Microsoft Says Firefox Not a Threat to IE 1306
KillaKen187 writes "A CNET article claims that 'just days after the launch of open-source browser Firefox 1.0, Microsoft executives defended Internet Explorer, saying it is no less secure than any other browser and doesn't lack any important features.' It's also interesting to note that these statements made by Steve Vamos, Microsoft Australia's managing director, come with no knowledge of what Firefox has to offer as he admits not even installing or using Firefox."
The real reason it's not a threat (Score:4, Funny)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
Many friends I know were reluctant about installing another weird name browser until I do it for them, and from then onwards IE is history
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
A friend of mine who is in charge of a bookstore had a similiar experience. He installed Firefox on all the machines, then deleted all the shortcuts and references to Internet Explorer. Shortly after, he had employees asking him where IE was, despite an icon on the desktop that clearly read "Mozilla Firefox Web Browser".
Eventually, some users would go back and find ways to run IE (whether through MS Word or Start -> Run). They spent more time trying to find/"reinstall" the IE rather than simply starting Firefox, simply because they were too scared to try a new program!
Finally, he kept all the IE links and icons, but changed the executable to point to Firefox. No complaints since then.
The main thing is that people are stubborn and too timid to bother learning a new program. I guess it can be an intimidating thing, so I don't blame them. Ultimately, I think we'll get a decent market share, it will just take time. It's taken a bit of prodding, but I've eventually gotten many of my friends and even my parents to switch to Firefox exclusively.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Informative)
The ayatollahs of open source (Score:5, Interesting)
For all the talk of the cathedral and the bazaar, there are a lot of folks here who seem to believe in the success of conversions driven by submission to secular authority, personal influence or techno-magic.
Don't tell me how Grandad, your kid sister, your lab rats -- one, a young woman, divorced, with two kids and a job to protect -- have all come to love Firefox.
Don't tell me how clever you've been, the tricks you played that make it all seem so easy.
Instead, prove to me that you can make it out there alone in the cold, cruel world of Windows. 300 million users world-wide. Nine million OEM systems shipping each month with IE6 as the default.
From Word???? (Score:5, Funny)
You can laungh IE from Word??? God, no wonder it takes forever to launch the damned thing.
Next they'll be putting flight sims into Excel or something.
IE is tied to the SHELL, and not to the OS (Score:5, Interesting)
Same with EXPLORER.EXE, it is only a stub that loads the COM controls that deal with file browsing.
There are other COM modules available, such as Network browsers, Picture viewers, and in Win95, there was the easter egg COM module.
the stubs can load any of these COM modules dependent on the content being displayed. Indeed it IS possible to make a HTML COM component based on Mozilla, and the COM/ActiveX component IS available. however, it is stil not possible for the Mozilla COM module to replace IE and its trident engine in this context either.
The point I am making, is that IE is NOT tied to the OS itself, its only tied to the SHELL of the OS.
If you REALLY want to stop IE from starting, even on a Windows XP box, use Program Manager as the shell! It does work.... its progman.exe located in c:\windows\system32
I use progman.exe and Mozilla as the shell on my "guest" account of my XP box, and it works VERY nicely!
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Funny)
And if you really want to mess with your users, skin Firefox with an IE theme [mozilla.org] (once the Firefox 1.0 version theme is released).
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
Clever idea, but it can backfire if they depend on a site that only works on IE. I tried something along those lines with one of my relatives, and his banking website wouldn't work. He was horribly freaked out because he thought I had "broken" his "bank account" and he thought he wouldn't be able to withdraw money while he was on a vacation he was leaving for in several days.
Well I explained what was wrong, but he didn't believe me so I spent about an hour on the phone trying first to explain how to open the site in IE, then trying to explain how to change the default browser to IE, then even trying to get him to simply delete Firefox. Unfortunately he was too stupid to figure it out, and I had to drive to his house and fix it for him.
As you can probably guess by now, I'm not going to install Firefox on people's machines anymore unless they know what I'm doing. If a luser is too thick skulled to figure out what a web browser is, then they deserve to be stuck with IE.
Not that I'm bitter or anything... :-P
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
Sites, especially banking sites (read: conservative sites), won't improve unless they get enough feedback to do so.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
What firefox needs is a new name like "Firefox Internet Navigator" and to execute a tutorial on how to use it on the first run.
Just my $0.02
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:4, Interesting)
It even works through my school's 'security'. Excellent
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Funny)
Problem solved.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Funny)
Well obviously they should be!
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
All she'd known is that her machine had been running slow. She did some thinking and came to the conclusion that it had come from some lyrics site that had nailed her with popup windows. As I floated the word "Firefox" across the office, the coworker who had installed Firefox happily piped up, "I haven't seen a popup all day!"
Peer pressure, that's where it's at.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
bookmarks in FireFox (Score:4, Interesting)
-Leigh
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Funny)
They said jump to windows 95, I jumped to slackware 3.2. Mmmm fvwm
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Funny)
Well, then, we need a simple solution.
Firefox will, from this point forth, be renamed, "Internet".
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Funny)
The Internet: Extreme
It worked for Intel...sorta...
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Funny)
And those in the blue states will claim to have invented it.
They, uh, did.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
They don't see a problem, they don't even realize they have a choice when it comes to browsers. They just use IE because that is what is on their desktop by default.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Informative)
Microsoft itself, for instance, became a success by giving people what they didn't know they needed, or by filling a void that no one realised was there.
The fact that they're now playing the "our customers don't want it" card is proof how much their corporate culture has stagnated: people don't want things like tabbed browsing, because they don't know they can have them.
I just find it strange that almost every person I've ever introduced tabbed browsing to has loved the feature, even those that still prefer to us IE.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
My uncle is a PHD in Physcial Education, Business Adminsitration, Philosphy and more, travelled the word advising in various counties (Malaysia, Turkey, USA) on such things as setting up Universities.
He is now retired - and quite frankly is not interested in become a POWER USER. So damn right he wants to be told what he wants.
He is quite happy that he can browser the internet, do video editing and do letter writing.
I may well approach him with some great new feature, but I really don't think that it is going to change his "exprience" enough to be worth the time to explain why he should change.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
Microsoft itself, for instance, became a success by giving people what they didn't know they needed, or by filling a void that no one realised was there.
<harshing on Microsoft>
Really? When was this? Bill Gates and Paul Allen did a good turn with BASIC back on the Altair, but they were copying the innovation of John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz in doing so. DOS was a rip of CP/M. Windows was an attempt to block VisiCorp's VISION and Digital Research's GEM, not to mention IBM's TopView, Quarterdeck's DESQ/View or, say, the Lisa and Macintosh. Flight Simulator came from Bruce Artwick's subLogic. Word came after dozens of other Word Processors. Excel was Microsoft's second attempt at a spreadsheet app after Multimate, which in turn was after Visicalc and Lotus 1-2-3.
The web browser? Tim Berners Lee and Marc Andreesen's team at NCSA, among others. Powerpoint? Purchased from an outside developer. Visio? Purchased from an outside developer. FoxPro? Purchased from an outside developer. C#/.NET? Closely imitative of Java, without all of that icky non-Windows-bound aspirations.
I'm rather looking forward to seeing Microsoft become a success by giving people what they didn't know they needed, myself. Microsoft Bob surely wasn't it.
</harshing on Microsoft>
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
I think if other companies want their browsers to be used, they should give them a name that has INTERNET in it. That way people will know that you're going on the internet. What the hell has Firefox got to do with the internet? Same goes for Netscape, Opera, and Safari.
One Day I switch that out (Score:4, Interesting)
So I come back a awhile later to help the teacher with some new computers.. Still seeing kids using IE.. So what did I do.. I installed firefox. Put it in the dock. I changed the Icon to the internet explorer one. Then promptly deleted IE. No one ever noticed. (I only did this on one mechine. The rest have safari. This was just a test mechine)
Oh the new computers.. Overkill.. Lets see iMac G5, Powermac G5, and a Dell pc. For each Workstation.. For a highschool. Wish I had that at home.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm a programmer by trade, and I know all of these things, and I use Firefox. Am I dumb? Apparently not.
I know nothing about motor mechanics; if my car develops a fault, I take it to a garage. Am I dumb now?
I know nothing about building. If I needed an extension built, or a wall knocked through, or whatever, I'd go to a builder. Am I dumb now?
I know nothing about teaching. I may know the subject, but I know nothing about planning and preparing lessons, setting homework, or keeping a class full of students interested and engaged. Am I dumb now?
Because by extending your reasoning to other fields, I am, and so are you, and everyone else here.
People here need to stop being so elitist, and denigrating people just because they know less about computers than some arbitrarily determined minimum level below which the person must be "dumb".
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
If your car comes to a halt because you don't know to put gas in it, you are dumb.
If you cause a lot of damage to your car because you burn it out because you never replace the oil, you are dumb.
There is a certain minimal skill and intelligence level required to simply drive and maintain a car safely. Most people have it.
There is a certain minimal skill and intelligence level required to simply operate and maintain a computer safely. Most people don't seem to want to get it
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
There are a LOT of learned skills in driving - from assessing the feedback through the wheel, judging your inner ear, etc - things we just don't think about because we do them every day now. Computers have similar tasks, which people don't care to learn because they won't die if they fuck up.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:4, Funny)
Evil Vision
Whatta ya sa we just run a special wire from the power supply to the user's chair. Have it get activated whenever the user fucks up. We could even rig it up with variable voltage/amperage depending upon the nature of the fuckup. That oughtta sort things out in a hurry, eh?
/Evil Vision
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
Congratulations.
I know nothing about motor mechanics; if my car develops a fault, I take it to a garage. Am I dumb now?
Knowing nothing about the mechanics of such an expensive piece of machinery is a quick way to get ripped off. Even compared to a JiffyLube for $20, you can save half by doing it yourself. I may be a network consultant, but I am quite comfortable seeing to the needs of my own automobile and have in the past changed everthing from oil, to spark plugs, to alternators, to oxygen sensors. None of which are as difficult as I or other might have imagined. Pick up a tear-down manual for your car at AutoZone for about $14 and knock yourself out.
I know nothing about building. If I needed an extension built, or a wall knocked through, or whatever, I'd go to a builder. Am I dumb now?
Construction is another area of greatly marked up labor. Basic engineering principles are easy to master and will save you thousands. I learned most of mine working on a low-slope/commercial/industrial roofing crew in the summers in college. I have also picked up carpentry, mansonary, and electrical along the way. Trust me, DIY projects will save you loads of cash and are not difficult to master. Start small, work you way up. That hole in the sheetrock you have a picture hung over is a nice small place to start learning. The most satisfying project I have completed are the two walk-in closets in my master bedroom complete with loads of built-ins.
I know nothing about teaching. I may know the subject, but I know nothing about planning and preparing lessons, setting homework, or keeping a class full of students interested and engaged. Am I dumb now?
I am not a "teacher" but I tutored people in college and also created the format for a 2-week summer computer camp that introducted K thru 4th graders to basic computer concepts. I can say without a doubt I learned more while teaching other people than I ever learned while other people were teaching me.
Because by extending your reasoning to other fields, I am, and so are you, and everyone else here.
People here need to stop being so elitist, and denigrating people just because they know less about computers than some arbitrarily determined minimum level below which the person must be "dumb".
It is not elitest to say someone is far from well rounded. Specialization is the autobaun to obsoletion. My social circle includes no other "computer people" but I have taken the time to learn wines (nice course at a local university), cigars (even though I don't smoke them more than VERY RARLY, being able to talk to an aficionado is a great way to start a conversation with them, a possible future client). I am not inclined to follow pop culture but I read People, US, etc., so I have something to chat up those interested in it about. I have picked up on while living in Miami Beach, Haute Couture, Haute Cuisine, styles of Architechture (followed that through with an Architechture Lecture at a local university, facinating stuff, Miami Beach is the only place you will find Tropical Deco), furniture design, more sports than I can count, and having a best friend that is a film festival coordinator I have learned a load of things (namely occupations) that I never imagined existed. I never knew existed. Computer People need to expand thier world to other things (and that doesnt mean reading about it on the computer, that's cheating, get outside) and non-Computer savvy people most definatly need to learn more about computers as they are a tidal wave on the horizon that will (more than now even) infultrate the very fabric of their existence. I by no means think that I am even close to well rounded, I have a long ways to go before I can begin to consider resting. It is, however, unforgivable for a person to *choose* to remain ignorant.
Leonardo Da Vinci never announced "I'm an artist, what do I care about engineering?"
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it's a fairly mealy way of saying that they're dumb in a way that they may not understand immediately. Being well-rounded, or diversifying in your interests and behaviours to the point where you can do almost anything is a couple of steps higher on Maslow's hierarchy than most people get; you should be applauded for your achievements, but at the same time understand that you are not _average_ by any stretch of the imagination.
Further to that the vast majority of people using computers out there do not have an interest in them. They want to know about the stuff on the internet, but not about the internet.
"It is, however, unforgivable for a person to *choose* to remain ignorant."
Now that is elitist. For one thing people don't necessarily choose ignorance as the direction of their life, and may not believe that Gilbert & Sullivan are anything more than a couple of old guys. To decry a person on the pleasures that they maintain is to completely misunderstand humanity as a whole.
"Computer People need to expand thier world to other things"
You'd be surprised by the breadth of knowledge shown by 'Computer People' over the age of 24. After you've mastered the basics, it leaves a lot of room for other things.
"Specialization is the autobaun to obsoletion."
You do know that 'species'...oh, never mind.
Generalisation means you never achieve true competence. Mention that around the next Vineyard you visit, as you'll find that they're extremely specialised.
"Leonardo Da Vinci never announced "I'm an artist, what do I care about engineering?""
He also never said 'Midgets make me laugh'. What conclusion are we to draw from that?
"Trust me, DIY projects will save you loads of cash and are not difficult to master."
But building an extension is a different matter to covering a hole in sheetrock. America appears to do much better in this regard than countries that like their buildings to consist of more than one storey, brick construction and have foundations, but I'm guessing that you still have building codes to adhere to.
"The most satisfying project I have completed are the two walk-in closets in my master bedroom"
Congratulations on mastering stud partitioning. I'm sure that you can comfortably create your next dwelling.
People are not dumb.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Most people are in the "mushy middle"--they aren't dumb it's just that their intelligence is just spread out a bit more and are thus not quite as "creative" or curious. The average "mushy middle" person has the benefit of being more socially adjusted but is also a creature of habit and is not easily driven to deviate from his comfort zone unless circumstances make things annoying enough to disturb that comfort. This is the only theory I've been able to come up with explaining why IE and Outlook have been allowed to rot and fester and continue to enjoy market dominance even in the face of free competition.
It isn't a name thing as much as it is good marketing or else Excel would've flopped because it didn't have "Calc" or "Spreadsheet" in the name. Excel was part of the Office juggernaut and is now market leader so out of habit now "Excel==Spreadsheet". Hell, when I started in university the school had just implemented WWW directories on student's accounts so they could have home pages and I know for the first little while people would say "look at the Mosaic page I made"!
Things are changing though because "mushy middle" is becoming uncomfortable. They are afraid of the WWW and their inbox because the news and the experts are telling them it is swimming with nasties that will corrupt their machines, spy on them and steal their account numbers. Even mainstream media is now starting to emphasise "windows" and "internet explorer". That is enough to get them thinking. They are very easy sells when they become vicims one too many times.
Anyway, to help the creature of habit with the conversion, I install Firefox and Thunderbird, and use "Set Program Access and Defaults" to remove the icons for IE and Outlook in addition to setting the Mozilla counterparts to the default clients. Furthermore, I rename the Mozilla icons to the generic "Web Browser" and "Email". This has resulted in a pretty much universally positive reception. I believe it would be second nature for people to click on "the fox" and "the bird" if that's what they learned to do from the start, or have done it long enough.
Re:The real reason it's not a threat (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, clearly it isn't.
At least to him
Be happy that some people in M$ still don't see it as a threat. If everyone in M$ thought that firefox was going to destroy their desktop dominance for the browser... it might get a little tougher for mozilla.org.
Better that they don't know.
Michael
Great quote to take out of context (Score:5, Funny)
Indeed they do!
Re:Great quote to take out of context (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Great quote to take out of context (Score:5, Funny)
Can't speak for you or him, but I use www.mozilla.org...
Feed Mania (Score:5, Funny)
We take user feedback very seriously. If you have that feedback, then you should feed it back to us because we will feed it to the product team.
It inspires a poem:
Feed us the feedback double-quick!
When we've digested the feed then lickey split
Your browser we'll enance to make it more slick
But keep you safe from all harm? Well that's quite a trick...
Instead look at XAML - it makes buttons you click!
Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Insightful)
English reiterated that features such as tabbed browsing are not important to IE users.
You can mark my word that IE will have tabbed browsing within 12 months from now.
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Insightful)
Or standards-compliant CSS rendering (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, forgot to take my pills. I'm off to the nurse.
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Insightful)
it's time for microsoft to step up and get out of denial, firefox is a viable alternative now.
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:4, Informative)
Just as a jackhammers aren't very dangerous to knowledgeable professionals, they can be very dangerous when used by masses who don't know any better.
Even with experienced people, accidents can happen. I've actually been hit by a nasty piece of spyware because I had two windows up, hit enter on the other window just as focus switched to the Active X popup, thus essentially clicking Yes.. D'OH! That was a mess.
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, duh! This is like claiming that snow isn't important to people living in the middle of the Sahara. If you can't use something, have no access to it, have no knowledge of it, then you won't consider it important, because you won't know about it to consider it important!
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm trying to think of something similar... hmm...
James reiterated that a feature like having a handle on both sides of the door is simply not important to someone who is only on their way out
Actually its a great statement. It covers most classes of Microsoft software users:
1.) The stupid ones
They couldn't use tabbed browsing even if they tried. No. Its true. I tried it with my mum (bless her) and she simply couldn't understand the concept. Sure, opening loads of browser windows everywhere was also confusing and cluttered the desktop, but hey.
2.) The ignorant ones
Is there any other browser than IE?
3.) The Microsoft zealots
If IE doesn't have it, then it isn't worth having.
4.) The wannabes
They just discovered computers and don't want to look different by using a browser that isn't pre-installed... until someone else does and tells them its cool.
5.) Those who just don't care
They have a browser installed. Why have another one? Heck, the whole OS stinks, so why try to polish a turd?
Firefox vs. IE, missing features... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yesterday I downloaded and installed FireFox 1.0. I wanted to look at it and find out if it would suit me better since I still consider IE to be a little too proprietary in that it hides what it really does. So I am looking for something a bit more open.
After looking at all the features of FireFox I was amazed at how few things it allowed me to adjust. It doesn't have any of the options I am used to using under IE. Here are a few...
* Changing the temporary cache path?
* No option to clear cache when done?
* Inability to prompt me if I want scripts to run?
* Prompted cookie setting control?
* Inline images are either on or off. Eg, no ability to prevent animations (gif or otherwise) from running.
(This is frustrating. I want to see the original images, but I absolutely hate animations of any sort.)
* No Zones feature so that I can configure certain security options for certain sites.
* Installed security is to save passwords, allow web sites to install software, save form information, and Java is enabled?
(Of course IE is probably even more open, but the point is that FireFox is supposed to be secure right?)
* Many other configuration options are missing that would allow me to be prompted if I want to execute or do something.
I notice that tabbed browsing ends up using even more desktop real estate. I've never needed tabbed browsing before, all my windows appear on my Explorer task bar...just like tabs. I suppose tabs would be useful for people whos operating systems don't have a taskbar enabled shell.
Other that than the above observations I found Firefox to work fine. It didn't crash at all, but was a bit slower to render than IE. Only once did it redirect me to a website I did not type in the URL for. I just shut it down and restarted to fix that problem.
I find that I don't think I'll be switching just yet because of the inability to actively control scripting and the in-line image problem. If those issues are taken care of in the future, I don't know why I would stay with IE. Until then.
+1
Re:Firefox vs. IE, missing features... (Score:5, Informative)
As for the benefit of tab browsing... What I find useful is that when you open links in a new tab, the page is loaded in the tab while you can still work on the current page. If you try to emulate that with IE by opening new IE windows, the original page's window becomes the furthest back window. Actually, more annoying is that to open up a series of links, you have to keep going back to the original window. In the case of tabbed browsing, you're in the original tab until you decide to switch off of it.
Re:Firefox vs. IE, missing features... (Score:5, Insightful)
Often I have mutiple windows open full of tabs, each one focusing on a diferent genere of my work, say one for slashdot, it's various topics and 1/2 written replies, one with some research I'm doing and the various aspects of that.
And of-course tabs for 'Open in Tabs' option at the bottom of a link-bar pulldown menu, ahh all the web cartoons loading as soon as I start the days uhh work
Re:Firefox vs. IE, missing features... (Score:4, Informative)
Personally, I don't see any real reason for this. But there may be some.
* No option to clear cache when done?
Sure there is. Firefox --> Preferences --> Privacy --> Cache --> Clear
(I'm on a Mac right now -- on Windows "Firefox --> preferences" is probably found as "Tools --> Options")
* Inability to prompt me if I want scripts to run?
You can turn the scripts off if you want. More fine-tuned controls would easily get rather confusing. Besides, you can control what window handling options you want to allow to be done by Javascript. You can't do that in IE.
* Prompted cookie setting control?
You can deny all cookies and make an exceptions list. An option for asking for every cookie isn't truly useful anyway, they're simply too plenty.
* Inline images are either on or off. Eg, no ability to prevent animations (gif or otherwise) from running.
(This is frustrating. I want to see the original images, but I absolutely hate animations of any sort.)
Does IE truly have such an option? Can you point me to that -- I wasn't aware of it, and most GIF animations are annoying anyway. If IE truly has that, I hope that Firefox developers will put it to their TODO.
* No Zones feature so that I can configure certain security options for certain sites.
There are good reasons for this -- large number of IE security holes have been cross-zone scripting related; such a system is fundamentally insecure. You can make exceptions for cookies, popups and images, though.
* Installed security is to save passwords,
I don't think that this is any worse than people writing passwords to post-it stickers stored under keyboard.
allow web sites to install software,
It is allowed per default for trusted sites -- BUT the list of trusted sites is empty!
save form information,
This does not sound a real security risk. Many forms are sent over unencrypted connections anyway. Forms sent over encrypted connections, on the other hand, are usually behind a login prompt.
and Java is enabled?
Java has a security system of its own. The security reputation of Sun's JRE is much higher than Microsoft's JVM.
* Many other configuration options are missing that would allow me to be prompted if I want to execute or do something.
Too hard to comment without more specific information. But one of the problems of IE is, that the various basically important prompts presented by it are too plenty. If you have to click "yes" to 9 prompts out of ten, it's hard to realise the 1/10 of boxes that absolutely require "no".
I notice that tabbed browsing ends up using even more desktop real estate. I've never needed tabbed browsing before, all my windows appear on my Explorer task bar...just like tabs. I suppose tabs would be useful for people whos operating systems don't have a taskbar enabled shell.
This is a valid point. I have a friend who uses Firefox under Windows, but hardly ever uses tabs at all. I can do pretty well without myself too. On the other hand, I couldn't live without tabs on a Mac.
But the stupid thing in IE is, that every time I open a new window, it:
a) opens it on top of other windows
b) opens my homepage on it, which is absolutely stupid, because I only want that page when I'm opening the first window of the browser.
So actually the greatest failures of IE on this matter are it's uncustomizeable window handling options, not the lack of tabbed browsing itself.
Re:Stone hatchet (Score:5, Funny)
"Where's the wood handle?"
"There's no leather thong to hold the rock in place"
There's no ROCK!!"
"Whats this handle with the string running through it?"
"The flat thing sticking out is TOO uncomfortable...and I can't make a cut with the big yellow blocky thing at the end"
"And these points on the thin handle...way too sharp and hard on my hands"
Re:Firefox vs. IE, missing features... (Score:5, Informative)
Uses a random folder name in your settings path for security. Though I believe you can change it in about:config
* No option to clear cache when done?
Privacy->Cache->Clear
* Inability to prompt me if I want scripts to run?
Uh it doesn't have Active X. Under Web Features->Advanced there are several things you can disallow or allow Javascript to do. about:config may have some more settings.
* Prompted cookie setting control?
Privacy->Cookies->Ask For Each Cookie. It even remembers what you said for each cookie so you don't have to tell it again for the same site. And there is an exceptions menu in the same place that allows you to go back and change what you said.
* Inline images are either on or off. Eg, no ability to prevent animations (gif or otherwise) from running.
(This is frustrating. I want to see the original images, but I absolutely hate animations of any sort.)
Its in about:config, and in regular Mozilla the setting is there. I agree this was a stupid one to leave out of the main menus.
* No Zones feature so that I can configure certain security options for certain sites.
Only Windows has the concept of "Zones" and its a stupid idea anyway. The browser should not be able to run code on your machine. You can configure Popup Windows, Images and Cookies per site though.
* Installed security is to save passwords, allow web sites to install software, save form information, and Java is enabled?
(Of course IE is probably even more open, but the point is that FireFox is supposed to be secure right?)
Firefox is trying to appeal to main stream users. Thus there is a trade-off. There are several prompts on the installing software stuff. Besides you can't install new programs with it, just add-ons and themes for your browser. And, as of yet no security problems have been discovered where someone can get around the prompts (unlike Active X)
* Many other configuration options are missing that would allow me to be prompted if I want to execute or do something.
Like what?
No offense but for most of these, it doesn't appear you looked all that hard before you gave up on it.
Re:Firefox vs. IE, missing features 2.0... (Score:5, Interesting)
As for the answers to certain queries. I'll try to be more accurate in my statements:
* Changing the temporary cache path?
I like storing anything temporary on another drive, not my system drive. That way I can erase the whole thing at the end of my windows session if necessary.
* No option to clear cache when done?
The IE option is to "Emtpy Temporary Internet Files folder when browser is closed".
* Inability to prompt me if I want scripts to run?
I am refering to any scripts, all scripts, whatever scripts. A TV or newspaper isn't capable of running scripts, neither should a browser...in my humble opinion. Yes I love the FireFox Javascript fine-tuning control. I really wish IE had that. Of course I unchecked all the options for Javascript on FireFox.
* Prompted cookie setting control?
Yea, I missed the "Ask me every time" option. Thanks. It wasn't obvious that it was under that dropdown because it is labled "Keep cookies". The word "Keep" gives me the impression that the cookie had already been set.
* Inline images are either on or off. Eg, no ability to prevent animations (gif or otherwise) from running.
(This is frustrating. I want to see the original images, but I absolutely hate animations of any sort.)
Yes apparently FireFox doesn't have this option, even under about:config. The specific IE option is "Play animations in web pages". I have this turned off.
* No Zones feature so that I can configure certain security options for certain sites.
Zones are nice for intranet stuff where you know you are completely in a secured development environment. The restricted and trusted sites are also nice. I think the thing I like about zones is that it completely adjusts every browser setting for each zone. In fact, I would argue that there should be more zones, more user creatable/definable zones. Zones that users can setup and name. Zones are the limited equivalent of sandbox type controls.
* Installed security is to save passwords, allow web sites to install software, save form information, and Java is enabled?
(Of course IE is probably even more open, but the point is that FireFox is supposed to be secure right?)
I don't know about you, but when I end my browser session, I erase everything. I erase history, cookies, temporary internet files, passwords, form data...everything. I even erase the sites in my blocked lists. In fact, whenever I start my browser, I want it to startup as if I had never used it before. In many ways Firefox should have the option to browse similarly, like in Apples Safari browser where the browser does a complete privacy reset when done. I would love that!
* Many other configuration options are missing that would allow me to be prompted if I want to execute or do something.
Obviously I don't want to name them all. Just open up any IE and choose the security tab, then choose a zone. All the promptable settings are there. And yes I can be prompted to prevent active x controls to run. I just wish META refresh was promptable. Arguably it needs to be.
Firefox is a good start. I really don't want to download Mozilla to get more advanced options. I mean what is the point of FireFox then? I want to use FireFox, I just need more browsing control. I do not like a broswer that does things for me. One other annoying thing about FireFox, even though it isn't a biggie...the fonts don't look right on some sites. I hope they fix that.
Thanks for your input. I'm just that much more informed now!
+2
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Tabbed browsing not important (Score:5, Interesting)
Uh-huh. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Uh-huh. (Score:5, Funny)
That poor, poor pony...
They can now see the Web sites that IE chokes on (Score:5, Interesting)
Preaching to the choir, but ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Preaching to the choir, but ... (Score:5, Insightful)
A resurgence in the browser wars will just serve to make both browsers better, and that's the way customers get better products. Since Firefox is an open project, there is no central company for Microsoft to destroy this time. We'll have to see how it all works out, but no matter what, it's good for the user.
That's a really good point (Score:5, Insightful)
"If you don't ask for it - we can't think of it!"
Re:Preaching to the choir, but ... (Score:5, Funny)
The Knights who say Nih demand a sacrifice!
We want
tabbed browsing
and a shrubbery!!!
Eh? (Score:5, Funny)
Did the former Iraqi Information Minister find a new job?
Nice market share you got...I think I'll take it. (Score:5, Insightful)
I only hope that the mangement at Microsoft continues to believe this statement for the forseeable future. Nothing could help Firefox more.
Say what you may (Score:5, Interesting)
Still using IE here (Score:5, Funny)
sometimes you gotta wonder (Score:5, Interesting)
This is nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)
...they would have told the company about it (Score:5, Interesting)
First MS will lose the small 'at home' and business customers. Once these people are comfortable with the competition, the competition will seep into the big MS customers, for whom the 'small customers' are employees.
No, I'm not going to post this directly to you Steve, as I reckon you will ignore it.
XUL (Score:5, Interesting)
Using XUL, you can develop full-blown user interfaces that aren't limited to HTML-style text boxes, radio boxes, drop-down boxes and so on. Instead, you get access to trees, grids, menus, groupboxes, SOAP and XML-RPC client access and so on; a sizeable subset of what e.g. VB has to offer. It also understands CSS, so you can make XUL interfaces visually attractive if you're unlike me and actually have the patience to do so...
It's quite easy to develop XUL code as well, if somewhat time-consuming because there isn't yet a good, stable IDE available.
MS knows there's a market for this stuff, because it was developing XAML which meets broadly the same requirements. However a solid XAML implementation is currently a few years away at least, so XUL has a window of opportunity.
In case it's not obvious, here's why you'd use XUL instead of e.g. VB to develop application front-ends:
- easy to deploy to clients (i.e. install e.g. Firefox, and that's it; no mucking around with DLL versions)
- easy to maintain (i.e. tweak the code on a server rather than tweak and redeploy to every client)
- already cross-platform (Windows, Linux, Solaris, Mac, BSD,
- no dependence on ActiveX or Java to give the "rich client experience"
- supports CSS and works with HTML, so competent Web designers should be able to pick up XUL without great difficulty. Someone please please please create an IDE to make this easy!
- works with existing Web servers (e.g. Apache, IIS) without difficulty; after all, XUL is just XML text and Web servers have been serving text since day 1
XUL already under assault by XAML!!!!! (Score:5, Interesting)
What needs to happen?
Make a XUL plugin for everything that browses!! But espceially makea n XUL plugin for IE that lets you run XUL stuff inside IE, basically a sort of embedded Mozilla engine. Then work up a few killer apps to make people download and use the plugin.
If a few good uses of XUL can become widespread over the next six months or so, it has a good chance to take a hold before XAML can squash it. And with enough visible support big companies like IBM might jump on the bandwagon.
IE attacked because it's common (Score:5, Insightful)
Site developers are hindering Firefox adoption (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, when I encounter a site that supports Firefox and encourages its use (Wells Fargo, for instance) I always send an email to whoemver contacts I can find praising their decision to support a more secure browser.
The more people that do this, the faster IE can be banished forever.
Who's side is he on? (Score:5, Funny)
Good job Steve, you just convinced me not to use MS products.
Developers are customers too... (Score:5, Interesting)
As a web developer there are plenty of features I would like to see [webstandards.org] along the lines of CSS/XHTML/ECMAScript standards compliance. I would say that my payment of sweat and tears with workarounds to these problems more than qualifies me as a customer.
Firefox is becomming the #1 browser where I work (Score:5, Interesting)
I'd say 1 out of 10 or fewer people so far have wanted to go back to MSIE... and the reason is usually because they are just used to doing things a certain way but it doesn't take long to get used to the new one anyway.
These steps are important because my company's goal is to dump Microsoft and any product that depends on a Microsoft operating system. Moving people to Firefox, and getting people to use OpenOffice has, so far, been a welcome improvement for most of my users. (We need to write PDF files from time to time and only OpenOffice does that... sure we could buy and install adobe acrobat... expensive... no point in that when they get what they want for free with OpenOffice.) And once they are all used to seeing OOo and Firefox in their faces, changing the OS from beneath them becomes a LOT more trivial than it would be to go about it the other way around.
Truly, the migration path from Windows to Linux is in the applications... get the apps we need to run under Linux and we're golden. So far, OOo and Firefox is paving the way nicely and presenting a very favorable impression for using OSS in the workplace.
More apt wording (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously... How can you be a succesful product manager if you're not aware of what the competition is doing?
I can't believe this guy is in the position he's in with statements like that, much less keeping that position after such an admission.
IE's Main Missing Feature (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, Microsoft has a lot of employees. . . (Score:5, Funny)
MS tells lies like every other evil corporation/government? This is a sad truth, but a non-story.
-FL
One major weakness of Firefox (Score:4, Interesting)
I've actually offered a US $1000 bounty for anybody who can fix this and incorporate it into the main code base. See Link Here [mozilla.org].
One thing that kills me about this is I spent 6-9 months developing software to work on MSIE and Mozilla. Mozilla would be a very small portion of my client base but I wanted to help promote open source. But since they made this change that disallows you from loading local images, all this work is gone to waste.
Anyways, I guess there are two things:
1. The fact that I developed on a 1.2 browser and the newer versions were NOT backward compatible. This sucks big ass. Imagine investing the time, money and effort on this and have it wasted. I know you could tell me I should have upgraded the browser but the point was that you always need to support the older browsers. I never even suspected that the newer browsers would purposely break something that worked in the older ones.
2. It's not a security issue. What damage can be done by loading an image that is on your computer. The most I could steal (info wise) is the width/height of that image and the fact that that image exists.
3. I wonder how my commercial incentive (the reward) plays out in an open source world. People are either going to be happy or hate it I presume. Either way, if you solve it and get it introduced into the release version, you get $1000.
Re:One major weakness of Firefox (Score:5, Interesting)
Trust me, you do not want this behavior changed. You see, Mozilla and IE used to allow this. Then the bad guys figured out that you could ferret out the local filenames things were cached under, load your own malicious code into the cache in an innocuous way, then refer to it as a local resource in a dangerous way. Since it was a local resource it could do things a remote resource wouldn't be allowed to do. So Mozilla drew a one-way wall: local resources can refer to remote resources, but remote resources aren't allowed to refer to local resources directly. They looked at being type-selective, but concluded that if they did someone would always be able to finagle a way to turn that into arbitrary access, so the only safe thing was to block across the board based on the local/remote nature of the protocol.
IE tried to avoid this and be more selective. The result has been a fairly steady stream of zone-escalation exploits for it. To put it plainly, you can't open just one hole.
And frankly, if your page is remote, why are you assuming a local file exists at a particular location? You should be referring to your own resources, not someone else's.
Switch to Firefox, and stay? (Score:5, Interesting)
I've made it a requirement of friends and relatives that if they want me to look at their machine and fix them that they need to install and use firefox as their primary browser.
There is a problem with the whole thing though - many of them go back to IE because one site of another will not work due to IE dependancies. Of all the people I've converted, only a small percentage kept with it.
We've seen a big spike in FF/Moz usage over the last few months, however, if you'll excuse my pessamism, I think this will eventually drop off as people find one or two sites that don't function properly because they were designed only with IE in mind. A good example of this is my sister, who went back because her son couldn't play a couple of yahoo games which explicitly ask for IE.
I think this is the real reason they say Firefox is not a threat to IE - because despite the superiority of Firefox, most people don't care about the benefits of security. They just want page X to work properly, and when it only works properly in IE, they'll run back.
Re:First they ignore you... (Score:5, Insightful)
Both sides ignore and laugh at each other anyway. Who wins?
That's Not How it Works With Microsoft (Score:5, Funny)
If Ghandi had been going up against Microsoft, he'd be one of those happy friendly cartoon search agents now, like that puppy or that paperclip.
Re:First they ignore you... (Score:5, Funny)
First a famous quote is used, then it's overused, then you get modded up.
Re:First they ignore you... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Lets face it (Score:4, Interesting)
I was flipping channels, and saw some news show (damn if I can remember which one) was talking about it briefly. Something like a open source browser being TV worthy is something.
Heck, even a lot of the non-geeks at my work have heard through the grape vine that Firefox is the way to go. They are installing it, and loving it, and spreading the word.
Of course, you were only trolling.
Re:Tabbed? (Score:5, Informative)
How come the tabs don't respond to the Tab key?
In Windows, Ctrl+Tab will cycle through taps from left to right, whilst Ctrl+Shift+Tab will cycle the opposite direction. Standard Windows behavior.
Why do I want downloaded files to automatically saved to my desktop - what's wrong with "My Documents/Fire Fox/Downloads" so I don't get clutter all over my desktop?
Go to Tools, Options, Downloads, and change the default download directory if you'd like it somewhere else. Alternately, you can have it ask where to download every time.
I do not load "harmful ActiveX controls" but I want to load "useful" ones. In fact as a smart user I wonder how to make them work in FF? If a client of mine tries to use my web form (activex) doesn't see it he will get the shits with me - not his browser.
There are third-party ActiveX plugins if you really want them, but remember not everyone uses Internet Explorer or Windows - if I want to use my Risc PC to browse an ActiveX-based website, I'm out of luck. Beware of alienating a potential audience.
Google is part of my toolbar.
Firefox comes with a search bar built in, not tacked-on as a third party add-on, and supports plugins for virtually any other search engine you could think of. From my browser, I can instantly search Google, Amazon, the IMDB, Wikipedia...
I have the "Features you are used to" because I got used to them in IE.
Virtually every feature you'll use commonly in IE is present in Firefox, many done in a superior way. Granted, some pages fail to render properly in Firefox at the moment, but for the vast majority there are no problems.
Meanwhile, 'Fox has many features that are a godsend in day-to-day browsing. Pop-up blocking? I've found many manage to sneak through in IE 6 SP2, whilst Firefox not only can block popups more consistantly, but also supports blocking images through a simple right-click.
Tabbed browsing is something you have to experience to realise why you need it - if you're browsing along and find something you want to read later, just middle-click to open it in a new tab, still browsing in the same window. It just works.