Until Oracle, Kronos, Siebel, DerpMaster, Manpower, Sap, and about 85% of all intranet app makers support anything above IE 8 the answer to any recent or different browser is a resounding NO!
Part of me feels they do so on purpose to hurt Microsoft so they can sell cloud solutions and make the pc platform and internal intranet apps higher TCO (Sap and Oracle) and we all need to suffer in the process by not having HTML 5 yet.
College kids reading this. Be prepared for disappointment in the real world as your paycheck comes at a price. THe real world is not so liberal and open to alternative and cutting edge things as your school is.
When your doctor tells you to stop eating unhealthy foods because you're at risk of diabetes, do you give him shit like that? When your mechanic tells you that you need to bring your car in to get an oil change on time, do you throw your hands up in the air and bitch about not being an expert?
pretty sure the op struggles to get food to dock with his food hole
The big boys at work who buy these $100,000 SAP, Oracle, Kronos, Manpower, Siebel, and other crapware do so because they get a ROI. Bitch about being geeky to this non tech user who just blew $500,000 upgrading everything from IE 6 to cutting edge IE 8 (in his mind) will fire you with such a doctors analogy on the spot. That or he will look at you funny and ask if you replaced the toner on his printer yet?... pff cost center peon.
This man writes your paycheck and he tells you what you support you either support that browser or get another job! In this economy that should not be hard. I know many computer science students who are making $10/hr working at call centers in Florida DESPERATE TO GET YOUR JOB as to them they need a break.
Geektalk doesn't matter boy and is an arrogant assumption if it is not certified for their work they consultant with 6 figures in it then it doesn't exist! IE 8 is here to stay!
Pretty much everyone has some old app that requires IE 8 and being the only version to wok on both oses it makes sense to lock that down for the next 5 - 10 years. If Google wont support IE 8 then Microsoft will. End of story.
Google does not support IE 8 which is the defecto standard and has no clue how good MS Office is as they do not use it. THey do not have to worry about relying on crappy intranet apps that lock XP and ancient versions of IE.
They do not have to worry about Office add-ons like barcode scanner VBA excell addons. They do not have suppliers that require IE 6 to do business with. They do nto have a budget on a shoestring.
They are hip with hipsters like Apple, but fail in the corporate market. One of my customers left google docs and gmail for hotmail and Office 365 because Google was arrogant enough to drop IE 8! They really do not get it as this client couldn't just upgrade like you and I could with Windows update and be done with it 3 minutes later.
So the crappiness of Windows products work against Google Docs ??
If a corporation considers using Google Docs, they have also the mental strength to consider installing firefox and/or chrome. These are actually rock-solid products as compared to what Microsoft currently delivers. But yeah, heresy in the view of M$. You are like the catholic church and you still rule all those advanced countries such as Spain, Mexico, Paraguay and 25 other countries run by military dictators or on the brink of that.
Welcome to the world of web developers.
Bash it all you want but IE is well supported and integrated with AD better than anything else. It doesn't matter if it is crap. It is what their intranet apps and works with what they have.
If Google refuses to work with it, then Microsoft will be happy to sell them Office 365 subscriptions instead. They will lose the corporate market totally!
I am in full agreement with you 100% and not opposed to what you are saying.
I am frustrated with the situation, and look at it differently. Business sense 101, the customer dictates to you. Not hte other way around. Microsoft has a very competitive product with Office 365 and are happy to accomodate.
We tend to look at it at nerds. Not businessmen who view it as a different lens. There are 3 arguments I see. One is technical, one is money, and the last is political and structural.
Technically a better browser would be nice. However, on a technical scale IE 8 standardization over IE 9 makes sense due to XP users and migrations to WIndows 7. Standardizing on just IE 8 means you can crossover gradually. Rarely can you flip a switch and every pc in a company is magically Windows 7. It takes time if you have 5,000 users in 30 offices across 4 continents! Yes you could write for it twice. Once with standards and another with jscript, but that costs money and doubles costs for the intranet vendor.
Money wise why change( customer )? It works! Why take the risk to buy something else from what you have that already works fine according to the bean counters? Yes, it is more insecure but if that one app that that is mission critical like a logistics ERP app if you are a trucking company is scary. How do you know the next one will be as good, or will have downtime that can throw you out of business? That then leaves politics. If it fails YOU ARE FIRED even if it is the fault of the vendor and not you. If you leave it and not touch it and go with Office 365 and you might be less secure and need to do more rewiping but it works.
Maybe in the future if enough of us band together and push HTML 5 they will leave it but I feel it is the next IE 6. Regardless if you write corporate software you MUST SUPPORT their applications if you want their business.
Google is in a bubble and not in the same world. They write their own apps. They never have to deal with this bullshit that their corporate customers do. What I described above is what any medium to large size company thinks and deals with. Trust me they would keep IE 6 if it were not for MS cancelling XP support.
First off do not tell 90% of corps who standardize on IE 6, 7, and 8 to go hell! Google docs is absolutely useless. Not even IE 8 which is the defecto standard for every single Intranet app in existence. I could see dropping IE 6 (that itself will cost business). Corps must use IE only as it is the only one with group policy, active directory, mass deployment, and a slow release cycle. Before the IE haters mod me down, ask yourselves why aren't you writing extensions to Firefox and Chrome for these features?
Also GoogleDocs is a glorified wordpad in functionality but with sharing....Office 365 has more features, integrates with the MS ecosystem, and supports older versions of IE where upgrading is out of the question and would cost more than savings with free Google Docs.
The internet is just a glorified PC experience with sharing. Microsoft missed the bus once before.
Google needs to:
So they can be just like MS? How is MS strategy working now: their browsers are behind the curve in many respects. Behind the curve is becoming Microsoft's strong suit in many areas. This is valid criticism, not to discount their innovation in other areas (Kinect, Metro, C# etc.)
Support ancient versions of IE.
Why not just have them use a LTS version of Firefox since it supports AD? IE for the shit apps, FF for everything else. If you want legacy software support, you pay for it like everyone else, and looks like the price is increasing. With IE its a pity these proprietary browsers have such shite standards support, maybe if these companies didn't paint themselves into a corner with brittle applications, developed most likely by the lowest bidder (it's low cost for a reason), they'd not be in the boat they're in now. I think it's time to change the mantra 'Nobody was fired for picking a Microsoft solution' since its the managers who are ultimately responsible for these shit sandwich mission critical systems with no exit strategy which have the company by the balls. If you are incompetent enough to be unable to upgrade the views to a system, you're doing it wrong. If it's a boondoggle then have the heads of those responsible, otherwise you will not encourage change, nothing is a motivator like self preservation.
Ancient software is typically bad idea. Old browsers need to go away for one simple reason: they're security nightmares.
With $500,000 worth of ancient apps that browser is not going away!
Support is dwindling. Vacuum tubes still exist after all...
XP users are stuck at IE 8 not to mention IE 8 is targeted for WIndows 7 users as well as it is the universal browser that works with both operating systems.
XP users are overdue for an upgrade, they're 3 versions behind now. I'd say Firefox is arguably the universal desktop browser since it runs on most platforms. A good lesson out of the last decade is standards, screw the 'one true platform.'
You can argue technical facts until you are blue in the face. If it is a cost it wont get adopted PERIOD! It works fine, it is what the PHB bet his reputation on that he feels you are ruining on these apps, workers hate change, it is not sox or
There is signifcant risk. You can get sick from eating it. However it can't spread to human to human... yet.That is the part that is missing.
The real risk from this is it can mutate or combine with another flu or cold virus that does have the gene for human to human transmission. A swine would be the perftect candidate if any are around the farm to do this. Also the virus could interact with a standard cold virus in a human and then with that mutation can spread person to person as a very lethal virus.
This is how most flu virii evolve. It makes sense to cull them not for the birds but because of the risks associated above. I think a 2nd opinion is needed on if you can get sick eating infected flesh as I was informed you can even if it is not contagious between human to human
First off do not tell 90% of corps who standardize on IE 6, 7, and 8 to go hell! Google docs is absolutely useless. Not even IE 8 which is the defecto standard for every single Intranet app in existence. I could see dropping IE 6 (that itself will cost business). Corps must use IE only as it is the only one with group policy, active directory, mass deployment, and a slow release cycle. Before the IE haters mod me down, ask yourselves why aren't you writing extensions to Firefox and Chrome for these features?
Also GoogleDocs is a glorified wordpad in functionality but with sharing. It is great to share something simple for a group project for college students but it is not as functional as LibreOffice or MS Office.
Office 365 has more features, integrates with the MS ecosystem, and supports older versions of IE where upgrading is out of the question and would cost more than savings with free Google Docs.
Google needs to 1. Update Chrome every 1 - 2 years 2. Add.msi, active directory, group policy, and deployment tools that are centrally managed to Chrome 3. Support ancient versions of IE. Yes, we hate them and yes HTML 5 features like drag and drop is nice, but javascript and css3pie can emulate them. With $500,000 worth of ancient apps that browser is not going away! XP users are stuck at IE 8 not to mention IE 8 is targeted for WIndows 7 users as well as it is the universal browser that works with both operating systems.
How about we can start by taking these PLCs off the internet!
I am mortified by the responses I see here with PHBs wanting live reports from their cell phones on the nuclear power plant and IT willing to do it and how they all use XP SP 2 unpatched with no AV software!
Do not be surprised when you have a nuclear meltdown or be without power for a few days during a grid outage. You brought this on yourselves and Iran has every right to attack back!
If this does happen then the PHBs and IT needs to be jailed for negligence if any of these live systems are on the internet with their PLCS. Good LORD what the hell were you thinking?
Registers are debatable. If your cache size is double it will slow I/O down to the point where you lose performance. 32bit compilers now have added instructions and other features including other registers recently. They add everything but the extra memory addresses so why upgrade? In 05 the 32bit kernel and runtimes were optimized for the PentiumII mmx2 instructions still. Another reason to leave that dinosaur but people love familiarity enough where they will look at things in Win 7 to hate on purpose and things to love in XP to resist the change.
I read one post earlier that he went back down to XP and never realized how pretty the icons were in it... puke.
Anyway it makes sense to keep going on 32-bit. Too many of these machines are out htere that wont run it and Firefox will then be blamed again for not supporting them due to poor leadership. You can't win either way.
If they have limited resources, then why don't they abandon the 32-bit branch?
1. Too many corps have old software written in 16 bit vb 4 with access 95 that requires the 32-bit versions of Windows 7 and 8 to run. Worse, many consumers use the 32-bit versions of Windows too for no reason at all other than their geek friends thought it would reduce ram usage. Many do not know what 32-bit is and will end up using an unsupported and insecure ancient version of Firefox if they were to drop support.
Windows is the only OS that is not 64-bit only. This is getting ridiculous and like old IE it will then become the problem of the next decade within that ecosystem.
Part of me really wishes MS dropped 32-bit at Vista or at least Windows 7. By still supporting it they are enablers to these corporate users. These corporate users are angry at MS as it is for not being COMPATIBLE ENOUGH. It is turning into a mainframe environment now where it is inflexible to change and consumers are getting used to using 10 year old software and resisting change.
2. Gatorsoft, bonzi buddy, and abunch of corporate crap addons from SAP, Oracle, and other plugins are not supported in 64-bit mode.
I do not know if there is a solution to this as these companies use Firefox because they have to keep IE 6 around as their browser. I guess with 2014 coming perhaps Firefox can drop it for them, but tens of millions if not hundreds use 32-bit versions of Windows. What are you going to do about them? Let them switch to Chrome instead?
I am not a kernel level programmer here. Assuming a theoretical situation requires a theoretical application to gain that advantage. In other words, 2 TB of ram it would be harder to crack. But I do not have this nor does anyone outside of advanced servers usage.
Since only the most powerful servers have it I see it as offering no real advantage. XP users use PAE to go around the 4 gig limit hack anyway. So if I had 4 gigs of ram it would not matter if the OS is 32-bit or 64-bit. The memory addresses would be the same. If I had 8 gigs of ram I would have it extended if I ran XP with PAE so I would have an identical amount of memory addresses in either case.
That argument does not hold water. THe bitness doesn't matter as much as much as the code to implement all of the above. As it has been pointed out there are no real 64-bit browsers. IE has a 64 bit build just like Office but does not support it.
The security is made by the browser/OS with the code programmed in and it is independent as Chrome has heap protection at 32-bit as well. Unless of course the hack does get through then that 2 TB of ram will help:-)
IE 10 32-bit has ASLR and heap spraying protection sandboxing right in. I think Chrome does as well but someone can correct me on this if I am wrong. Infact, the only thing Windows 7 64-bit has that the 32-bit does not is signed bootloaders and drivers to prevent rootkits.
ASLR has been part of 32-bit operating systems for years since Vista.
If someone knows the ram address of a particular dll they can target it anyway with a poke regardless of the bitness. You can still spray on a 64 bit system as well. It just will take longer but can gradually compromise it. THe best defense is a patched OS with a sandboxed browser to prevent the attack from evening happening. Thankfully with ASLR this can of attack is useless except on those with XP as ram addresses constantly change.
32-bit for desktop systems is outdated since more than a decade ago, and a complete anachronism for everything except backwards Windows. But even Windows caught up five years ago.
Somehow I have the feeling that the hostility of the closed and primitive Windows platform locks Windows developers in some kind of mental box, that causes them to be very limited in their thinking, when it comes to how to approach developing things or moving to 64-bit for example. I mean, the damn thing doesn't even have a package manager. (No, Windows Installer doesn't even remotely count.)
Difference is the win32 environment is not free. As a result customers tend to hang on to old obsolete systems. As a result older incompatible and backwards operating systems still need to be supported like Windows 98. If you use dos like stuff in your windows 98 that is also compatible with XP, then it probably wont run on 7/8. Unless you run the 32-bit version of course. You couldn't have just made it XP compatible only in 2006 (the version most customers use) as people still had win98.
Linux doesn't have this problem. Or the opposite. It is free so who cares? Just re-invent the wheel every 3 years etc. In the real world where people care about results Windows does the job as it just works, is tested, not to mention people need software to get work done. That is not free my friend. So compatibility like what I described is a clusterfuck. Firefox 32-bit is needed as many use obsolete java plugins to use their expensive and shitty Oracle ERP.
It has nothing to do with developers being retarded and an inferior operating system. It is the economic reality in this new economy that new software must run on old platforms which hinder it, likewise many people want to run old software on newer systems too.
If Gnome 1.x was $120 with all the libraries and apis, and the linux kernel costs $50, you bet your ass Redhat 6.2 (its golden version) would be like XP today and millions would still use it. Why? Software would only work with that or the other and would be a pain to upgrade and expensive! Sorry but commercial software wont be made if it is free. If developers wont get paid they will seek other occupations and users would not be able to get work done.
I can see where Mozilla is coming from as they have limited resources to double the development efforts for a so called free product. I wish Mozilla would invent Mozilla search to go head to head with Google, but they do not have the revenue for such a risky maneuver.
Too bad many of my clients have Cisco connect which only works with java 1.4.2 and IE 6/7 or some $1,000,0000 ERP abomination-ware tied to Oracle financials that only work on Java 1.4.2, not java 1.4.1, not java 1.4.3, but java 1.4.2.
These machines need to keep being reimaged from infections and as a result can't leave XP or IE 7 behind. Sometimes Firefox works believe it or not in quirks mode with these old java releases. The new ones are not compatible as they follow w3c and not the corporate standards MS/Oracle use.
I swear Oracle loves obsolete software and are doing this on purpose in order to make MS look bad and cost them revenue.
This will coincide with XP ending support which is the last holdout.
If Mozilla does not want to double the work then just focus on 64-bit. Besides a few Vista users who went to 7, I do not know anyone who uses the 32-bit version. Usually they tell me some driver or piece of software is not compatible. Most cases running it in XP mode is better nowdays and by 2014 that hardware will very old!
Maybe release the long term version on that day as the last 32 bit version for 1 year? By 2015 no one should be running 32 bit XP software or operating systems anymore. I mean enough is enough!
Probably because flash, java, and other plugin makers are so slow to move to 64 bits. Not to mention many out there feel a browser should not use more than 4 gigs of ram and is a light text and graphics reader. Not a minature operating system running complex ajax applications
For awhile with Ubuntu Linux had an advantage. XP really is dated with driver detection but considering it is form 2001 how would it know what a Firewall 800 card is or a SATA?
Since it is the next XP, I wonder in 2019 when IT people and loyalist try to backforce it on an futuristic system how it will work? If MS is cancelling SP 2 for Windows 7 how is that going to work out?
I happen to be modded down -1 often here touting that Windows is simply a better option for a regular pc for average Joe and I agree with you and AMD/ATI comments.... however when it comes to a server. Ah uh. Windows SUCKS.
With Linux I may not have exchange. But I can run SMTP trace. Sure, I may not have AD. But I have ethereal and a libcap and a million other apis, tools, for a shitload of languages.
Apache beats IIS hands down for configuration and options. You do not have to sit and wait on the MS upgrade trendmill thinking man maybe the next version of IIS will do X. Apache and the Unix culture itself encourages hackability and modules. As a result you can choose. Hell do not like Apache? Use NGIX. With Windows you are stuck with what MS wants. Well I guess what Oracle wants too if you hate.NET and invested in Java back when it was cool and owned by SUN.
Users do not care about hackability yes, but real IT pros who need to configure servers for clouds and backend stuff DO. With that said I have to say Windows Server 2012 is a big improvement. It is nice it is VM friendly and when you fire it up it does not use 100% of all the ram in your VM. I can have 10 VMs in 16 gigs of ram of Linux becuase I give them 2048 each and they use only what they need and dynamically scale on VMWare. But WIndows... nope it has to use 100% of the ram even if all you do is run notepad in previous releases. Linux has been ahead for well over half a decade.
With that said its hackiness and the lack of an API is why it does not belong on a desktop. But the average user does not care or know what Exchange or SQL server is. It is what PHB IT managers want thinking it will somewhow save money to be locked into a proprietary stack like IE 6 which they can't leave 10 years later.
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Until Oracle, Kronos, Siebel, DerpMaster, Manpower, Sap, and about 85% of all intranet app makers support anything above IE 8 the answer to any recent or different browser is a resounding NO!
Part of me feels they do so on purpose to hurt Microsoft so they can sell cloud solutions and make the pc platform and internal intranet apps higher TCO (Sap and Oracle) and we all need to suffer in the process by not having HTML 5 yet.
College kids reading this. Be prepared for disappointment in the real world as your paycheck comes at a price. THe real world is not so liberal and open to alternative and cutting edge things as your school is.
When your doctor tells you to stop eating unhealthy foods because you're at risk of diabetes, do you give him shit like that? When your mechanic tells you that you need to bring your car in to get an oil change on time, do you throw your hands up in the air and bitch about not being an expert?
pretty sure the op struggles to get food to dock with his food hole
The big boys at work who buy these $100,000 SAP, Oracle, Kronos, Manpower, Siebel, and other crapware do so because they get a ROI. Bitch about being geeky to this non tech user who just blew $500,000 upgrading everything from IE 6 to cutting edge IE 8 (in his mind) will fire you with such a doctors analogy on the spot. That or he will look at you funny and ask if you replaced the toner on his printer yet? ... pff cost center peon.
This man writes your paycheck and he tells you what you support you either support that browser or get another job! In this economy that should not be hard. I know many computer science students who are making $10/hr working at call centers in Florida DESPERATE TO GET YOUR JOB as to them they need a break.
Geektalk doesn't matter boy and is an arrogant assumption if it is not certified for their work they consultant with 6 figures in it then it doesn't exist! IE 8 is here to stay!
Your employer Microsoft doesn't count.
Pretty much everyone has some old app that requires IE 8 and being the only version to wok on both oses it makes sense to lock that down for the next 5 - 10 years. If Google wont support IE 8 then Microsoft will. End of story.
Then why did 6 people die already from it? I thought you said humans can't get the virus?
Are you a doctor or biologists as you sure think you are one.
I say it is the other way around.
Google does not support IE 8 which is the defecto standard and has no clue how good MS Office is as they do not use it. THey do not have to worry about relying on crappy intranet apps that lock XP and ancient versions of IE.
They do not have to worry about Office add-ons like barcode scanner VBA excell addons. They do not have suppliers that require IE 6 to do business with. They do nto have a budget on a shoestring.
They are hip with hipsters like Apple, but fail in the corporate market. One of my customers left google docs and gmail for hotmail and Office 365 because Google was arrogant enough to drop IE 8! They really do not get it as this client couldn't just upgrade like you and I could with Windows update and be done with it 3 minutes later.
So the crappiness of Windows products work against Google Docs ??
If a corporation considers using Google Docs, they have also the mental strength to consider installing firefox and/or chrome. These are actually rock-solid products as compared to what Microsoft currently delivers. But yeah, heresy in the view of M$. You are like the catholic church and you still rule all those advanced countries such as Spain, Mexico, Paraguay and 25 other countries run by military dictators or on the brink of that.
Welcome to the world of web developers.
Bash it all you want but IE is well supported and integrated with AD better than anything else. It doesn't matter if it is crap. It is what their intranet apps and works with what they have.
If Google refuses to work with it, then Microsoft will be happy to sell them Office 365 subscriptions instead. They will lose the corporate market totally!
I am in full agreement with you 100% and not opposed to what you are saying.
I am frustrated with the situation, and look at it differently. Business sense 101, the customer dictates to you. Not hte other way around. Microsoft has a very competitive product with Office 365 and are happy to accomodate.
We tend to look at it at nerds. Not businessmen who view it as a different lens. There are 3 arguments I see. One is technical, one is money, and the last is political and structural.
Technically a better browser would be nice. However, on a technical scale IE 8 standardization over IE 9 makes sense due to XP users and migrations to WIndows 7. Standardizing on just IE 8 means you can crossover gradually. Rarely can you flip a switch and every pc in a company is magically Windows 7. It takes time if you have 5,000 users in 30 offices across 4 continents! Yes you could write for it twice. Once with standards and another with jscript, but that costs money and doubles costs for the intranet vendor.
Money wise why change( customer )? It works! Why take the risk to buy something else from what you have that already works fine according to the bean counters? Yes, it is more insecure but if that one app that that is mission critical like a logistics ERP app if you are a trucking company is scary. How do you know the next one will be as good, or will have downtime that can throw you out of business? That then leaves politics. If it fails YOU ARE FIRED even if it is the fault of the vendor and not you. If you leave it and not touch it and go with Office 365 and you might be less secure and need to do more rewiping but it works.
Maybe in the future if enough of us band together and push HTML 5 they will leave it but I feel it is the next IE 6. Regardless if you write corporate software you MUST SUPPORT their applications if you want their business.
Google is in a bubble and not in the same world. They write their own apps. They never have to deal with this bullshit that their corporate customers do. What I described above is what any medium to large size company thinks and deals with. Trust me they would keep IE 6 if it were not for MS cancelling XP support.
No I am not talking about IE 6.
I am talking about IE 8. The one browser 90% their customers use and only modern one on XP!
Until then it doesnt matter what Google does. Intranet apps wont run on anything newer. Do any offices run IE 9 yet? Rediculous
Google does not live in the real world.
First off do not tell 90% of corps who standardize on IE 6, 7, and 8 to go hell! Google docs is absolutely useless. Not even IE 8 which is the defecto standard for every single Intranet app in existence. I could see dropping IE 6 (that itself will cost business). Corps must use IE only as it is the only one with group policy, active directory, mass deployment, and a slow release cycle. Before the IE haters mod me down, ask yourselves why aren't you writing extensions to Firefox and Chrome for these features?
Defecto standard? Ain't that the truth. IE9 and lower are now legacy. IE7 is declining in use and is increasingly not worth supporting for many companies. Facebook dropped support for it in 2011. As of November Google dropped support for IE8. Supporting IE8 does have its merits but its now 2 versions behind the current offering, not to mention the partial CSS 2.1 support.
Also GoogleDocs is a glorified wordpad in functionality but with sharing. ...Office 365 has more features, integrates with the MS ecosystem, and supports older versions of IE where upgrading is out of the question and would cost more than savings with free Google Docs.
The internet is just a glorified PC experience with sharing. Microsoft missed the bus once before.
Google needs to:
So they can be just like MS? How is MS strategy working now: their browsers are behind the curve in many respects. Behind the curve is becoming Microsoft's strong suit in many areas. This is valid criticism, not to discount their innovation in other areas (Kinect, Metro, C# etc.)
Support ancient versions of IE.
Why not just have them use a LTS version of Firefox since it supports AD? IE for the shit apps, FF for everything else. If you want legacy software support, you pay for it like everyone else, and looks like the price is increasing. With IE its a pity these proprietary browsers have such shite standards support, maybe if these companies didn't paint themselves into a corner with brittle applications, developed most likely by the lowest bidder (it's low cost for a reason), they'd not be in the boat they're in now. I think it's time to change the mantra 'Nobody was fired for picking a Microsoft solution' since its the managers who are ultimately responsible for these shit sandwich mission critical systems with no exit strategy which have the company by the balls. If you are incompetent enough to be unable to upgrade the views to a system, you're doing it wrong. If it's a boondoggle then have the heads of those responsible, otherwise you will not encourage change, nothing is a motivator like self preservation.
Ancient software is typically bad idea. Old browsers need to go away for one simple reason: they're security nightmares.
With $500,000 worth of ancient apps that browser is not going away!
Support is dwindling. Vacuum tubes still exist after all...
XP users are stuck at IE 8 not to mention IE 8 is targeted for WIndows 7 users as well as it is the universal browser that works with both operating systems.
XP users are overdue for an upgrade, they're 3 versions behind now. I'd say Firefox is arguably the universal desktop browser since it runs on most platforms. A good lesson out of the last decade is standards, screw the 'one true platform.'
You can argue technical facts until you are blue in the face. If it is a cost it wont get adopted PERIOD! It works fine, it is what the PHB bet his reputation on that he feels you are ruining on these apps, workers hate change, it is not sox or
There is signifcant risk. You can get sick from eating it. However it can't spread to human to human ... yet.That is the part that is missing.
The real risk from this is it can mutate or combine with another flu or cold virus that does have the gene for human to human transmission. A swine would be the perftect candidate if any are around the farm to do this. Also the virus could interact with a standard cold virus in a human and then with that mutation can spread person to person as a very lethal virus.
This is how most flu virii evolve. It makes sense to cull them not for the birds but because of the risks associated above. I think a 2nd opinion is needed on if you can get sick eating infected flesh as I was informed you can even if it is not contagious between human to human
Yeah right
First off do not tell 90% of corps who standardize on IE 6, 7, and 8 to go hell! Google docs is absolutely useless. Not even IE 8 which is the defecto standard for every single Intranet app in existence. I could see dropping IE 6 (that itself will cost business). Corps must use IE only as it is the only one with group policy, active directory, mass deployment, and a slow release cycle. Before the IE haters mod me down, ask yourselves why aren't you writing extensions to Firefox and Chrome for these features?
Also GoogleDocs is a glorified wordpad in functionality but with sharing. It is great to share something simple for a group project for college students but it is not as functional as LibreOffice or MS Office.
Office 365 has more features, integrates with the MS ecosystem, and supports older versions of IE where upgrading is out of the question and would cost more than savings with free Google Docs.
Google needs to .msi, active directory, group policy, and deployment tools that are centrally managed to Chrome
1. Update Chrome every 1 - 2 years
2. Add
3. Support ancient versions of IE. Yes, we hate them and yes HTML 5 features like drag and drop is nice, but javascript and css3pie can emulate them. With $500,000 worth of ancient apps that browser is not going away! XP users are stuck at IE 8 not to mention IE 8 is targeted for WIndows 7 users as well as it is the universal browser that works with both operating systems.
How about we can start by taking these PLCs off the internet!
I am mortified by the responses I see here with PHBs wanting live reports from their cell phones on the nuclear power plant and IT willing to do it and how they all use XP SP 2 unpatched with no AV software!
Do not be surprised when you have a nuclear meltdown or be without power for a few days during a grid outage. You brought this on yourselves and Iran has every right to attack back!
If this does happen then the PHBs and IT needs to be jailed for negligence if any of these live systems are on the internet with their PLCS. Good LORD what the hell were you thinking?
Was X10 even active when Linux was developed?
Yes, if you ran SCO Unixware or Openserver.
Who am I kidding, that is way too cutting edge to compile without some serious work.
Registers are debatable. If your cache size is double it will slow I/O down to the point where you lose performance. 32bit compilers now have added instructions and other features including other registers recently. They add everything but the extra memory addresses so why upgrade? In 05 the 32bit kernel and runtimes were optimized for the PentiumII mmx2 instructions still. Another reason to leave that dinosaur but people love familiarity enough where they will look at things in Win 7 to hate on purpose and things to love in XP to resist the change.
I read one post earlier that he went back down to XP and never realized how pretty the icons were in it ... puke.
Anyway it makes sense to keep going on 32-bit. Too many of these machines are out htere that wont run it and Firefox will then be blamed again for not supporting them due to poor leadership. You can't win either way.
If they have limited resources, then why don't they abandon the 32-bit branch?
1. Too many corps have old software written in 16 bit vb 4 with access 95 that requires the 32-bit versions of Windows 7 and 8 to run. Worse, many consumers use the 32-bit versions of Windows too for no reason at all other than their geek friends thought it would reduce ram usage. Many do not know what 32-bit is and will end up using an unsupported and insecure ancient version of Firefox if they were to drop support.
Windows is the only OS that is not 64-bit only. This is getting ridiculous and like old IE it will then become the problem of the next decade within that ecosystem.
Part of me really wishes MS dropped 32-bit at Vista or at least Windows 7. By still supporting it they are enablers to these corporate users. These corporate users are angry at MS as it is for not being COMPATIBLE ENOUGH. It is turning into a mainframe environment now where it is inflexible to change and consumers are getting used to using 10 year old software and resisting change.
2. Gatorsoft, bonzi buddy, and abunch of corporate crap addons from SAP, Oracle, and other plugins are not supported in 64-bit mode.
I do not know if there is a solution to this as these companies use Firefox because they have to keep IE 6 around as their browser. I guess with 2014 coming perhaps Firefox can drop it for them, but tens of millions if not hundreds use 32-bit versions of Windows. What are you going to do about them? Let them switch to Chrome instead?
I am not a kernel level programmer here. Assuming a theoretical situation requires a theoretical application to gain that advantage. In other words, 2 TB of ram it would be harder to crack. But I do not have this nor does anyone outside of advanced servers usage.
Since only the most powerful servers have it I see it as offering no real advantage. XP users use PAE to go around the 4 gig limit hack anyway. So if I had 4 gigs of ram it would not matter if the OS is 32-bit or 64-bit. The memory addresses would be the same. If I had 8 gigs of ram I would have it extended if I ran XP with PAE so I would have an identical amount of memory addresses in either case.
That argument does not hold water. THe bitness doesn't matter as much as much as the code to implement all of the above. As it has been pointed out there are no real 64-bit browsers. IE has a 64 bit build just like Office but does not support it.
The security is made by the browser/OS with the code programmed in and it is independent as Chrome has heap protection at 32-bit as well. Unless of course the hack does get through then that 2 TB of ram will help :-)
IE 10 32-bit has ASLR and heap spraying protection sandboxing right in. I think Chrome does as well but someone can correct me on this if I am wrong. Infact, the only thing Windows 7 64-bit has that the 32-bit does not is signed bootloaders and drivers to prevent rootkits.
ASLR has been part of 32-bit operating systems for years since Vista.
If someone knows the ram address of a particular dll they can target it anyway with a poke regardless of the bitness. You can still spray on a 64 bit system as well. It just will take longer but can gradually compromise it. THe best defense is a patched OS with a sandboxed browser to prevent the attack from evening happening. Thankfully with ASLR this can of attack is useless except on those with XP as ram addresses constantly change.
32-bit for desktop systems is outdated since more than a decade ago, and a complete anachronism for everything except backwards Windows. But even Windows caught up five years ago.
Somehow I have the feeling that the hostility of the closed and primitive Windows platform locks Windows developers in some kind of mental box, that causes them to be very limited in their thinking, when it comes to how to approach developing things or moving to 64-bit for example.
I mean, the damn thing doesn't even have a package manager. (No, Windows Installer doesn't even remotely count.)
Difference is the win32 environment is not free. As a result customers tend to hang on to old obsolete systems. As a result older incompatible and backwards operating systems still need to be supported like Windows 98. If you use dos like stuff in your windows 98 that is also compatible with XP, then it probably wont run on 7/8. Unless you run the 32-bit version of course. You couldn't have just made it XP compatible only in 2006 (the version most customers use) as people still had win98.
Linux doesn't have this problem. Or the opposite. It is free so who cares? Just re-invent the wheel every 3 years etc. In the real world where people care about results Windows does the job as it just works, is tested, not to mention people need software to get work done. That is not free my friend. So compatibility like what I described is a clusterfuck. Firefox 32-bit is needed as many use obsolete java plugins to use their expensive and shitty Oracle ERP.
It has nothing to do with developers being retarded and an inferior operating system. It is the economic reality in this new economy that new software must run on old platforms which hinder it, likewise many people want to run old software on newer systems too.
If Gnome 1.x was $120 with all the libraries and apis, and the linux kernel costs $50, you bet your ass Redhat 6.2 (its golden version) would be like XP today and millions would still use it. Why? Software would only work with that or the other and would be a pain to upgrade and expensive! Sorry but commercial software wont be made if it is free. If developers wont get paid they will seek other occupations and users would not be able to get work done.
In this case they are listening.
I can see where Mozilla is coming from as they have limited resources to double the development efforts for a so called free product. I wish Mozilla would invent Mozilla search to go head to head with Google, but they do not have the revenue for such a risky maneuver.
Too bad many of my clients have Cisco connect which only works with java 1.4.2 and IE 6/7 or some $1,000,0000 ERP abomination-ware tied to Oracle financials that only work on Java 1.4.2, not java 1.4.1, not java 1.4.3, but java 1.4.2.
These machines need to keep being reimaged from infections and as a result can't leave XP or IE 7 behind. Sometimes Firefox works believe it or not in quirks mode with these old java releases. The new ones are not compatible as they follow w3c and not the corporate standards MS/Oracle use.
I swear Oracle loves obsolete software and are doing this on purpose in order to make MS look bad and cost them revenue.
This will coincide with XP ending support which is the last holdout.
If Mozilla does not want to double the work then just focus on 64-bit. Besides a few Vista users who went to 7, I do not know anyone who uses the 32-bit version. Usually they tell me some driver or piece of software is not compatible. Most cases running it in XP mode is better nowdays and by 2014 that hardware will very old!
Maybe release the long term version on that day as the last 32 bit version for 1 year? By 2015 no one should be running 32 bit XP software or operating systems anymore. I mean enough is enough!
Probably because flash, java, and other plugin makers are so slow to move to 64 bits. Not to mention many out there feel a browser should not use more than 4 gigs of ram and is a light text and graphics reader. Not a minature operating system running complex ajax applications
Windows 7 does work really well in this regard.
For awhile with Ubuntu Linux had an advantage. XP really is dated with driver detection but considering it is form 2001 how would it know what a Firewall 800 card is or a SATA?
Since it is the next XP, I wonder in 2019 when IT people and loyalist try to backforce it on an futuristic system how it will work? If MS is cancelling SP 2 for Windows 7 how is that going to work out?
I happen to be modded down -1 often here touting that Windows is simply a better option for a regular pc for average Joe and I agree with you and AMD/ATI comments. ... however when it comes to a server. Ah uh. Windows SUCKS.
With Linux I may not have exchange. But I can run SMTP trace. Sure, I may not have AD. But I have ethereal and a libcap and a million other apis, tools, for a shitload of languages.
Apache beats IIS hands down for configuration and options. You do not have to sit and wait on the MS upgrade trendmill thinking man maybe the next version of IIS will do X. Apache and the Unix culture itself encourages hackability and modules. As a result you can choose. Hell do not like Apache? Use NGIX. With Windows you are stuck with what MS wants. Well I guess what Oracle wants too if you hate .NET and invested in Java back when it was cool and owned by SUN.
Users do not care about hackability yes, but real IT pros who need to configure servers for clouds and backend stuff DO. With that said I have to say Windows Server 2012 is a big improvement. It is nice it is VM friendly and when you fire it up it does not use 100% of all the ram in your VM. I can have 10 VMs in 16 gigs of ram of Linux becuase I give them 2048 each and they use only what they need and dynamically scale on VMWare. But WIndows ... nope it has to use 100% of the ram even if all you do is run notepad in previous releases. Linux has been ahead for well over half a decade.
With that said its hackiness and the lack of an API is why it does not belong on a desktop. But the average user does not care or know what Exchange or SQL server is. It is what PHB IT managers want thinking it will somewhow save money to be locked into a proprietary stack like IE 6 which they can't leave 10 years later.