Well I wonder if that clone maker thats been in court with Apple would find this interesting and/or useful?
If they can demonstrate that a major corporation (and partner of Apple) is installing OS X on non-apple hardware and openly using the hackintosh for it's own product demonstrations it might give their case some support.
Perhaps not... but it was the 1st thing that came to mind.
And how is the W3C going to force Microsoft to do anything, and how would they block any browser from accessing web content? W3C only suggests standards.
If they suggest a standard codebase and Microsoft don't use it then they are violating the standards and shouldn't have to be supported. They can be blocked voluntarily by web developers by suggesting the rendering engine is not compliant with web standards and the performance is so slow that it makes the experience worse. Right now, Microsoft get away with it because they can claim to adhere to some of the spec.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cdyates
Even if this were possible, you advocate blocking more than 50% of web users from the web?
No, forcing them to upgrade to a better browser. They are free to access the web. It had to happen with Flash at one point so that everyone could get a common video decoder.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
According to the developers, it was the constant "fixing" of their new products to run on MSIE (in other words Microsoft pissing *them* off), that was at the root of it. It turned out to just be simpler to replace their rendering engine than try to work around it.
I don't know why Microsoft decided to make things so difficult. They even have rendering glitches on pages so for example border and background images can just disappear at random and then appear when you click them. You can even crash IE by missing out some end tags.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DaveGee
If they can demonstrate that a major corporation (and partner of Apple) is installing OS X on non-apple hardware and openly using the hackintosh for it's own product demonstrations it might give their case some support.
They aren't profiting from it though and as one commenter points out, aren't an end user so can't violate an end user license. Plus, it's pre-release hardware and Intel will probably want to test the OS with it. I doubt Apple will complain as they get some free press.
Major companies are trusted with having higher privileges - some major film studios for example will get access to source code of major software packages if they need to change things or to pre-release hardware for testing.
I still don't understand all the fuzz about HTML5 and Microsoft. The standard has not been finalized yet and won't be for another year or two. I really can't blame Microsoft for not implementing half-finished drafts. On the other hand Internet Explorer 8 has allegedly the most complete and correct support for CSS 2.1 so one can't say that they are not trying at least to keep up.
EDIT:
WebKit also gets too often a free pass in my opinion as its standard support is still medicore at best. The WebKit supporters try too often to narrow the discussion on the standards that WebKit implements and rarely mentions all the standards which have not been implemented (yet). [1]
If they suggest a standard codebase and Microsoft don't use it then they are violating the standards and shouldn't have to be supported. They can be blocked voluntarily by web developers by suggesting the rendering engine is not compliant with web standards and the performance is so slow that it makes the experience worse.
That will never in a million years happen whilst ~70% of the Internet uses IE based browsers and Internet Explorer is pre-installed on every PC. The vast majority of users don't understand it to that level and want things to just work how they worked before.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marvin
I don't know why Microsoft decided to make things so difficult. They even have rendering glitches on pages so for example border and background images can just disappear at random and then appear when you click them. You can even crash IE by missing out some end tags.
No browser is perfect. If your coding is so basically flawed then why should a browser support it anyway? And IMO, IE is a lot more forgiving than other browsers for most things.
And how is the W3C going to force Microsoft to do anything, and how would they block any browser from accessing web content? W3C only suggests standards.
Even if this were possible, you advocate blocking more than 50% of web users from the web?
It is rather standard in every other industry. If you don't follow the norms and regulations, you are not allowed to enter the market. Try to sell a car that doesn't comply to the emission regulations. Its everywhere and for a good reason. IT needs to become less jungle and obeying to the standardization bodies is a step in the right direction.
That will never in a million years happen whilst ~70% of the Internet uses IE based browsers and Internet Explorer is pre-installed on every PC. The vast majority of users don't understand it to that level and want things to just work how they worked before.
Showing a note to those IE users that they might consider switching to other browser to get a better browsing experience (together with links to download) might be a good start. I hate wasting my time supporting nonstandard rubbish in IE in my web applications.
Am I the only one who thinks that Google did MS a favor by doing that?!
I disagree though I understand where you're coming from on this. The reason why we wanted to kill off IE is because Microsoft uses it as a way to implement its own web standards. Google is trying to break that with this plugin in order to promote HTML5 and kill off Flash, Silverlight and Active X. I don't mind those who want to keep IE despite the security risks. Let them live in ignorance.
The only question I have is how hard is Google trying to push this plugin so it can be widely adopted. Hopefully any IE user will be required to download this plugin if they have a Google or YouTube account.
Actually, they are putting the hurt on both Adobe & Microsoft. With support for HTML 5 being now available ... why would anyone continue to dabble in Silverlight or Flash?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marvin
I'm sure the reaction from most people outside of Microsoft would be positive and this is why I think the W3C should enforce an implementation not a specification. Make Microsoft use Webkit... I doubt FF or Opera devs would be averse to the move.
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism
I love the ?or continue at your own peril? as an option for sticking with IE?s browser engine. Gotta love Google!
Yeah, sort of like the scamware that tells you your computer is infected with viruses but click here and we'll take care of it. If this is just the demo version of the plugin prompt, that's fine, very cute, but entirely inappropriate in released software.
I definitely have mixed feelings on this story. IE is a nightmare to develop for, Flash and Silverlight need to go away -- and this definitely has high potential to make that happen -- and it's always fun to see MS get cut off at the knees. On the other hand, I'm not thrilled to see the Google juggernaut gain momentum.
I'm not sure about the Opera developers, but I think the FF community would flip out over the idea of switching to WebKit. They've spent a lot of time and effort developing their own rendering engine and I'm sure there's a major emotional/ego commitment there.
Rather than waiting for Microsoft to implement HTML 5, Google has released a plugin for Internet Explorer 8 that injects its own WebKit rendering engine, resulting in a ten fold performance boost for JavaScript.
PRICELESS!
Not good when third-parties can do a better job with your own product.
Quote:
Microsoft responded to the release of Chrome Frame by claiming that Google's new plugin makes IE 8 less secure. In a comment made to Ars Technica, Microsoft said that installing the plugin "is not a risk we would recommend our friends and families take."
As the queen of the whorehouse lectures us on values....
It is rather standard in every other industry. If you don't follow the norms and regulations, you are not allowed to enter the market. Try to sell a car that doesn't comply to the emission regulations. Its everywhere and for a good reason. IT needs to become less jungle and obeying to the standardization bodies is a step in the right direction.
Your car analogy is specious. There is a regulatory infrastructure in place to deal with cars and pollution. Each country has its own. The same can't be said about the internet, and the w3c is not a government agency that has to be obeyed.
Not everyone agrees on what the standards are or should be, and the w3c has no authority to enforce them - they only suggest them. Browser vendors are free to disagree with the w3c at their leisure.
It's up to developers to develop for the audience, not to ask the audience to become educated on this issue and pick the right browser to make developers' lives easier.
Not everyone agrees on what the standards are or should be, and the w3c has no authority to enforce them - they only suggest them. Browser vendors are free to disagree with the w3c at their leisure.
It's up to developers to develop for the audience, not to ask the audience to become educated on this issue and pick the right browser to make developers' lives easier.
On the other hand, choosing some implementation, such as WebKit, as a reference implementation, might have a positive impact on browser standardization.
Microsoft suckered a lot of developers into using unique features of IE at a time when browser development and standards were relatively immature. Features and limitations that they are now stuck with because there is not a compelling enough reason to abandon their IE specific code.
WebKit offers a mature base that offers developers a sound development platform and, along with IE's diminishing market share, decreases the likelihood that any but the most Microsoft centric development shops would sacrifice cross browser compatibility for proprietary extensions likely to be of little value, especially if that browser can't claim standards compliance.
On the third hand, being a reference implementation could end up being a liability for WebKit by requiring that WebKit developers stick strictly to the spec -- i.e., limiting their ability to innovate on the platform toward, say, HTML6 -- or at least slow development by making it subject to approval by the standards body.
On the fourth hand, one could argue that WebKit is already quickly becoming a de facto standard and that other implementors will need to be compatible with it to be perceived as, "correctly rendering the Web."
I still don't understand all the fuzz about HTML5 and Microsoft. The standard has not been finalized yet and won't be for another year or two. I really can't blame Microsoft for not implementing half-finished drafts. On the other hand Internet Explorer 8 has allegedly the most complete and correct support for CSS 2.1 so one can't say that they are not trying at least to keep up.
EDIT:
WebKit also gets too often a free pass in my opinion as its standard support is still medicore at best. The WebKit supporters try too often to narrow the discussion on the standards that WebKit implements and rarely mentions all the standards which have not been implemented (yet). [1]
If we waited for standards to be completed and ratified before putting them into production then we?d only have 802.11n routers for a couple weeks now, yet MS has been including 802.11n drivers in Windows for some time now. That just isn?t how the technology tends to work. With HTML5, it?s a very complex system. When one part is completed there is no reason that a browser engine developer shouldn?t try to implement it, especially when that addition can assist in the speed and usefulness of the browser. If it?s a popular enough it will get picked up by other developers and site developers. No need to wait 5 years before we put these efficient and useful additions into the browsers. Some of these HTML5 inclusions may need to change, but for the most part each part will be finished enough that they can included as needed.
We?re finally seeing the momentum pick up in browser development after such a long stagnation. This is a very good thing.
On the other hand, choosing some implementation, such as WebKit, as a reference implementation, might have a positive impact on browser standardization.
Who gets to pick which one? You think anyone would agree on which one?
Quote:
Originally Posted by anonymouse
Microsoft suckered a lot of developers into using unique features of IE at a time when browser development and standards were relatively immature. Features and limitations that they are now stuck with because there is not a compelling enough reason to abandon their IE specific code.
Suckered? I don't think it was malicious. At the time their competition was Netscape 4, then Netscape 6 - IE 6 was a better browser than either.
Quote:
Originally Posted by anonymouse
WebKit offers a mature base that offers developers a sound development platform and, along with IE's diminishing market share, decreases the likelihood that any but the most Microsoft centric development shops would sacrifice cross browser compatibility for proprietary extensions likely to be of little value, especially if that browser can't claim standards compliance.
On the third hand, being a reference implementation could end up being a liability for WebKit by requiring that WebKit developers stick strictly to the spec -- i.e., limiting their ability to innovate on the platform toward, say, HTML6 -- or at least slow development by making it subject to approval by the standards body.
IE market share is still well more than half, depending on whos numbers you use. Its more than Microsoft centric development shops - its every major corporation on the planet practically, and most home users.
Quote:
Originally Posted by anonymouse
On the fourth hand, one could argue that WebKit is already quickly becoming a de facto standard and that other implementors will need to be compatible with it to be perceived as, "correctly rendering the Web."
Not even close. Safari and Chrome combined are a small fraction of web users. Firefox's market share is much greater. Most web developers consider Firefox the defacto standard, because its the browser they use because its so developer friendly.
Suckered? I don't think it was malicious. At the time their competition was Netscape 4, then Netscape 6 - IE 6 was a better browser than either.
Perhaps suckered is not the correct word, but malicious certainly fits since they used anti-competitve maneuvering to destroy Netscape thus stagnating web browser innovation for a a very long time in tech terms.
Quote:
IE market share is still well more than half, depending on whos numbers you use. Its more than Microsoft centric development shops - its every major corporation on the planet practically, and most home users.
It’s getting close to being less than 50%. Along with the other fronts that is chipping away at IE’s marketshare, the mobile front is taking bigger and bigger chunks out. With smartphone interest growing where developers have to support a more efficient code base and WebKit being the browser choice on Blackberry, Android and iPhone OSes it will likely be less than a year before IE drops below 50%. Trident will still be the single most dominate browser engine for a few years until smartphones and other portables catchup (likely with WebKit if Mozilla’s Fennec doesn’t get going soon) but the browsers that are using modern HTML, DOM, CSS and fast JS engines will have taken over 50% of the market. That is a major and important shift. IE can still be dominate in and of itself and be the odd man out if the collective opposition are working together… and so far that appears to be the case.
Who gets to pick which one? You think anyone would agree on which one?
Suckered? I don't think it was malicious. At the time their competition was Netscape 4, then Netscape 6 - IE 6 was a better browser than either.
IE market share is still well more than half, depending on whos numbers you use. Its more than Microsoft centric development shops - its every major corporation on the planet practically, and most home users.
Not even close. Safari and Chrome combined are a small fraction of web users. Firefox's market share is much greater.
Picking one: Obviously the W3C controls the HTML spec, so, if a reference implementation were to be picked, they would do the picking.
Suckered: They were absolutely suckered by Microsoft.
IE Market Share: it's rapidly declining and almost non existent on mobile.
See the comment above re mobile. And if Google's plugin gains traction, which it very likely will, WebKit's market share will quickly rival or overtake FF.
Picking one: Obviously the W3C controls the HTML spec, so, if a reference implementation were to be picked, they would do the picking.
Says who? They don't have a mandate or the authority to decide this, and absolutely no ability to enforce it. Neither does anyone else. Compliance with w3c standards is completely voluntary. More likely, if there were to be enforceable standards, it would be a body like the ISO, not the w3c.
Quote:
Originally Posted by anonymouse
Suckered: They were absolutely suckered by Microsoft.
I'll give you that Microsoft was anti-competitive and used predatory business practices that probably killed Netscape.
Quote:
Originally Posted by anonymouse
IE Market Share: it's rapidly declining and almost non existent on mobile.
You can be optimistic and spin it however you want, but its not declining as fast as you seem to think:
Internet Explorer (65.29%)
Mozilla Firefox (25.69%)
Safari (3.74%)
Google Chrome (2.84%)
Opera (1.62%)
Other (0.82%)
this is from wikipedia, August 2009 - not sure where their data came from, but all the numbers i've seen are pretty similar to this. These numbers vary according to the source, but even if you factor in a significant margin of error you still get a clear picture. Even if IE is only 50%, that leaves 50% for the other 5 to divey up.
Quote:
Originally Posted by anonymouse
See the comment above re mobile. And if Google's plugin gains traction, which it very likely will, WebKit's market share will quickly rival or overtake FF.
You are speculating - you don't know that. From the numbers I could find, Firefox's share is 25.69%, webkit (safari + chrome) is 6.58. so Webkit has about 20% market share to gain in order to rival Firefox.
And as far as mobile goes, from what I could quickly google about mobile browser share, it looks like Opera is the winner there.
I'm not trying to argue for the sake of arguing here. My point is that It is a huge stretch that there is anyway we will have a "reference implementation", "standards that are enforced", and that Webkit would be the one to be picked. There are just way to many variables there.
Perhaps suckered is not the correct word, but malicious certainly fits since they used anti-competitve maneuvering to destroy Netscape thus stagnating web browser innovation for a a very long time in tech terms.
It?s getting close to being less than 50%. Along with the other fronts that is chipping away at IE?s marketshare, the mobile front is taking bigger and bigger chunks out. With smartphone interest growing where developers have to support a more efficient code base and WebKit being the browser choice on Blackberry, Android and iPhone OSes it will likely be less than a year before IE drops below 50%. Trident will still be the single most dominate browser engine for a few years until smartphones and other portables catchup (likely with WebKit if Mozilla?s Fennec doesn?t get going soon) but the browsers that are using modern HTML, DOM, CSS and fast JS engines will have taken over 50% of the market. That is a major and important shift. IE can still be dominate in and of itself and be the odd man out if the collective opposition are working together? and so far that appears to be the case.
Says who? They don't have a mandate or the authority to decide this, and absolutely no ability to enforce it. Neither does anyone else. Compliance with w3c standards is completely voluntary. More likely, if there were to be enforceable standards, it would be a body like the ISO, not the w3c.
You can be optimistic and spin it however you want, but its not declining as fast as you seem to think:
Internet Explorer (65.29%)
Mozilla Firefox (25.69%)
Safari (3.74%)
Google Chrome (2.84%)
Opera (1.62%)
Other (0.82%)
You are speculating - you don't know that. From the numbers I could find, Firefox's share is 25.69%, webkit (safari + chrome) is 6.58. so Webkit has about 20% market share to gain in order to rival Firefox.
And as far as mobile goes, from what I could quickly google about mobile browser share, it looks like Opera is the winner there.
I'm not trying to argue for the sake of arguing here. My point is that It is a huge stretch that there is anyway we will have a "reference implementation", "standards that are enforced", and that Webkit would be the one to be picked. There are just way to many variables there.
Well, no the W3C does not have any enforcement authority, but they could certainly pick a reference implementation, and it would be known which browsers are "compliant" or not.
Assuming, for the sake of argument, that half of IE users install the Google plugin for some reason, then, based on your numbers, from that alone, WebKit ends up with about 53% marketshare, while IE either remains the same (in which case the totals are greater than 100%, of course the totals are really already greater than 100% because many people run multiple browsers) or decreases to about 33% (depending on how you count it and how users use it.) WebKit market share is increasing on it's own, so, even if it's not half, but some smaller number, the impact could be significant.
As far as mobile goes (and this applies to non-mobile as well) the important number is not the installed base, but the amount of actual web use, which most surveys seem to indicate is overwhelmingly WebKit based.
And, yes, of course I am speculating.
EDIT: My mistake, I misread your numbers, so, in correction: WebKit goes to ~40%, not 53%. The other numbers remain the same.
Comments
PSST! Intel demonstration running OS X on a HACKINTOSH!! Does this mean Apple may be releasing OS X separate from hardware soon? http://www.engadget.com/2009/09/24/v...le-transferri/
Well I wonder if that clone maker thats been in court with Apple would find this interesting and/or useful?
If they can demonstrate that a major corporation (and partner of Apple) is installing OS X on non-apple hardware and openly using the hackintosh for it's own product demonstrations it might give their case some support.
Perhaps not... but it was the 1st thing that came to mind.
Dave
And how is the W3C going to force Microsoft to do anything, and how would they block any browser from accessing web content? W3C only suggests standards.
If they suggest a standard codebase and Microsoft don't use it then they are violating the standards and shouldn't have to be supported. They can be blocked voluntarily by web developers by suggesting the rendering engine is not compliant with web standards and the performance is so slow that it makes the experience worse. Right now, Microsoft get away with it because they can claim to adhere to some of the spec.
Even if this were possible, you advocate blocking more than 50% of web users from the web?
No, forcing them to upgrade to a better browser. They are free to access the web. It had to happen with Flash at one point so that everyone could get a common video decoder.
According to the developers, it was the constant "fixing" of their new products to run on MSIE (in other words Microsoft pissing *them* off), that was at the root of it. It turned out to just be simpler to replace their rendering engine than try to work around it.
I don't know why Microsoft decided to make things so difficult. They even have rendering glitches on pages so for example border and background images can just disappear at random and then appear when you click them. You can even crash IE by missing out some end tags.
If they can demonstrate that a major corporation (and partner of Apple) is installing OS X on non-apple hardware and openly using the hackintosh for it's own product demonstrations it might give their case some support.
They aren't profiting from it though and as one commenter points out, aren't an end user so can't violate an end user license. Plus, it's pre-release hardware and Intel will probably want to test the OS with it. I doubt Apple will complain as they get some free press.
Major companies are trusted with having higher privileges - some major film studios for example will get access to source code of major software packages if they need to change things or to pre-release hardware for testing.
EDIT:
WebKit also gets too often a free pass in my opinion as its standard support is still medicore at best. The WebKit supporters try too often to narrow the discussion on the standards that WebKit implements and rarely mentions all the standards which have not been implemented (yet). [1]
[1] http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=16210
If they suggest a standard codebase and Microsoft don't use it then they are violating the standards and shouldn't have to be supported. They can be blocked voluntarily by web developers by suggesting the rendering engine is not compliant with web standards and the performance is so slow that it makes the experience worse.
That will never in a million years happen whilst ~70% of the Internet uses IE based browsers and Internet Explorer is pre-installed on every PC. The vast majority of users don't understand it to that level and want things to just work how they worked before.
I don't know why Microsoft decided to make things so difficult. They even have rendering glitches on pages so for example border and background images can just disappear at random and then appear when you click them. You can even crash IE by missing out some end tags.
No browser is perfect. If your coding is so basically flawed then why should a browser support it anyway? And IMO, IE is a lot more forgiving than other browsers for most things.
And how is the W3C going to force Microsoft to do anything, and how would they block any browser from accessing web content? W3C only suggests standards.
Even if this were possible, you advocate blocking more than 50% of web users from the web?
It is rather standard in every other industry. If you don't follow the norms and regulations, you are not allowed to enter the market. Try to sell a car that doesn't comply to the emission regulations. Its everywhere and for a good reason. IT needs to become less jungle and obeying to the standardization bodies is a step in the right direction.
That will never in a million years happen whilst ~70% of the Internet uses IE based browsers and Internet Explorer is pre-installed on every PC. The vast majority of users don't understand it to that level and want things to just work how they worked before.
Showing a note to those IE users that they might consider switching to other browser to get a better browsing experience (together with links to download) might be a good start. I hate wasting my time supporting nonstandard rubbish in IE in my web applications.
Am I the only one who thinks that Google did MS a favor by doing that?!
I disagree though I understand where you're coming from on this. The reason why we wanted to kill off IE is because Microsoft uses it as a way to implement its own web standards. Google is trying to break that with this plugin in order to promote HTML5 and kill off Flash, Silverlight and Active X. I don't mind those who want to keep IE despite the security risks. Let them live in ignorance.
The only question I have is how hard is Google trying to push this plugin so it can be widely adopted. Hopefully any IE user will be required to download this plugin if they have a Google or YouTube account.
Actually, they are putting the hurt on both Adobe & Microsoft. With support for HTML 5 being now available ... why would anyone continue to dabble in Silverlight or Flash?
I'm sure the reaction from most people outside of Microsoft would be positive and this is why I think the W3C should enforce an implementation not a specification. Make Microsoft use Webkit... I doubt FF or Opera devs would be averse to the move.
I love the ?or continue at your own peril? as an option for sticking with IE?s browser engine. Gotta love Google!
Yeah, sort of like the scamware that tells you your computer is infected with viruses but click here and we'll take care of it. If this is just the demo version of the plugin prompt, that's fine, very cute, but entirely inappropriate in released software.
I definitely have mixed feelings on this story. IE is a nightmare to develop for, Flash and Silverlight need to go away -- and this definitely has high potential to make that happen -- and it's always fun to see MS get cut off at the knees. On the other hand, I'm not thrilled to see the Google juggernaut gain momentum.
I'm not sure about the Opera developers, but I think the FF community would flip out over the idea of switching to WebKit. They've spent a lot of time and effort developing their own rendering engine and I'm sure there's a major emotional/ego commitment there.
Rather than waiting for Microsoft to implement HTML 5, Google has released a plugin for Internet Explorer 8 that injects its own WebKit rendering engine, resulting in a ten fold performance boost for JavaScript.
PRICELESS!
Not good when third-parties can do a better job with your own product.
Microsoft responded to the release of Chrome Frame by claiming that Google's new plugin makes IE 8 less secure. In a comment made to Ars Technica, Microsoft said that installing the plugin "is not a risk we would recommend our friends and families take."
As the queen of the whorehouse lectures us on values....
It is rather standard in every other industry. If you don't follow the norms and regulations, you are not allowed to enter the market. Try to sell a car that doesn't comply to the emission regulations. Its everywhere and for a good reason. IT needs to become less jungle and obeying to the standardization bodies is a step in the right direction.
Your car analogy is specious. There is a regulatory infrastructure in place to deal with cars and pollution. Each country has its own. The same can't be said about the internet, and the w3c is not a government agency that has to be obeyed.
Not everyone agrees on what the standards are or should be, and the w3c has no authority to enforce them - they only suggest them. Browser vendors are free to disagree with the w3c at their leisure.
It's up to developers to develop for the audience, not to ask the audience to become educated on this issue and pick the right browser to make developers' lives easier.
Not everyone agrees on what the standards are or should be, and the w3c has no authority to enforce them - they only suggest them. Browser vendors are free to disagree with the w3c at their leisure.
It's up to developers to develop for the audience, not to ask the audience to become educated on this issue and pick the right browser to make developers' lives easier.
On the other hand, choosing some implementation, such as WebKit, as a reference implementation, might have a positive impact on browser standardization.
Microsoft suckered a lot of developers into using unique features of IE at a time when browser development and standards were relatively immature. Features and limitations that they are now stuck with because there is not a compelling enough reason to abandon their IE specific code.
WebKit offers a mature base that offers developers a sound development platform and, along with IE's diminishing market share, decreases the likelihood that any but the most Microsoft centric development shops would sacrifice cross browser compatibility for proprietary extensions likely to be of little value, especially if that browser can't claim standards compliance.
On the third hand, being a reference implementation could end up being a liability for WebKit by requiring that WebKit developers stick strictly to the spec -- i.e., limiting their ability to innovate on the platform toward, say, HTML6 -- or at least slow development by making it subject to approval by the standards body.
On the fourth hand, one could argue that WebKit is already quickly becoming a de facto standard and that other implementors will need to be compatible with it to be perceived as, "correctly rendering the Web."
I still don't understand all the fuzz about HTML5 and Microsoft. The standard has not been finalized yet and won't be for another year or two. I really can't blame Microsoft for not implementing half-finished drafts. On the other hand Internet Explorer 8 has allegedly the most complete and correct support for CSS 2.1 so one can't say that they are not trying at least to keep up.
EDIT:
WebKit also gets too often a free pass in my opinion as its standard support is still medicore at best. The WebKit supporters try too often to narrow the discussion on the standards that WebKit implements and rarely mentions all the standards which have not been implemented (yet). [1]
[1] http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=16210
If we waited for standards to be completed and ratified before putting them into production then we?d only have 802.11n routers for a couple weeks now, yet MS has been including 802.11n drivers in Windows for some time now. That just isn?t how the technology tends to work. With HTML5, it?s a very complex system. When one part is completed there is no reason that a browser engine developer shouldn?t try to implement it, especially when that addition can assist in the speed and usefulness of the browser. If it?s a popular enough it will get picked up by other developers and site developers. No need to wait 5 years before we put these efficient and useful additions into the browsers. Some of these HTML5 inclusions may need to change, but for the most part each part will be finished enough that they can included as needed.
We?re finally seeing the momentum pick up in browser development after such a long stagnation. This is a very good thing.
On the other hand, choosing some implementation, such as WebKit, as a reference implementation, might have a positive impact on browser standardization.
Who gets to pick which one? You think anyone would agree on which one?
Microsoft suckered a lot of developers into using unique features of IE at a time when browser development and standards were relatively immature. Features and limitations that they are now stuck with because there is not a compelling enough reason to abandon their IE specific code.
Suckered? I don't think it was malicious. At the time their competition was Netscape 4, then Netscape 6 - IE 6 was a better browser than either.
WebKit offers a mature base that offers developers a sound development platform and, along with IE's diminishing market share, decreases the likelihood that any but the most Microsoft centric development shops would sacrifice cross browser compatibility for proprietary extensions likely to be of little value, especially if that browser can't claim standards compliance.
On the third hand, being a reference implementation could end up being a liability for WebKit by requiring that WebKit developers stick strictly to the spec -- i.e., limiting their ability to innovate on the platform toward, say, HTML6 -- or at least slow development by making it subject to approval by the standards body.
IE market share is still well more than half, depending on whos numbers you use. Its more than Microsoft centric development shops - its every major corporation on the planet practically, and most home users.
On the fourth hand, one could argue that WebKit is already quickly becoming a de facto standard and that other implementors will need to be compatible with it to be perceived as, "correctly rendering the Web."
Not even close. Safari and Chrome combined are a small fraction of web users. Firefox's market share is much greater. Most web developers consider Firefox the defacto standard, because its the browser they use because its so developer friendly.
We?re finally seeing the momentum pick up in browser development after such a long stagnation. This is a very good thing.
Abso-friggin-lutely.
Suckered? I don't think it was malicious. At the time their competition was Netscape 4, then Netscape 6 - IE 6 was a better browser than either.
Perhaps suckered is not the correct word, but malicious certainly fits since they used anti-competitve maneuvering to destroy Netscape thus stagnating web browser innovation for a a very long time in tech terms.
IE market share is still well more than half, depending on whos numbers you use. Its more than Microsoft centric development shops - its every major corporation on the planet practically, and most home users.
It’s getting close to being less than 50%. Along with the other fronts that is chipping away at IE’s marketshare, the mobile front is taking bigger and bigger chunks out. With smartphone interest growing where developers have to support a more efficient code base and WebKit being the browser choice on Blackberry, Android and iPhone OSes it will likely be less than a year before IE drops below 50%. Trident will still be the single most dominate browser engine for a few years until smartphones and other portables catchup (likely with WebKit if Mozilla’s Fennec doesn’t get going soon) but the browsers that are using modern HTML, DOM, CSS and fast JS engines will have taken over 50% of the market. That is a major and important shift. IE can still be dominate in and of itself and be the odd man out if the collective opposition are working together… and so far that appears to be the case.
Who gets to pick which one? You think anyone would agree on which one?
Suckered? I don't think it was malicious. At the time their competition was Netscape 4, then Netscape 6 - IE 6 was a better browser than either.
IE market share is still well more than half, depending on whos numbers you use. Its more than Microsoft centric development shops - its every major corporation on the planet practically, and most home users.
Not even close. Safari and Chrome combined are a small fraction of web users. Firefox's market share is much greater.
Picking one: Obviously the W3C controls the HTML spec, so, if a reference implementation were to be picked, they would do the picking.
Suckered: They were absolutely suckered by Microsoft.
IE Market Share: it's rapidly declining and almost non existent on mobile.
See the comment above re mobile. And if Google's plugin gains traction, which it very likely will, WebKit's market share will quickly rival or overtake FF.
Picking one: Obviously the W3C controls the HTML spec, so, if a reference implementation were to be picked, they would do the picking.
Says who? They don't have a mandate or the authority to decide this, and absolutely no ability to enforce it. Neither does anyone else. Compliance with w3c standards is completely voluntary. More likely, if there were to be enforceable standards, it would be a body like the ISO, not the w3c.
Suckered: They were absolutely suckered by Microsoft.
I'll give you that Microsoft was anti-competitive and used predatory business practices that probably killed Netscape.
IE Market Share: it's rapidly declining and almost non existent on mobile.
You can be optimistic and spin it however you want, but its not declining as fast as you seem to think:
Internet Explorer (65.29%)
Mozilla Firefox (25.69%)
Safari (3.74%)
Google Chrome (2.84%)
Opera (1.62%)
Other (0.82%)
this is from wikipedia, August 2009 - not sure where their data came from, but all the numbers i've seen are pretty similar to this. These numbers vary according to the source, but even if you factor in a significant margin of error you still get a clear picture. Even if IE is only 50%, that leaves 50% for the other 5 to divey up.
See the comment above re mobile. And if Google's plugin gains traction, which it very likely will, WebKit's market share will quickly rival or overtake FF.
You are speculating - you don't know that. From the numbers I could find, Firefox's share is 25.69%, webkit (safari + chrome) is 6.58. so Webkit has about 20% market share to gain in order to rival Firefox.
And as far as mobile goes, from what I could quickly google about mobile browser share, it looks like Opera is the winner there.
I'm not trying to argue for the sake of arguing here. My point is that It is a huge stretch that there is anyway we will have a "reference implementation", "standards that are enforced", and that Webkit would be the one to be picked. There are just way to many variables there.
Perhaps suckered is not the correct word, but malicious certainly fits since they used anti-competitve maneuvering to destroy Netscape thus stagnating web browser innovation for a a very long time in tech terms.
It?s getting close to being less than 50%. Along with the other fronts that is chipping away at IE?s marketshare, the mobile front is taking bigger and bigger chunks out. With smartphone interest growing where developers have to support a more efficient code base and WebKit being the browser choice on Blackberry, Android and iPhone OSes it will likely be less than a year before IE drops below 50%. Trident will still be the single most dominate browser engine for a few years until smartphones and other portables catchup (likely with WebKit if Mozilla?s Fennec doesn?t get going soon) but the browsers that are using modern HTML, DOM, CSS and fast JS engines will have taken over 50% of the market. That is a major and important shift. IE can still be dominate in and of itself and be the odd man out if the collective opposition are working together? and so far that appears to be the case.
I agree with all that.
Says who? They don't have a mandate or the authority to decide this, and absolutely no ability to enforce it. Neither does anyone else. Compliance with w3c standards is completely voluntary. More likely, if there were to be enforceable standards, it would be a body like the ISO, not the w3c.
You can be optimistic and spin it however you want, but its not declining as fast as you seem to think:
Internet Explorer (65.29%)
Mozilla Firefox (25.69%)
Safari (3.74%)
Google Chrome (2.84%)
Opera (1.62%)
Other (0.82%)
You are speculating - you don't know that. From the numbers I could find, Firefox's share is 25.69%, webkit (safari + chrome) is 6.58. so Webkit has about 20% market share to gain in order to rival Firefox.
And as far as mobile goes, from what I could quickly google about mobile browser share, it looks like Opera is the winner there.
I'm not trying to argue for the sake of arguing here. My point is that It is a huge stretch that there is anyway we will have a "reference implementation", "standards that are enforced", and that Webkit would be the one to be picked. There are just way to many variables there.
Well, no the W3C does not have any enforcement authority, but they could certainly pick a reference implementation, and it would be known which browsers are "compliant" or not.
Assuming, for the sake of argument, that half of IE users install the Google plugin for some reason, then, based on your numbers, from that alone, WebKit ends up with about 53% marketshare, while IE either remains the same (in which case the totals are greater than 100%, of course the totals are really already greater than 100% because many people run multiple browsers) or decreases to about 33% (depending on how you count it and how users use it.) WebKit market share is increasing on it's own, so, even if it's not half, but some smaller number, the impact could be significant.
As far as mobile goes (and this applies to non-mobile as well) the important number is not the installed base, but the amount of actual web use, which most surveys seem to indicate is overwhelmingly WebKit based.
And, yes, of course I am speculating.
EDIT: My mistake, I misread your numbers, so, in correction: WebKit goes to ~40%, not 53%. The other numbers remain the same.