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The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview

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Re: The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview

#291

Post by sjwright »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #276
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just wish they'd moved to Gecko instead of Chromium. It's not like Gecko is an inherently inferior engine by any stretch, and it would significantly bolster their marketshare so that developers actually have to test against it.

One huge advantage the Chromium has over Gecko is Google's Security Team (ie Project Zero). For most users, the web browser is one of the biggest attack surfaces and having arguably the best security team behind the browser engine is a good thing.

Google have certainly done a great job of maximizing the PR benefit from their security researchers. And it’s a great thing they’re doing. But regardless of how well individual companies market their respective security teams, Firefox has a comparable reputation for their browser engine.

Yes some of that might be thanks to PZ, but that’s beside the point, isn’t it?

Choosing Mozilla’s platform would have been better for code diversity, which has its own distinct security benefits.

Re: The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview

#292

Post by catach »

techntoke wrote: post #236
gamblor956 wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft has always been developer-first, even when they didn't need them, and even during the Ballmer era. Google has never been about the developer experience, and is quite hostile to developers even when they need them. (See, e.g., Stadia.)

What is your definition of developer-first? My experience working at Microsoft in 2015 was the opposite of what you describe. They were too focused on supporting legacy MS that they couldn't innovate or find and keep talented developers in open source because they were forced to adopt tools and frameworks that were crap compared to standard open source development tools. The only reason people went there usually was…

External rather than internal dev support.

Re: The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview

#293

Post by Rapzid »

rejectfinite wrote: post #243
Rapzid wrote: post #158

Tested it out a few weeks ago and discovered Netflix was limiting the streaming bitrate on it. Turns out Chrome and Edge can play at 1080p now, but the bitrate is reduced(much) over what I see in Safari and the Netflix app on Windows.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/edge/features Says it is 4k in Netflix now * 4K Ultra HD exclusivity is limited to PCs running Windows 10. 4K works in both Microsoft Edge and Netflix app. Only 7th Gen Intel® Core™ processor or higher devices can decrypt PlayReady 4K DRM. Netflix Ultra HD plan required.

Interesting, I did report the issue. Worth looking at again but I don't have a 4k display and it may still be reduced nitrate. The quality difference was very noticeable on something like Lost In Space.

Re: The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview

#294

Post by microcolonel »

duhi88 wrote: post #277
microcolonel wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chromium is open source, Microsoft has published most of their interesting work on Chromium itself. A monoculture is a big problem if the alternative is to write a new browser to compete , less so if you can just fork and have the same start line.

Well they could have picked up one of the other less-dominate browser engines. WebKit and Firefox are good starting points, and both could use the extra help maintaining their open-source core. I get that they wanted to use the same browser as Electron, now that they own it...it just sucks.

The general quality of Firefox is worse, the tooling is more fiddly, some of it is written in languages which are not as familiar to Microsoft, it is considerably less straightforward to customize; and on top of this, performance is similar at best. Chromium has an architecture which lends itself to deep integration, and the default UI is much closer to Microsoft's own designs.

> WebKit and Firefox are good starting points, and both could use the extra help maintaining their open-source core.

If Firefox needs "help" from a big boy like Microsoft, it is probably the worse starting point. If WebKit is a good starting point, why is Blink worse? Chromium is more than Blink, and means that the moment Microsoft started with Chromium, they were already close to done. Whereas with WebKit, they would still have to build and test a shell.

It doesn't suck.

Re: The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview

#295

Post by okareaman »

I've been using it all afternoon and I must say it is very snappy, crisp and pleasant to use. Microsoft has cleverly copied Chrome and made it better. A bit of the ol' Embrace and Extend of the past? I've tried Firefox but it never feels right and I switch back to Chrome. I'm not switching back this time. They even restored a feature that Chrome inexplicably took out -- the option in history to restore all your open tabs that went away when you accidentally closed the browser.

Edit: I even like Bing better. What miracle is this that the top links aren't advertisements?

Re: The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview

#298

Post by marbletiles »

altitudinous wrote: post #127

On MacOS it requires admin privilege to install. I am done with that after all the crap that previous software with admin rights installed. I cleaned it up and swore I would not install anything that required admin rights again - for my own security and peace of mind. What does it need admin rights for?

Do "Show Files" in the Installer app's menubar and it'll show you everything it's installing.

In this case, it's installing Edge and the universal Microsoft AutoUpdater app. Given the range of stuff that thing has to support (including all the Office apps) and the privs it will need to run at to do so, I think the admin requirement is not entirely unreasonable.

Re: The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview

#300

Post by lostmsu »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #271
sime2009 wrote: post #184

Regarding the topic of browser mono-cultures, I was web developer in the post browser war era in the early 2000s where we had a dominant IE6 and a stagnant browser landscape. It was bad. Real bad. But I'm actually fairly positive about MS getting into the chromium landscape and back into the game. Let's face it MS had lost all of its influence in the browser world before dropping IE and making this move. It is a Goog…

I just wish they'd moved to Gecko instead of Chromium. It's not like Gecko is an inherently inferior engine by any stretch, and it would significantly bolster their marketshare so that developers actually have to test against it.

Or they could have open sourced EdgeHTML. It's not like it was worse, than Gecko.
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