"Further improvements to IE will require enhancements to the underlying OS."

[Barnaby W. Füi]

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/treeview/default.asp?url=/technet/itcommunity/chats/trans/ie/ie0507.asp

Funniest thing I've seen today. I wonder how other browsers work so much better than IE without said enhancements to the OS? (and the fact that they can't even rely on alot of os-dependant things since most other browsers are cross-platform)

 

[TheOmegaCode]

I'd say the sentence beore that is the funniest, "Legacy OSes have reached their zenith with the addition of IE 6 SP1. "

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

Yeah they both cracked me up. That's some zenith alright...

 

[TonyRic]

I thought this one was preety good also

¨Host: Rob (Microsoft)
Q: when will IE get transparent PNG support?


A: Ian, I'm sorry, I can't answer that question for you¨

Typical, MS will never truely support open standards.

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: TonyRic
I thought this one was preety good also

Host: Rob (Microsoft)
Q: when will IE get transparent PNG support?

A: Ian, I'm sorry, I can't answer that question for you¨

Typical, MS will never truely support open standards.

Same goes for CSS, I presume.

:frown: :|

 

[Lord Evermore]

All this means is they don't want to make new IE versions that don't have features that aren't done in old OSes and that they don't feel like making possible. Not really as much obfuscation as it might seem, just means no more IE updates below ME and XP probably (I assume they won't be abandoning XP so soon). And it sounds like they're referring to server stuff, not consumer.

I think it's funny watching Microsoft interview Microsoft. And then editing the comments "for clarity".

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: Lord Evermore
All this means is they don't want to make new IE versions that don't have features that aren't done in old OSes and that they don't feel like making possible. Not really as much obfuscation as it might seem, just means no more IE updates below ME and XP probably (I assume they won't be abandoning XP so soon). And it sounds like they're referring to server stuff, not consumer.

Talk about obfuscation... It took me several reads to properly comprehend your first sentence. Nevermind, it may just be because I'm tired.

I think it's funny watching Microsoft interview Microsoft. And then editing the comments "for clarity".

LOL. "I'm schizophrenic, and so am I"

Edit: Supposedly with the next release of Office, they are dropping support for anything not in the NT line of OSes. Not that I care, because my systems run either 2000, XP, Linux, or a combination, but that will be sure to piss off plenty of the Win98-is-God FPS freaks around here.

 

[Idoxash]

If they rely on the OS to make IE better then IE would never get better ... Then again why even us IE at all? I guess some ppl have their reasons-

--Idoxash

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

Read a funny comment on /., too lazy to find it again, went something like this:

1. Microsoft integrates IE into windows
2. Govt charges Microsoft with anticompetetive practices
3. Microsoft loses
4. Microsoft includes option to delete IE icons
5. Microsoft integrates IE into windows even more tightly

Makes no sense, I seriously hope the government takes action against them, they're doing exactly what they are supposed to not be doing.

 

[Lord Evermore]

We all know it won't stop till they screw a senator by allowing his credit card details to be stolen.

 

[drag]

Why should a senator care? I am sure that Bill Gates would happily replace them with free unlimited money ones.

 

[imported_Phil]

LOL. "I'm schizophrenic, and so am I"

We concur.

Dopefiend

 

[THUGSROOK]

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey
Read a funny comment on /., too lazy to find it again, went something like this:

1. Microsoft integrates IE into windows
2. Govt charges Microsoft with anticompetetive practices
3. Microsoft loses
4. Microsoft includes option to delete IE icons
5. Microsoft integrates IE into windows even more tightly

Makes no sense, I seriously hope the government takes action against them, they're doing exactly what they are supposed to not be doing.

yes MS did lose that antitrust case, but what actually happened is that the govn now has MS in their pocket.
they are most likely going to allow MS to do what they want IF they also do what the govn wants

BTW: you can delete IE from win98

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey
Read a funny comment on /., too lazy to find it again, went something like this:

1. Microsoft integrates IE into windows
2. Govt charges Microsoft with anticompetetive practices
3. Microsoft loses
4. Microsoft includes option to delete IE icons
5. Microsoft integrates IE into windows even more tightly

Makes no sense, I seriously hope the government takes action against them, they're doing exactly what they are supposed to not be doing.

I don't know. I kind of like the idea of a tightly integrated web browser, especially for Windows. Windows caters to the "I want to check my email, talk on forums, and write term papers" market.

I really don't get the people who say that IE shouldn't come with Windows. I want a browser with my OS.

 

[drag]

yes MS did lose that antitrust case, but what actually happened is that the govn now has MS in their pocket.
they are most likely going to allow MS to do what they want IF they also do what the govn wants

There is no point to fighting MS thru the government. The free market can take care of itself. If people want to buy Windows based PC's thats what they will buy. WTF is the government going to do? Force people to buy a OS they don't want to use, even if they actually knew what a OS was?

And MS doesn't have no one in it's pocket, it's simple economics/politics. MS makes allot of it's it's money off of reinvensting the money people give it back into the stock market, the other half it makes off of selling windows and office. If MS can't keep it's image up then they can't get money, if they can't get money they can't reinvest it. If they can't reinvest it then technology takes another s**t. Then a lot of us lose jobs. In reality you aren't going to hurt MS by splitting them up, and you aren't going to hurt Bill Gates (whats a billion or 2 to a trillionare?). You are just going to either screw over MS's investors (mom and pops's and companies big and small) OR accidently create 2 or three smaller companies that will be much more evil and less accountable and even more competative.

MS has to die a slow painfull death, if it goes down quickly then it's going to take a lot of other people with it. If MS had the polititions in their pockets then many of the Linux projects in it's various forms in the different deparments would be put on hold. MS is nearly as invincaple as they may seem, they only make money off of a very very narrow range of products (2 in fact and the stockmarket) every thing else they do at a loss just to keep people buying Windows and MS Office. How many multinational corporations can survive forever on just a 2 product line?

(I had a whole page and a half explaining my thoughts on the matter but it's probably not quite apropriate for these forums)

 

[Lord Evermore]

It's fine to have it come bundled with the OS. What people are opposed to is that it's turned into an integral part of the OS, which can't be removed safely and still leave the system fully functional.

Windows Explorer is just IE with a different label for the most part. So is Control Panel and the My Computer display (which is just a different format of Explorer) and all the other system things like Network Connections. If IE has a problem, it can affect the entire OS. Heck even Windows Media Player is all HTML/XML crap now, even the window itself is just made up of graphics loaded like in a browser.

Installing another browser and making it the default is only a partial fix. You're still stuck with an unwanted program installed, and at random times the defaults get reset to IE stuff. Other programs are made to be dependent on the IE settings, like Outlook Express (not everyone who hates IE hates OE) which isn't even separate. Then they made the Microsoft website almost unusable by anything but IE. Even Windows Update doesn't work at all, meaning they've made it hard to get updates for the OS you paid for unless you do it in the way they want you to. (Some apps like Symantec stuff use their own update system too, but that program is ONLY used for that purpose.)

Most people didn't care that Windows 3.1 didn't come with a browser, or even sockets capability (to enable any sort of Internet service). There were existing browsers that worked fine. Microsoft brought out IE with Win95, and it worked and was free and was the first browser people saw in the OS, so it became common.

There's no reason for Microsoft to tightly integrate IE into the OS. Nothing it's doing is such a deep requirement to the OS that it couldn't be done alternately. File managers don't need to have web browsing capabilities. And really, that's about the ONLY way that I can visibly tell that IE is part of the OS most of the time. If IE was de-integrated and new code written to perform the functions it was, nobody would know the difference, except that their systems wouldn't be crashing all the time due to random DLL files that were mixed together for "integration" purposes.

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: Lord Evermore


Windows Explorer is just IE with a different label for the most part. So is Control Panel and the My Computer display (which is just a different format of Explorer) and all the other system things like Network Connections. If IE has a problem, it can affect the entire OS. Heck even Windows Media Player is all HTML/XML crap now, even the window itself is just made up of graphics loaded like in a browser.

So that's what MS chooses to do. They've intergrated the program into the OS. Nothing wrong with that.

Installing another browser and making it the default is only a partial fix. You're still stuck with an unwanted program installed, and at random times the defaults get reset to IE stuff. Other programs are made to be dependent on the IE settings, like Outlook Express (not everyone who hates IE hates OE) which isn't even separate. Then they made the Microsoft website almost unusable by anything but IE.

Most Windows users are content with IE. Since IE is being integrated, it's not longer an "unwanted program". It's part of the OS.

Even Windows Update doesn't work at all, meaning they've made it hard to get updates for the OS you paid for unless you do it in the way they want you to. (Some apps like Symantec stuff use their own update system too, but that program is ONLY used for that purpose.)

Yeah, Windows Update sucks. I don't like it at all.

Most people didn't care that Windows 3.1 didn't come with a browser, or even sockets capability (to enable any sort of Internet service). There were existing browsers that worked fine.

Most people didn't browse the internet when Windows 3.1 came out.

Microsoft brought out IE with Win95, and it worked and was free and was the first browser people saw in the OS, so it became common.

Yes. What's wrong with that? IE is very, very fast. I have my problems with it, but I use it in Windows XP.

There's no reason for Microsoft to tightly integrate IE into the OS. Nothing it's doing is such a deep requirement to the OS that it couldn't be done alternately. File managers don't need to have web browsing capabilities. And really, that's about the ONLY way that I can visibly tell that IE is part of the OS most of the time. If IE was de-integrated and new code written to perform the functions it was, nobody would know the difference, except that their systems wouldn't be crashing all the time due to random DLL files that were mixed together for "integration" purposes.

Well, it's MS's perrogative to integrate IE into Windows. To me it seems that MS is trying to blur the lines of "home systems" and the internet. Whether you like it or not, it's their product to do what they want with.

Yes, IE has stability and security issues galore. This isn't a good thing for their intergration plans, but if they could shore it up, it would be fine.

 

[drag]

My limited understanding of Windows tells me that all explorer windows are rendered in a sorta sudo-html way. All "windows" (as in things that hold icons) integrated as part of the of the OS (control panel, desktop, windows explorer, file and folder windows, my computer etc etc) are basicely a modified form of what is the heart of IE. And all the programs that use these features or look like they are tightly integratd into the OS must also use this sceme.

So basicly IE is not entirely seprate program, but uses parts of windows itself to render webpages. All this tight integration is also big part of why IE has so many serious security flaws, The design doesn't allow compartmentalism that is need to create a secure OS. Otherwise these flaws would not cause so many security violations they would just be inconvenances.

Of course this would explain why there has been such a lack of innovatioin comming out of the MS internet explorer sector. In linux all you have to do to get a new version of Mozilla with all the nice new trimmings. If you want to change how IE works you are going to have to restructure how major parts of the OS operate and have all third-party programs redesign themselves to fit a different model. The most you can expect as a upgrade to IE would be nothing much more then a patch or windows upgrade (we know how well those work) to tack on functionality.

I wonder how close my assumptions are to the truth.. probably a not a whole lot...

 

[iam29a]

I really find it funny when so many people on boards like these have a lot of negatives to say about anything Microsoft does. Yet, still, more people on this board (and most of the others) ARE using Microsoft operating systems and applications. That makes those naysayers nothing more than hypocrites.

Now, I'm not about to sit here and defend Microsoft as they are an Evil Empire, but then again my employer is one, too. But, they did create the operating system and should be allowed to do whatever the hell they want with it. If you don't like, don't buy (or steal) it, and especially don't use it.

If the alternative platforms (along with their wares) are 'all that' then go use it and shut-up already. BTW, I happily use IE for about 90% of my surfing activities, and Mozilla for those damn sites that have known annoying pop-ups. I have no problem co-existing with Microsoft along side my other operating environments.

You people bitch, but you use Microsoft products. That's worse than a crack addict complaining about the associated problems of the habit!

 

[drag]

Uh uh. Thanks for pointing this out, this is something most of us never contemplated before. You saying what you said sure puts this subject in a different light. I mean, without microsoft were would we be?

Oh, or let me think... hmm could this be a forum for discussing different aspects of different operating systems, and some people do have a preference, but i don't suppose that would have any bearing on what we are talking about. I suppose that all us crack addicts must go back to our MS operating system full of chagrin and self-loathing and hatered for our bosses for inflicting this horror on us.

Mr. iam29a do you also like to go to nascar forums and bitch about them talking about different advantages ford has over chevy or visa versa?

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

But, they did create the operating system and should be allowed to do whatever the hell they want with it.

Do you realize what such a world would be like? One where people can do "whatever the hell they want" with things, just because they created them? Can I create a new weapon and kill people with it?

You people bitch, but you use Microsoft products. That's worse than a crack addict complaining about the associated problems of the habit!

Why is it bad? If you use something, you are automatically forced to cease any complaining about it? If we were talking about governments here, you would be suggesting something along the lines of Fascism or Nazism. You almost sound angry that people complain about things while using them. What is wrong with that? Since I use these forums, I should keep my mouth shut about any problems I find with them? That's insane, YOU are insane, if you truly feel that way.

BTW, some people here don't use windows.

 

[iam29a]

Yes, I realized exactly what I said. I don't go placing America's strategic defence system on Wondows and as such don't stay up at night thinking about what crap Microsoft is doing with their CONSUMER products. I'm not saying what Microsoft has done in terms of business decisions were not wrong, not evil, not with malice, but I also think its easy for someone to sit there is complain while at the same time use the enemy's products.

If you do not like what Microsoft is doing with the operating system and FREE web browser, switch to an iMac and shut-up. Or better yet, build you own computer and put a free operating system on it with your free web browser and then complain about what the evil Microsoft is doing with their products that you did not buy, or steal.

Its one thing to complain about something, but when you SUPPORT the evil-doer you are part of the problem. Remember, IE is free and I see no problem with it being integrated FOR FREE into their operating system. I can just as easily eleminate it from my desktop and run Mozilla, another free browser without any problem.

Its all about choices. You made your choice and you probably are sleeping with the enemy, but hypocritically complaining about it. If you don't like a FREE application integrated into a CONSUMER operating system, then find another platform you will be happy with. I would suggest Mandrake, or OSX, or PC-DOS (IBM).

BTW, how many of you have complained about how the automotive industry employes a computing environment that you and I have little or no access to so that we have to rely on others (the dealership service departments) to get accurate diagnostics. This has been a problem non-dealership automotive maintenance shops have been dealing with for a good 20 years and no one here seems to mind those evil empires and we all support them, too.

There are a lot of things that go on out there in the world in terms of unpopular business practices, but if you use a Microsoft operating system then you are part of the problem you are complaining about.

 

[Armitage]

Originally posted by: iam29a
Yes, I realized exactly what I said. I don't go placing America's strategic defence system on Wondows

You might be suprised/scared to realize just how much of our national defense infrastructure relies on microsoft software.

 

[iam29a]

And you would be surprised at how much waste your phone company generates and how I, personally, get paid from it.

PS I thank you for paying your phone bill.

 

[TheOmegaCode]

A lot of us here wouldn't classify IE as free. At least not in the sense we like our browsers to be...

As for the whole automotive thing, I bitch about everything