[bgmccollum]

for all the people cheering about the announcements of IE/Mac being discontinued, you dont understand the flipside...the windows camp, and how it may affect you the mac user, and more general, the internet as a whole.

looks as if IE isn't going to be available as a standalone download anymore. each time a browser is updated, it supports new internet features. things like CSS, PNG, XML etc. generally, browsers are updated quite frequently due to new standards that emerge. you may know this, but joe schmoe doesnt. microsoft has chosen not to update IE to support these new features until they release their new OS (longhorn in 2005). most people wont upgrade to longhorn for up to 3 years after its release, or never (how many people do you know that still run 95 or 98?).

the newest version (and last till longhorn) is IE6 SP1. this was released in 2000. since then, many things have changed in web developement and web standards. the most glaring problems with IE are FLOAT support, and transparent PNGs. IE has the dominance (85%). basically, the internet will be frozen technology-wise till the next version of windows is in widespread use (post 2005), or if people start to migrate away from IE to other standards compliant browsers. once MS sees this, maybe something will click in their head and get their **** together, release standalone versions for legacy OSs, and update IE more frequently.

without an updated IE, these features cannot be used until (hopefully) 2005. and still is the problem of people using legacy OSs not being able to get this new IE when released, since it is to be embedded into the system.

MS believes that since they dominate the browser market, they dont have to work on it anymore, leaving it in whatever state it is. only to update it when it will benefit MS financially. and by financially, forcing the user to buy the new OS to get the new browser. the internet is open and free, and so should browsers.

me, from this day forward as a web developer will conform to 100% standards. if a visitor comes to any one of my sites using IE, i will inform them of MS's choice to not develop IE any further for the next few years. i will offer them the choice to move to something this is compliant (gecko Derived, KHTML Derived) or face the rendering problems with the site using IE.

if every web developer did this, we could nip this little problem in the bud. more users using compliant browsers, microsoft losing share, forcing them to update IE and its rendering engine to be more compliant, and getting back in the game.

competition is good. monopolies are bad...

[Sharky K.]

I agree with your post.
But I don't really like messages like "this site is best viewed with Mozilla". As a little note in the website it would be ok I think.
A website I am now working on has a help page where people can read about technologies used in the website such as CSS2, Quicktime VR, PDF and in the future SVG. I just advise there to download specific software if they want to and explain how it works.

MS is very good in letting people grow into applications such as for example MSN Messenger. People think it is great, has cool features etc, they don't see it is getting bloated. They would if they used it for the first time. MS could do the same with IE so no one will even think about downloading Mozilla.

[OptimusG4]

Yea, I've decided as well to use 100% standards, using Safari and Mozilla to develop on. It's not my fault MS won't support standards, and I shouldn't have to lower my standards because of that. A good example is http://www.macrabbit.com/cssedit/. IE botches it up where Safari renders it perfectly.

[Sharky K.]

Originally posted by OptimusG4:
A good example is http://www.macrabbit.com/cssedit/. IE botches it up where Safari renders it perfectly.

thank you although the product is not designed for windows users so...

[OptimusG4]

Na, although I remember the author stating that they were getting complaints from PC users because it didn't look right on IE, although the latest Mozilla (1.5a) shows it perfect as well.

[digi-jj]

No IE for the Mac is a very very bad thing for Apple. It doesn't matter how much a person likes/hates Micro$oft, they lead the way when it comes to networking and the internet.

[Sharky K.]

Originally posted by digi-jj:
No IE for the Mac is a very very bad thing for Apple. It doesn't matter how much a person likes/hates Micro$oft, they lead the way when it comes to networking and the internet.

IE:mac is so different from IE:windows. Developers just try to make there site also compatible with IE:mac for mac users. Now they have to do it with Safari. I don't see any problem.

[calimehtar]

The best browser for Windows these days is Mozilla Firebird. It has all the cool Mozilla features, and is faster and less bloated than either IE or Mozilla. It's got a really sweet interface too, without the Mozilla bloat.

Go tell all your Windows-using friends to try it out. Before long we won't have to worry about IE at all anymore. Transparent PNGs, here I come!