On 8 Feb 2005 at 12:20, Phil Daley wrote: > At 2/8/2005 12:10 PM, Darcy James Argue wrote: > > >On 08 Feb 2005, at 8:06 AM, Christopher Smith wrote: > > > >> This worries me, frankly. What am I going to do when IE isn't > working >> on some future version of MacOS, and some pages won't open > in Safari? > >Given that Safari, Firefox, etc, are being actively > developed, and IE >for Mac isn't, I think the opposite situation is > more likely. With > >On the other hand, Microsoft stopped developing > IE for Mac over a year >ago. So eventually, there will be sites that > require the very latest > > I just read an article today that said the problem with IE is that it > hasn't been challenged and, therefore, there was no incentive for MS > to spend bucks on improving it (other than security issues).
That's why Microsoft is losing market share to other browsers like never before. Certain reporting organizations are saying that IE is below 90%, when only a year ago it was above 95%. There are even certain kinds of sites that are reporting IE below 75% now (though those sites already tended to a higher proportion of non-IE browsers). IE now has the reputation among web developers that Netscape had after the release of IE4.x -- back then, you had to code to Netscape's non-standard implementations of various features, whereas IE suported W3C standards. Today the tables are turned, with IE being the least standards- compliant web browser out there. When you throw in the horrid security problems and popups in IE, it's a no-brainer. I install Firefox for everyone I meet, and no one goes back to IE. > If you think Firefox, etc is going to challenge MS monopoly on the > browser, you can bet your booties that MS will be improving it very > soon. MS is not going to "improve" it until the release of the next major version of Windows, code-named Longhorn, which is at least a year away (and probably more like 2 years away). You won't get the "benefit" of the new IE unless you upgrade to Longhorn or buy a new computer with it installed. Microsoft did the same thing with the essential security improvements in Windows XP service pack 2 -- they did not unbundle them so they could be separately downloaded for Windows 2000, as well. This has not always been the case at Microsoft. Microsoft made a point of creating an installable library for bringing old versions of Windows up to snuff in regard to Unicode, called the MSLU. Of course, that's a developer tool, but MS still made the effort to support old (really old) versions of Windows (it provides Unicode compatibility for Win95, Win98 and WinME). All I need to know about the viability of other browsers is demonstrated to me by going to http://support.microsoft.com -- until recently, all non-IE browsers got a reduced functionality website that lacked advanced search tools. Now, Firefox users get a website that is IDENTICAL to the one delivered up to IE users. If Microsoft itself thinks it should support Firefox, then that means non-IE browsers are a significant threat to IE. -- David W. Fenton http://www.bway.net/~dfenton David Fenton Associates http://www.bway.net/~dfassoc _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
