5 ms·

well , Microsoft want people to upgrade their software ( and pay for it ) so it makes sense. MS wants you to buy W8. The problem is businesses have legacy softw

by camus 14y ago

well , Microsoft want people to upgrade their software ( and pay for it ) so it makes sense. MS wants you to buy W8. The problem is businesses have legacy software full of stuffs that would not work in modern browsers , so they have to stick with IE6 or redevelop the legacy software ( at least the front-end ). Or they could allow their employees to use a second browser...

derefr 14y ago
I can't understand why Microsoft doesn't just ship a recompiled version of IE6 (for all OSes) that: 1. can't be set to be the default browser; 2. has no address bar, bookmarks menu, or any other "user navigation" feature besides interacting with the pages themselves; 3. and, most importantly, requires a GPO for each set of Intranet domains you want to grant it access to, with a hard-coded start page. All navigation to domains outside the allowed list would trigger the default (modern) browser to open the link instead. This effectively would make IE6 not a web browser, but just another runtime for ordinary installable software, which just happens to run mostly by loading external code from the web. (Sort of like node-webkit, actually.) Microsoft could re-brand it, with their usual flare, as the "Legacy Intranet Services Application Framework", and tout it as a "transition tool" for any enterprise "lagging behind." All the people needing IE6 for something could safely upgrade to a new OS, knowing their old web-apps would continue working for as long as LISAF is supported; and all the people developing for the web would be released from the burden of seeing IE6 outside an Intranet ever again.
- Offler 14y ago
  Because they want it to die.
  - derefr 14y ago
    Presumably they want MS-DOS and Win16 to die, too, but they still ship versions of those with every copy of Windows, and will continue to indefinitely. They're just very, very sandboxed :)
    - ygra 14y ago
      Only the 32-bit versions. And those appear to be dying out (even cheap low-end laptops nowadays come with 4 GiB of RAM and a 64-bit version preinstalled).
    - swinglock 14y ago
      But MS-DOS and Win16 isn't software anyone still have to deal with when making new content because the software isn't used by anyone to deal with any content, only legacy software that won't hurt anyone. It's isolated. But a browser doesn't get stuck in time like a OS does when it dies, they don't surf on the same Web as when they were popular while an old outdated OS still runs its old outdated software just fine. MS-DOS and Win16 also weren't garbage, IE6 is.
      - scholia 14y ago
        IE6 wasn't garbage when it came out. It generally got good reviews. Mostly, people adopted it because it was better than Netscape.
      - scholia 14y ago
        IE6 wasn't garbage when it came out. It generally got good reviews. Mostly, people adopted it because it was better than Netscape.
    - TylerE 14y ago
      Windows 7, at least the 64bit version, will not run Win16 programs. Ran into that limitation trying to install some old software from the Win98 days that was still using essentially a Win3.1 installer.
      - niggler 14y ago
        Did you try doing it via XP mode?
        TylerE 14y ago
        That's not really Win16 support. It's like saying it supports DOS because it can run DOSBox.
- TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
  Well, there's IE6 Compatibility Mode.
  - pilif 14y ago
    Is there? How to enable it? The farthest down I can go with stock IE is IE7 (which arguably isn't really much better than IE6, but still)
    - TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
      Browser Mode goes down to IE7, but Document Mode goes down to IE5.
      - yuhong 14y ago
        "IE5" document mode is basically IE7 Quirks mode.
bpatrianakos 14y ago
Front-ends that work in IE6 but not in modern browsers? Are you sure? That doesn't really make sense to me. I can see how maybe some outdated code or a bunch of hacks could make a site designed for IE6 look just a little funny here and there but I don't see how it would be a lot of work at all to make a site made for IE6 work in a modern browser. As far as I know, the only reason large companies don't upgrade is because they have a bunch of infrastructure that's totally unrelated to websites that stop them from upgrading. Basically, the IT department sets up the entire company's computer systems a certain way and then resist upgrading anything so they don't have to do a lot of testing, more patching, and generally adapt to the new tech after they've tuned their infrastructure just so.
- tow21 14y ago
  ActiveX
- PakG1 14y ago
  Then you've never seen it happen. I've seen it happen lots. It's horrible. Absolutely horrible. :) I won't pretend I knew why those apps broke in IE6.
- michael_miller 14y ago
  Large IT departments are really conservative for good reason. Hypothetically, consider that a company maintained a web app that accountants used to track revenue. Now, consider that the accountants needed to input interest earned from investments. Let's say there was a Regex bug in parsing the interest rate, and all values were interpreted to be NaN or 0 on non-IE6 browsers due to an implementation quirk. This would have disastrous consequences for a large company: they might face shareholder suits, government investigations, etc. And of course, the people maintaining the system would likely lose their jobs. There are so many downsides, but what's the upside? So that FB loads a little faster? The incentives are stacked against adopting new technology. Any new browser has to be thoroughly tested against every one of the company's apps to make sure that nothing breaks. As anyone who's done QA before will tell you, that's a tall order. I agree that the probability of such an incident is small. However, given the disastrous consequences that would happen for a large organization should such a bug occur, it's hard to make the case that an upgrade is a good idea for the sake of "better technology."
JimmaDaRustla 14y ago
No, they just want you to download a newer browser. Yes, MSFT wants you to buy their products, but that isn't the intention of this site. The only thing this site does is a) promote site owners to warn users of old browsers b) promote users to tell others to upgrade and c) promote recent versions of IE to visitors But you're very right about the legacy applications. We seem to have been able to at least upgrade to IE8...still not that good though.
maigret 14y ago
Agree with all your points. Additionally, MS is probably seeking to get back a bit of the developers love, who are influential in the browser popularity game.

by camus 14y ago

derefr 14y ago

I can't understand why Microsoft doesn't just ship a recompiled version of IE6 (for all OSes) that: 1. can't be set to be the default browser; 2. has no address bar, bookmarks menu, or any other "user navigation" feature besides interacting with the pages themselves; 3. and, most importantly, requires a GPO for each set of Intranet domains you want to grant it access to, with a hard-coded start page. All navigation to domains outside the allowed list would trigger the default (modern) browser to open the link instead. This effectively would make IE6 not a web browser, but just another runtime for ordinary installable software, which just happens to run mostly by loading external code from the web. (Sort of like node-webkit, actually.) Microsoft could re-brand it, with their usual flare, as the "Legacy Intranet Services Application Framework", and tout it as a "transition tool" for any enterprise "lagging behind." All the people needing IE6 for something could safely upgrade to a new OS, knowing their old web-apps would continue working for as long as LISAF is supported; and all the people developing for the web would be released from the burden of seeing IE6 outside an Intranet ever again.

Offler 14y ago
Because they want it to die.
- derefr 14y ago
  Presumably they want MS-DOS and Win16 to die, too, but they still ship versions of those with every copy of Windows, and will continue to indefinitely. They're just very, very sandboxed :)
  - ygra 14y ago
    Only the 32-bit versions. And those appear to be dying out (even cheap low-end laptops nowadays come with 4 GiB of RAM and a 64-bit version preinstalled).
  - swinglock 14y ago
    But MS-DOS and Win16 isn't software anyone still have to deal with when making new content because the software isn't used by anyone to deal with any content, only legacy software that won't hurt anyone. It's isolated. But a browser doesn't get stuck in time like a OS does when it dies, they don't surf on the same Web as when they were popular while an old outdated OS still runs its old outdated software just fine. MS-DOS and Win16 also weren't garbage, IE6 is.
    - scholia 14y ago
      IE6 wasn't garbage when it came out. It generally got good reviews. Mostly, people adopted it because it was better than Netscape.
    - scholia 14y ago
      IE6 wasn't garbage when it came out. It generally got good reviews. Mostly, people adopted it because it was better than Netscape.
  - TylerE 14y ago
    Windows 7, at least the 64bit version, will not run Win16 programs. Ran into that limitation trying to install some old software from the Win98 days that was still using essentially a Win3.1 installer.
    - niggler 14y ago
      Did you try doing it via XP mode?
      - TylerE 14y ago
        That's not really Win16 support. It's like saying it supports DOS because it can run DOSBox.
TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
Well, there's IE6 Compatibility Mode.
- pilif 14y ago
  Is there? How to enable it? The farthest down I can go with stock IE is IE7 (which arguably isn't really much better than IE6, but still)
  - TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
    Browser Mode goes down to IE7, but Document Mode goes down to IE5.
    - yuhong 14y ago
      "IE5" document mode is basically IE7 Quirks mode.

bpatrianakos 14y ago

Front-ends that work in IE6 but not in modern browsers? Are you sure? That doesn't really make sense to me. I can see how maybe some outdated code or a bunch of hacks could make a site designed for IE6 look just a little funny here and there but I don't see how it would be a lot of work at all to make a site made for IE6 work in a modern browser. As far as I know, the only reason large companies don't upgrade is because they have a bunch of infrastructure that's totally unrelated to websites that stop them from upgrading. Basically, the IT department sets up the entire company's computer systems a certain way and then resist upgrading anything so they don't have to do a lot of testing, more patching, and generally adapt to the new tech after they've tuned their infrastructure just so.

tow21 14y ago
ActiveX
PakG1 14y ago
Then you've never seen it happen. I've seen it happen lots. It's horrible. Absolutely horrible. :) I won't pretend I knew why those apps broke in IE6.
michael_miller 14y ago
Large IT departments are really conservative for good reason. Hypothetically, consider that a company maintained a web app that accountants used to track revenue. Now, consider that the accountants needed to input interest earned from investments. Let's say there was a Regex bug in parsing the interest rate, and all values were interpreted to be NaN or 0 on non-IE6 browsers due to an implementation quirk. This would have disastrous consequences for a large company: they might face shareholder suits, government investigations, etc. And of course, the people maintaining the system would likely lose their jobs. There are so many downsides, but what's the upside? So that FB loads a little faster? The incentives are stacked against adopting new technology. Any new browser has to be thoroughly tested against every one of the company's apps to make sure that nothing breaks. As anyone who's done QA before will tell you, that's a tall order. I agree that the probability of such an incident is small. However, given the disastrous consequences that would happen for a large organization should such a bug occur, it's hard to make the case that an upgrade is a good idea for the sake of "better technology."

JimmaDaRustla 14y ago

No, they just want you to download a newer browser. Yes, MSFT wants you to buy their products, but that isn't the intention of this site. The only thing this site does is a) promote site owners to warn users of old browsers b) promote users to tell others to upgrade and c) promote recent versions of IE to visitors But you're very right about the legacy applications. We seem to have been able to at least upgrade to IE8...still not that good though.

maigret 14y ago

Agree with all your points. Additionally, MS is probably seeking to get back a bit of the developers love, who are influential in the browser popularity game.