like the typical accumulation of time passing software by, and I'm under no delusion that XP is the cat's meow. However, for me, the upgrade process is driven by the killer app effect.
"Soonish" I will update, and then all your fair points come for the ride, but my goal is to upgrade at the correct tech tipping point to avoid the Facepalm "I upgraded one year too early". Currently my sights are set on a serious look at Windows 8 due in two years.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
See subject-line, & yes: it appears Chrome 10x & 11x BOTH had the security vulnerability noted... It must have been (Chrome 11.696.3 issued TODAY)!
APK
P.S.=> Hence why Chrome 11.696.3 issued today (& previous build was 11.696.0)... Well, @ least GOOGLE was F A S T about patching it! apk
IE9 on my machine is super-fast. The RC had one or two issues, but in yesterday's release those were fixed. It is smokin' fast - it renders a page in probably 1 second, and after a reboot starts to the home-page (google) in, again, around 1 second. Yes, it does not have many add-ons - only 2, actually. True.
However, on the same machine, on a freshly installed win7 home pro 64, the current version of FF starts in.... hang on, boys.... 50 seconds. 50 ! I kidd you not. 50. I have enough time to go to the kitchen to grab a coffee. I have uninstalled it, downloaded it again from the mothership, installed it again. No luck. I have only 5 add-ins, the most common ones (AdBlock, NoScript, etc). Not to mention that the CPU spikes at 90% while struggling to load this beast. The subsequent FF loads are much better, they take under 4-5 seconds. Now you tell me...
Yes, I am not an accomplished webdev, true, although I have done that too. But overall I'm mostly a user.
So, on my (recent) machine - Ie9 - super. Chrome - good. FF - poor-ish.
Just sayin'.
The question is, have you? It's not like they have to generate entirely new code here to support Windows XP...
Right, so talking to you on this topic is a waste of my time. Glad that's cleared up.
Don't worry about IE6, last time i checked usage was below 3%. If you are still using a browser that is 10 years old, you've got issues as a user.