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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.
Well in my own (albeit not very scientific) testing with canvas/js performance. It's running at around 10x the speed of Firefox. Much faster for sites with a lot of Canvas animation (as their own demos display - Firefox stutters along badly, while IE9 is so fast some of the tests are a blur.) I'm primarily a Firefox user, but it's hard to ignore this huge performance difference.
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
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 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.
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
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!
When your phone catches up to your desktop, it's definitely time to upgrade.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
Initially I was referring to the latest live release of Firefox (3.6). On my system my test (linked from story) runs at ~34fps. Firefox 4.0 Beta hits ~97fps and IE9 ~311fps. That's quite a performance gap. The test is mostly rendering polygons in a quick little JS 3D engine, with some canvas->canvas blitting & rotation mixed in. Note that both Firefox 3.6 and Firefox 4.0 appear to be CPU bound, where IE is bound by the resolution of the interval timer (I assume), as it's only using 2-3% CPU.
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
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?
As with any Linux product, by the time I've finally worked out what all the config options do, a new version will be out that deprecates all of them in favour of newer, shinier options.
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!
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
As with all Linux products, once I've found a stable chain of individual tools that does what needs to be done, I will live in fear of upgrading any of them, lest the entire chain fail catastrophically.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
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!