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Who Is Still Using IE6? the UK Government
strawberryshakes writes "The death knell for IE6 was sounded a couple of years ago, but seems like some people just can't let go. Many UK government departments are still using IE6, which is so old — 11 years old to be exact — it can't cope with social media — which the government is trying to get its staff to use more to engage with citizens."
Good to see the US government isn't the only ones.
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New PC, old OS. Microsoft did a really good job locking people into IE. So good that many people still haven't escaped.
No sig today...
The "Social media guidance" document on which this is based is an interesting read: http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/resource-library/social-media-guidance
It's not about "letting go" - I'm sure it's about the cost of upgrading thousands (tens of thousands?) of systems. Not just the licensing of the software, but also the cost of execution and management of the upgrade, and then the upgrade of all the applications, training on new versions, rewriting an ass ton of security and management policies, and years of churn getting the kinks out of thousands of systems, and the loss of productivity while switching over, and... (I'm sure with a couple more minutes thought I could come up with five other angles of cost).
The summary makes it seem like they're holding on for sentiment, and that they're shooting themselves in the foot by sticking with tried and true software. The summary hasn't given any voice to the enormity of the task (it's not a simple "derr, click the upgrade button stupid"), nor the idea that this is government money which can and arguably should be used in more critical areas of life.
Are slashdot editors really this shortsighted?
I'm a web developer for an organisation that builds web based software that is primarily used by UK local government departments.
IE6 is my nemesis.
A lot of these local authorities are slowly starting to upgrade to Win7 platforms (just in time for Win8), but just like a chain being only as strong as it's weakest link, we have to ensure we are developing for the slowest common denominator.
From the dozens of conversations I've had with Council IT teams around the country, it isn't a lack of will or of motivation or of education, but of a real (and partially justified) fear that if they upgrade to Win7, some essential legacy web based application that works flawlessly in IE6 and XP, will fall over when introduced to IE8. This has happened at various places around the country and has cost Councils a pile of money to fix the issue or to replace those legacy systems. In the post recession cost-cutting world, no one wants to be the guy who lands their employer with a huge bill. I expect we wont see the stragglers taking up the challenge until austerity is done and dusted.
And there you have it. I managed to make this all the coalition government's fault. My work here is done.
We still use IE6 in certain instances where I work (U.S. Gov't). It isn't part of a standard install, it is a published Citrix app and really only used for specific applications that require it. Our standard install is IE8 and Firefox 3.6.28.
The problem isn't the cost of upgrading workstations. It is there are a couple of critical web-interface apps that require it and are an expensive bitch to upgrade. Older versions of Oracle Financials for one.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Sure you can. Buy more than 100 seats of Windows 7 Pro, with Software Assurance, and self-downgrade before the initial install. Besides, most 100+ seat businesses use a custom OS image anyways. Easy enough to make it an XP Pro image, if you can find drivers for everything.
The preceding comment is my own, and in no way construes an opinon of the Emperor of Mankind.
Dude, eleven isn't old.
I'm forty-four and I can't cope with social media either.
As a IT admin, I can attest we are not all lazy. It more often then not is a matter of pulling upper levels of the business kicking and screaming into modern times by spending some money to make sure things still work. They would often rather spend tons of money maintaining old OSes on modern hardware then make sure old software they feel is critical actually gets fixed to work on modern OSes.
It's even crazier when they then want some ancient IE6 based web app to miraculously work on their shiny new Ipads and don't understand that they simply won't work. I have had a a CEO complain that we need to put IE6 on his Ipad because he needs to run X web app that was made 15 years ago and only works in IE6. He refused to accept that an Ipad will not run IE6, to the point where he even cursed at us and demanded we install Win XP on his Ipad to 'make it work'.
Most of us IT admins know that we have to get this stuff working and get them off of systems often setup before we were even hired. Getting large businesses and governments to do such things though is at times futile.
we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
Obviously sticking with IE6 is misguided, but I've seen the opposite side. I've worked in IT for 20+ years, and I've never seen any organization as cavalier about software upgrade costs as my provincial and federal governments. Entire departments would be upgraded to the latest version of Microsoft Office as soon as it came out. It had nothing to do with product features, or whether the previous version was sufficient for their needs. (And I'm not talking about file format changes, which caused a legitimate need for upgrading). The cost to taxpayers for unnecessary software upgrades must be be significant.
The culprit here isn't the desktops, it's the general, rock bottom, dire state of "enterprise" software.
Truth be told, shrink wrap software is way better put together than the overpriced, utter shite corporate web apps that many government and big corporate users are forced to endure. They are usually written by inexperienced or bored 9-to-5 developers, and get bit-rotten and unmaintainable fast and thus are sheer hell to work on or upgrade.
As a bored corporate drone myself, I feel the pain. I endure IE6 for using our business apps, and use Chrome for everything else.
Governments have a way of getting special deals that aren't available to people on the street.
No sig today...
This is pretty standard in the Microsoft volume licensing agreement. There's lots of corporations doing the exact same thing. How do you think XP hung around so long after it wasn't for sale anymore?
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
So, your 11-year-old child would only be five because she didn't have any siblings until six years ago? Good luck with that.
No, see, that's how it works with computer software; the date we're interested in isn't the date of introduction but the date of supersession. In this case that was only six years ago. Until, say, a year before that tops it didn't make sense to try to aim for IE7, and if you were committed to using a platform browser you were therefore targeting IE6. I was glad someone had figured out what year all this had happened because I didn't want to look it up.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"