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Look, something I’m finally qualified to answer! At my previous job our customers were a representative sample of the Fortune 500 and about 40% of our users (th

Look, something I’m finally qualified to answer! At my previous job our customers were a representative sample of the Fortune 500 and about 40% of our users (their employees) were on IE11 just a few months ago. There were some very well known companies that used IE11 exclusively. It’s very quickly changing and this might be the year when it finally goes away, but it’s still alive and well in the corporate world.

vips7L 5y ago
50% of our users (all big corporations) are still on IE too.
xen2xen1 5y ago
Is the new Edge changing that?
koboll 5y ago
>It’s very quickly changing and this might be the year when it finally goes away Microsoft is offering IE11 extended support until at least 2025, so I wouldn't bet on that.
- jtdev 5y ago
  Great… thanks Microsoft…
- TheRealPomax 5y ago
  IE11: yes. IE11 "integrated into anything you were using IE11 for": no. MS is working hard to make sure that it fulfills its contractual obligation with respect to IE11's EOL, but it's at the same time removing it from everywhere it was traditionally integrated so that it can die a proper death. It'll be officially supported for as long as Windows 10 is a thing, but they're going to make it as useless as possible outside of "just being an old browser that's incompatible with today's web".
  - Rapzid 5y ago
    Yeah, it's been made clear for some time that MS considers IE11 a compatibility platform and don't recommend it as a "browser".
ethbr0 5y ago
FWIW, some parts of US HHS are just rolling out Chrome support, and there's still not full coverage of all functionality. Granted, this is the same codebase that has an element on their login page named "acceptCredintials", so... that's the starting point.
ok_coo 5y ago
I promise that this isn't a snarky question. Why has it taken so long for corp America to move off of IE? There are so many other better alternatives. I still sometimes have flashbacks of having to design around and support IE6. /shudder
- vijaybritto 5y ago
  I think if they are shown that moving off IE is gonna increase the profits then they'll do it in a week
- vb6sp6 5y ago
  I think it is two reasons 1) Sometimes companies go out of business or stop supporting\updating things. If you build critical processes around these outdated tools, it can be very difficult to change. 2) Users aren't savvy enough to know when to use Chrome, Firefox or IE. Some aren't even savvy enough to call things the correct names (looking at you Mozzarella Foxfire). So they just settle on on a lowest common denominator.
- mschuster91 5y ago
  Easy reason: why spend money (and reduce quarterly profit) if the software is still supported by the vendor for another two years? Let it be the problem of the CTO of two years from now. In two years the C-level/VP responsible has long since taken the golden parachute and his successor is stuck with the bill. Also, any sort of internal IT stuff is exclusively seen as a cost center by the MBA bean counters. Stuff like employees leaving due to outdated IT isn't something quantifiable in impact unless you have entire departments walking away at once.
- crispyambulance 5y ago
  I still have IE installed so that I can run ONE god-forsaken enterprise application known as Oracle EBS (Enterprise Business Suite). For everything else I use Chrome. Oracle EBS uses NPAPI (AKA Java Plugins AKA Java Applets). Chrome dropped support for NPAPI years ago, and since then we've been using IE to whenever we need to use Oracle EBS. I understand that the latest version of Oracle EBS might now support the cutting-edge technology of Java Web Start to continue to deliver their 1990's era grey-blah UI's with shitty layout. I don't even care to ask about upgrades. Negotiating with the bean-counter types that have enabled Oracle to put it's slimy tentacles into every critical area of the business is a dreadful, thankless task. I expect it will keep running, at its current version, long after I leave or retire. At some point, I expect employees will need to spin up VM's to open IE to use the f-ing thing-- perhaps they can set it up in their "forever" dream OS, Windows NT with IE4?
yashap 5y ago
Huh, my last company was very successful in the enterprise space, selling to tonnes of Fortune 500 companies and government organizations, and IE11 was <2% of users for us. We were preparing to deprecate support for it around the time I left.
furstenheim 5y ago
We got a huge company using IE11, they could not update to Chrome because "it was not secure" according to their IT department
- unethical_ban 5y ago
  That's odd. Both Chrome and Firefox have strong "enterprise" controls now, well integrated with Windows/Active Directory/etc.
  - ocdtrekkie 5y ago
    The biggest issue with newer browsers is actually probably the feature cycle. Every couple months browsers introduce at least one horrible feature I need to update our policies to disable.
    - unethical_ban 5y ago
      Firefox does ESR - https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/choosing-firefox-update-channel https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/choosing-firefox-update... It might not be IE6 stable, but better than running nightly.
      - ocdtrekkie 5y ago
        I generally do the normal Firefox release and just put up with it, but I can understand why larger organizations might be frustrated with keeping modern browsers secure. They're worried about info leaks while browser vendors are interested in figuring out how to hook websites up to USB devices and VR headsets, and figuring out how to ad new advertising experiences to the new tab page.
- donio 5y ago
  Technically that's true since none of the browsers are. But not a very good justification obviously.
  - 5y ago

vips7L 5y ago

50% of our users (all big corporations) are still on IE too.

xen2xen1 5y ago

Is the new Edge changing that?

koboll 5y ago

>It’s very quickly changing and this might be the year when it finally goes away Microsoft is offering IE11 extended support until at least 2025, so I wouldn't bet on that.

jtdev 5y ago
Great… thanks Microsoft…
TheRealPomax 5y ago
IE11: yes. IE11 "integrated into anything you were using IE11 for": no. MS is working hard to make sure that it fulfills its contractual obligation with respect to IE11's EOL, but it's at the same time removing it from everywhere it was traditionally integrated so that it can die a proper death. It'll be officially supported for as long as Windows 10 is a thing, but they're going to make it as useless as possible outside of "just being an old browser that's incompatible with today's web".
- Rapzid 5y ago
  Yeah, it's been made clear for some time that MS considers IE11 a compatibility platform and don't recommend it as a "browser".

ethbr0 5y ago

FWIW, some parts of US HHS are just rolling out Chrome support, and there's still not full coverage of all functionality. Granted, this is the same codebase that has an element on their login page named "acceptCredintials", so... that's the starting point.

ok_coo 5y ago

I promise that this isn't a snarky question. Why has it taken so long for corp America to move off of IE? There are so many other better alternatives. I still sometimes have flashbacks of having to design around and support IE6. /shudder

vijaybritto 5y ago
I think if they are shown that moving off IE is gonna increase the profits then they'll do it in a week
vb6sp6 5y ago
I think it is two reasons 1) Sometimes companies go out of business or stop supporting\updating things. If you build critical processes around these outdated tools, it can be very difficult to change. 2) Users aren't savvy enough to know when to use Chrome, Firefox or IE. Some aren't even savvy enough to call things the correct names (looking at you Mozzarella Foxfire). So they just settle on on a lowest common denominator.
mschuster91 5y ago
Easy reason: why spend money (and reduce quarterly profit) if the software is still supported by the vendor for another two years? Let it be the problem of the CTO of two years from now. In two years the C-level/VP responsible has long since taken the golden parachute and his successor is stuck with the bill. Also, any sort of internal IT stuff is exclusively seen as a cost center by the MBA bean counters. Stuff like employees leaving due to outdated IT isn't something quantifiable in impact unless you have entire departments walking away at once.
crispyambulance 5y ago
I still have IE installed so that I can run ONE god-forsaken enterprise application known as Oracle EBS (Enterprise Business Suite). For everything else I use Chrome. Oracle EBS uses NPAPI (AKA Java Plugins AKA Java Applets). Chrome dropped support for NPAPI years ago, and since then we've been using IE to whenever we need to use Oracle EBS. I understand that the latest version of Oracle EBS might now support the cutting-edge technology of Java Web Start to continue to deliver their 1990's era grey-blah UI's with shitty layout. I don't even care to ask about upgrades. Negotiating with the bean-counter types that have enabled Oracle to put it's slimy tentacles into every critical area of the business is a dreadful, thankless task. I expect it will keep running, at its current version, long after I leave or retire. At some point, I expect employees will need to spin up VM's to open IE to use the f-ing thing-- perhaps they can set it up in their "forever" dream OS, Windows NT with IE4?

yashap 5y ago

Huh, my last company was very successful in the enterprise space, selling to tonnes of Fortune 500 companies and government organizations, and IE11 was <2% of users for us. We were preparing to deprecate support for it around the time I left.

furstenheim 5y ago

We got a huge company using IE11, they could not update to Chrome because "it was not secure" according to their IT department

unethical_ban 5y ago
That's odd. Both Chrome and Firefox have strong "enterprise" controls now, well integrated with Windows/Active Directory/etc.
- ocdtrekkie 5y ago
  The biggest issue with newer browsers is actually probably the feature cycle. Every couple months browsers introduce at least one horrible feature I need to update our policies to disable.
  - unethical_ban 5y ago
    Firefox does ESR - https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/choosing-firefox-update-channel https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/choosing-firefox-update... It might not be IE6 stable, but better than running nightly.
    - ocdtrekkie 5y ago
      I generally do the normal Firefox release and just put up with it, but I can understand why larger organizations might be frustrated with keeping modern browsers secure. They're worried about info leaks while browser vendors are interested in figuring out how to hook websites up to USB devices and VR headsets, and figuring out how to ad new advertising experiences to the new tab page.
donio 5y ago
Technically that's true since none of the browsers are. But not a very good justification obviously.
- 5y ago