3 ms·

IMHO, The whole reason Javascript is the de-facto language of the web is because Microsoft made the mistake of shipping a Turing complete language runtime that

IMHO, The whole reason Javascript is the de-facto language of the web is because Microsoft made the mistake of shipping a Turing complete language runtime that was not dependent on the Win 32 API and the language happened to be Javascript. IMHO, any kind of new web bytecode standard will be immediately broken by Microsoft into an incompatible variant that we won't be able to nicely hack around and will thus fragment the market in their favor. The code base and runtime installed base of Javascript is so massive now that they can't easily fragment it.

jerf 14y ago
Netscape shipped Javascript. Microsoft shipped JScript in a desperate attempt to peel away their near-monopoly market share, and they (correctly, IMHO) judged that impossible if they were entirely incompatible with Navigator. Microsoft is no longer in a position to unilaterally destroy the web anymore, and I see no high probability of them regaining that position in the forseeable future. (Too much stuff going mobile, and they're still not strong enough in that space to dictate.... to put it lightly.)
- nitrogen 14y ago
  Microsoft may still be able to hinder the web by using its influence in W3C to push for detrimental standards like Encrypted Media Extensions, and by refusing to implement things like WebGL.
  - jabr 14y ago
    They can't stall forever on new web standards if they prove useful. I'm not sure WebGL will, but if it does, the "graceful degradation" culture in web development means that IE users will get some sort of slow, limited approximation of the intended experience. And enough of them will know and start installing Chrome or Firefox in larger numbers again. Microsoft can slow the adoption of web standards (and just via the desktop), but they don't have any real control now. And the only reason WebGL isn't in IE 10 is because they didn't want to offend the DX/D3D team. Once IE supports WebGL, D3D will die.
    - nitrogen 14y ago
      WebGL is useful for more than just games. For example, I'm using a fragment shader to implement client-side demosaicing[0] in the web interface for my Kinect-enabled home automation hardware (link in my profile if you're curious). CSS Shaders/custom filters might serve as a partial substitute for WebGL, but IE doesn't support those either. On the bright side, I've seen rumors that IE11 will support WebGL, but that is of little use to people stuck on XP, Vista, or W7 due to compatibility requirements of other legacy apps. As you say, IE doesn't have the dominance it once did, but for some reason it's still used in certain market segments. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demosaicing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demosaicing

jerf 14y ago

Netscape shipped Javascript. Microsoft shipped JScript in a desperate attempt to peel away their near-monopoly market share, and they (correctly, IMHO) judged that impossible if they were entirely incompatible with Navigator. Microsoft is no longer in a position to unilaterally destroy the web anymore, and I see no high probability of them regaining that position in the forseeable future. (Too much stuff going mobile, and they're still not strong enough in that space to dictate.... to put it lightly.)

nitrogen 14y ago
Microsoft may still be able to hinder the web by using its influence in W3C to push for detrimental standards like Encrypted Media Extensions, and by refusing to implement things like WebGL.
- jabr 14y ago
  They can't stall forever on new web standards if they prove useful. I'm not sure WebGL will, but if it does, the "graceful degradation" culture in web development means that IE users will get some sort of slow, limited approximation of the intended experience. And enough of them will know and start installing Chrome or Firefox in larger numbers again. Microsoft can slow the adoption of web standards (and just via the desktop), but they don't have any real control now. And the only reason WebGL isn't in IE 10 is because they didn't want to offend the DX/D3D team. Once IE supports WebGL, D3D will die.
  - nitrogen 14y ago
    WebGL is useful for more than just games. For example, I'm using a fragment shader to implement client-side demosaicing[0] in the web interface for my Kinect-enabled home automation hardware (link in my profile if you're curious). CSS Shaders/custom filters might serve as a partial substitute for WebGL, but IE doesn't support those either. On the bright side, I've seen rumors that IE11 will support WebGL, but that is of little use to people stuck on XP, Vista, or W7 due to compatibility requirements of other legacy apps. As you say, IE doesn't have the dominance it once did, but for some reason it's still used in certain market segments. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demosaicing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demosaicing