4 ms·

If they were going to rebuild it from the ground up anyway, would it really have killed them to just use Webkit?

Jamiecon 14y ago
What's the point of having open, published standards if you only have one implementation? You might ask, what's the point of having more than one rendering engine implementation, but look what happened with IE6. Edit: Fixed formatting and reworded while I was at it.
azakai 14y ago
> If they were going to rebuild it from the ground up anyway, would it really have killed them to just use Webkit? First thing, Microsoft isn't willing to use an LGPL-licensed project. Perhaps if it was permissively-licensed, they've used BSD code before, but even so very unlikely. Second, browsers are a crucial part of an OS. Microsoft wants to own their browser in the sense of not depending on an external development community to drive it. Microsoft has the resources to do so, so it does make sense. Finally, even if they had used WebKit, it would have been bad for everyone but WebKit users. WebKit is already too dominant on mobile, sites only work on it, and that is a huge problem for the web. Yes, it's ironic given that IE was the previous dominant implementation. But still, we need diversity in the browser market to keep the web open, even if that diversity comes from Microsoft with it's sordid history.
simonw 14y ago
A browser rendering engine is a pretty crucial piece of strategic infrastructure for an operating system company. Having future features controlled by a competitor isn't a great place to be in.
- RandallBrown 14y ago
  webkit isn't controlled by a competitor necessarily. It's an open source project with contributors from lots of companies. Apple started it, so they likely have the most say right now but I think plenty of people at Google have a bit of power. I'm sure that if Microsoft was to put serious effort into it, they would get decision making power too.
JimmaDaRustla 14y ago
Agreed! Google, Apple and Adobe own/use it. If they all want common web standards, why are you implementing different variations? Unless there is a security risk or something glaring we're missing... Edit: Atleast IE9 and IE10 pass the Acid3 test 100/100. Not sure how that reflects on html5/css3.
- upinsmoke 14y ago
  How are they owning it? WebKit is open source.
  - JimmaDaRustla 14y ago
    They're the primary developers.
  - TwoBit 14y ago
    WebKit is open source, and you can fork it. But you can't make changes to the main version unless they are approved, and Apple is the gatekeeper there.
kaonashi 14y ago
That was kind of my feeling about Windows 8, why not just standardize around Unix like everyone else? The most obvious answer is inertia, but there might also be internal political roadblocks as well.

What's the point of having open, published standards if you only have one implementation? You might ask, what's the point of having more than one rendering engine implementation, but look what happened with IE6. Edit: Fixed formatting and reworded while I was at it.

azakai 14y ago

> If they were going to rebuild it from the ground up anyway, would it really have killed them to just use Webkit? First thing, Microsoft isn't willing to use an LGPL-licensed project. Perhaps if it was permissively-licensed, they've used BSD code before, but even so very unlikely. Second, browsers are a crucial part of an OS. Microsoft wants to own their browser in the sense of not depending on an external development community to drive it. Microsoft has the resources to do so, so it does make sense. Finally, even if they had used WebKit, it would have been bad for everyone but WebKit users. WebKit is already too dominant on mobile, sites only work on it, and that is a huge problem for the web. Yes, it's ironic given that IE was the previous dominant implementation. But still, we need diversity in the browser market to keep the web open, even if that diversity comes from Microsoft with it's sordid history.

simonw 14y ago

A browser rendering engine is a pretty crucial piece of strategic infrastructure for an operating system company. Having future features controlled by a competitor isn't a great place to be in.

RandallBrown 14y ago
webkit isn't controlled by a competitor necessarily. It's an open source project with contributors from lots of companies. Apple started it, so they likely have the most say right now but I think plenty of people at Google have a bit of power. I'm sure that if Microsoft was to put serious effort into it, they would get decision making power too.

JimmaDaRustla 14y ago

Agreed! Google, Apple and Adobe own/use it. If they all want common web standards, why are you implementing different variations? Unless there is a security risk or something glaring we're missing... Edit: Atleast IE9 and IE10 pass the Acid3 test 100/100. Not sure how that reflects on html5/css3.

upinsmoke 14y ago
How are they owning it? WebKit is open source.
- JimmaDaRustla 14y ago
  They're the primary developers.
- TwoBit 14y ago
  WebKit is open source, and you can fork it. But you can't make changes to the main version unless they are approved, and Apple is the gatekeeper there.

kaonashi 14y ago

That was kind of my feeling about Windows 8, why not just standardize around Unix like everyone else? The most obvious answer is inertia, but there might also be internal political roadblocks as well.