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Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

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21–29 of 29 posts

Re: Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

#21
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Microsoft feels it needs to provide a better browser because the popular alternative is controlled by their competitor. Chrome itself does its best to make sure you get pulled into the Google ecosystem - you need a Google account just to use the sync feature. On top of that, when you switch Chrome to its full-screen Windows 8 app mode (for touch screen support, etc.) it basically turns into a clone of Chrome…

Yeah, I think Chrome is the browser to beat right now... but does most people really use the sync feature? I might be wrong but my guess would be no, and that's true for a lot of the other "additional value" features that browsers add

> Yeah, I think Chrome is the browser to beat right now... but does people really use the sync feature?

I certainly do; its a pretty significant convenience if you are a device-hopper.

Re: Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

#22
post #3

Great, now I have to support IE 7 AND Spartan...

Can you explain what circumstances require that you support IE7?

I work for a company that has a "managing" application that runs on windows. This application has a browser plugin that runs in an equivalent IE7 environment which must be supported.

Unfortunately that is what you get with proprietary sometimes.

Re: Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

#23
post #14

It feels like browsers in general has become to commoditized for people to even bother. How much does it really matter these days if you use chrome, firefox,opera etc. It used to be that it DID matter that you used IE because they were so hopefully after (after they were before netscape) but these days it more of a popularity contest. Every browser pretty much presents webpages correctly according to modern CSS stand…

Keep the 1990s in mind when considering this. We all know how dangerous it can be when one organisation monopolizes usage, and then has control over the future of browser functionality.

The tables might have turned, but Microsoft keeping competition up is necessary to maintain a healthy ecosystem.

Re: Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

#25
post #16
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://status.modern.ie says WebRTC is in development and CSS 3D transforms are part of a IE preview release.

There are three incompatible proposed web real-time communication standards. Google, Mozilla and Opera - "WebRTC": http://caniuse.com/#search=WebRTC and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebRTC Microsoft proposed another draft "CU-RTC-WEB" based on Skype details: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CU-RTC-WEB and later "ORTC": http://www.infoq.com/news/2014/08/ortc-webrtc Hangout vs. Skype vs. iOS messages is the deal breaker wh…

We're implementing ORTC (which actually gets its origins from outside Microsoft: http://ortc.org/history/). ORTC is essentially WebRTC "1.1" and there's active standardization work going on (in both WebRTC 1.0 and ORTC specs) to make them have a high level of compatibility. ORTC enables more scalable video and simplifies the way the data is exchanged by using a vanilla JS object style (eliminates SCP Offer/Answer).

Re: Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

#26
post #7

Spartan is based on an improved version IE11's trident engine. The browser window is a WinRuntime app. It's still unclear if it will support WebGL 2, WebRTC, CSS 3D transformations.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2014/11/11/living-on-the-... mentions CSS 3D transformations are included.

Re: Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

#27
post #14

It feels like browsers in general has become to commoditized for people to even bother. How much does it really matter these days if you use chrome, firefox,opera etc. It used to be that it DID matter that you used IE because they were so hopefully after (after they were before netscape) but these days it more of a popularity contest. Every browser pretty much presents webpages correctly according to modern CSS stand…

MS has a couple of good reasons for a fresh start:

#1 Spartan gets rid of all the legacy back-compatibility code that was holding them back.

#2 They added very interesting features that I haven't seen in other browsers (i.e colaboration)

Re: Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

#28
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Microsoft feels it needs to provide a better browser because the popular alternative is controlled by their competitor. Chrome itself does its best to make sure you get pulled into the Google ecosystem - you need a Google account just to use the sync feature. On top of that, when you switch Chrome to its full-screen Windows 8 app mode (for touch screen support, etc.) it basically turns into a clone of Chrome…

Yeah, I think Chrome is the browser to beat right now... but does most people really use the sync feature? I might be wrong but my guess would be no, and that's true for a lot of the other "additional value" features that browsers add

It would be interesting to see those metrics on sync adoption.

I can tell you from my own personal, anecdotal experience, it's one of those things as soon as someone knows about (and fully understands) they typically become Chrome users everywhere because of it. I found this to be the case for our Apps domain users at work and even friends & family who just have personal Google accounts and maybe even use iPhones, etc. It's powerful to show someone that your history, bookmarks, and even open tabs across devices stay in sync. I find that if one isn't "creeped out" by that, they usually think it's extremely convenient.

Re: Microsoft's new browser and the Windows 10 January preview build

#29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain what circumstances require that you support IE7?

I work for a company that has a "managing" application that runs on windows. This application has a browser plugin that runs in an equivalent IE7 environment which must be supported. Unfortunately that is what you get with proprietary sometimes.

I always hear about these applications but I've never actually seen one.
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