[DarkPhoenix]

Don't flame me for this, that would be against forum rules section 7.b. Instead hear me out. If anyone of you have been "following" me since I joined, you've probably noticed my discontent for Internet Explorer and my love for web standards. For instance I only program in XHTML 1.1 and CSS2. Out of boredom, I made a search on Google, and started looking through the articles. After a while, I came across the ultimate page to show why IE sucks. The wonderfulness of this page is that it doesn't say that IE sucks. It just shows you why IE sucks. It also proves why Mozilla rules. Mmhm.. why Mozilla rules. Before I saw that page, I was an Opera fan. But even Opera has errors in it, that makes this page show up wrong. Mozilla on the other hand makes it look just perfect. And that is not because the page has been made just for Mozilla. It's because Mozilla is the only browser that interprets the CSS as it is meant to be interpreted.

The page is called Newt Edge, and has a lot of demonstrations of the wonderfulness of good CSS. For those of you who swear to use Internet Explorer, you will se a rather boring page. That is because IE is incapable of doing anything right. So, for you guys, I've made a screenshot (~80 KiB), so you can see what the page really should look like. Most of the other pages on the site will look rather bad for you too, but I won't bother to get you a screenshot for each one of them.

As a final note, please check out my google search. Read the first ten or so articles and be sure to also follow their links at least one step further... oh what the heck, I'll direct you to the decent articles.

Hixie's Natural Log: Spring 2004 Travelog: Part 2 (Backwards Compatibility)
Sore Eyes: IE sucks
Warning! Your Browser Has A Problem
Smoke screens ala Scoble | mentalized
eclecticism > It's not my fault IE sucks. Get a real browser

Note that these articles don't necessarily reflect my opinion, although I can almost guarantee that they speak the truth most of the time. Take their word for it. IE sucks.

And if anyone of you try to tell me that it's weird to be against Microsoft products on a Microsoft forum, I'll just say: "Well, I might be against a Microsoft product, but it's a Microsoft forum and I'm talking about Microsoft, so per definition, I'm doing what's the forum's intent."

[mutahir]

Hello Dark Phoenix,

I would really appreciate your efforts and the time you would have taken to dig out such a real thing which would i think effect the whole universe, if not, then atleast will make you happy, so for your happiness I say IE Sucks:)

Now, what is your Operating system?
and as you are so knowledgable, so you must have read this line somewhere.....
NO ONE or THING is perfect !!

So, I would say instead of searching what sucks and what not, try to get creative and take an example from microsoft, while Sun, netscape, and etc were busy in filing law suits against microsoft and they were busy making softwares and making them more better and no doubt that they have given the home market a really stable Operating system as compared to the past OS's, they were not bad either but user friendliness and many other additions, so this shows that they did not divided there concentration,

and if you would have heard of SUN JAVA Desktop system, i saw a demo on Sun's Net talk event website and it has 3D Desktop, which looks really cool, but such a big company still mentioning Microsoft again and again, as whatever we say or they say, Microsoft is running in almost every home where Pc is.

So, you are or you must be right on what you are saying, but try to take excuse microsoft's developers for there mistakes, they are not like you a genius:)

I can bet if they had your approach, they couldn't have even developed IE rather they would have been praising or comparing browsers.

I am not offending you or flamming, I am sorry if you are taking it personal, but to all of us I would say everyone is good, end of the day its our USE and requirments.

Thanks once again for your informative comparison:)
Take care all of you
Mutahir

[DarkPhoenix]

Hi mutahir. Thanks for answering my post.

I don't really like saying IE sucks. I'd rather just show it, so people can make that decision for themselves. That is rather hard though. When people look at a website with IE and it looks bad, what do people say? (I hope I don't offend anyone; by "people" I mean the general (severely ignorant) public) They just say "Oh, this page looks like crap. It can only be because the web author doesn't know what s/he's doing. Microsoft is übercompetent, and never makes a mistake, and so I cannot imagine that it's the browsers fault."

Ok, so that's a little exaggerated... but in short, it explains why IE still has the major market. Please notice that Internet Explorer hasn't had a real update for over 3 years, whereas most other browsers update frequently. I'd say there's something there.

My Operating System? Windows XP. I'm not saying Microsoft sucks, if that's what you're saying? OK, so I do think so.. but unfortunately, unlike on the Internet, where switching to a non-Microsoft web browser won't keep you off the net... in the very best cases, it'll make your net experience a better one, an OS, if you use something else besides Windows, you'll miss out a lot of good stuff. Especially commercial games. HTML and CSS is cross platform. Win32 exectutables aren't. True, there are emulators.. but it's just not the same thing.

Yeah, nothing is perfect. Including Mozilla. I'll give you that. Though I believe Mozilla is the best. I wish to have the right to say and feel that way. Sure, you may disagree with me, but I'm still entitled to believe and say so.

Yeah, I agree with you about Windows XP. After having used Windows since version 3.1 (except for NT and 2000), Windows XP was a true pleasure to have. Windows 95 was buggy, Win98 was nice though... and WinME was buggy again... and then came WinXP along. It gave me the stability I was always looking for in other Windows versions. However, this was not really about XP... I was talking about browsers, IE in particular, and as I mentioned earlier, Microsoft doesn't seem to care about it. CSS2 has been a W3C recommendation since May 1998, and yet Microsoft hasn't implemented it (fully and properly). Does that prove somehing, or what?

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So, you are or you must be right on what you are saying, but try to take excuse microsoft's developers for there mistakes, they are not like you a genius:)

I don't know what you intented with this comment, but I find it somewhat offensive. I never claimed to be a genious. And I doubt you seriously think I am. (Yeah, yeah, I know sarcasm when I see it)

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I can bet if they had your approach, they couldn't have even developed IE rather they would have been praising or comparing browsers.

What exactly was my approach? I'm just saying that... ok, take it like this... If you had an apparatus that was not functioning properly (in this case IE), and someone offered you something that is remarkably better (Mozilla, Opera, etc.) for free... what would be your arguments for not accepting the latter? Why would you hold on to the malfunctioning apparatus?

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I am not offending you or flamming, I am sorry if you are taking it personal, but to all of us I would say everyone is good, end of the day its our USE and requirments.

I don't understand fully what you mean from "I would say everyone is good..." and out, but I didn't take it personally. I wanted a discussion over this, and to be honest, I was slightly disappointed when nobody answered me.. I wish to thank you for taking the time to, it was interesting to read what you had to say, as it got me thinking (thus having more to say). Like I said in my introduction post:

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As you might have guessed, I'm talkative. Very.

Which I guess this answer is a proof of..

[Marsden]

What percentage of the world uses IE? The other browsers by total percentage are basically a rounding error... Designers code the for the largest market... always have and always will...

[SiMoNsAyS]

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What percentage of the world uses IE? The other browsers by total percentage are basically a rounding error... Designers code the for the largest market... always have and always will...

if you always look the larger market probably you will always not get the best. what u want: a browser with lot of security problems, without multitab support, higher system resources...? or a browser that do the same as iexplorer but only a few pages are showed wrong? the answer it's that today the best browser ever it's mozilla (firefox in my case), i've tested it for 2 years and i got this conclusion. the other answer is that if we look to tomorrow iexplorer will not be integrated in microsoft OSs and with competency between them iexplorer will be improved (gates only think in users until they see other resources )
finally this is obviusly a subjective opinion

[gamehead200]

This is my favourite:

http://toastytech.com/evil/

ROFL!

[neosapience]

What is compliance?

Does the W3C dictate what the internet should and shouldn't do?

If 90% of us are using Internet Explorer, wouldn't you say that the current web 'standards' aren't 'compliant' with Internet Explorer?

Look at it from a legal point of view. Was every law ever written correct? Do you follow the letter of the law exactly?

People don't like Internet Explorer mainly because of it's security flaws. I'd like to point out that IE will soon be getting an upgrade that will address many of it's problems.

Don't like Internet Explorers lack of functionality? Want some tabbed windows or a built in popup blocker? Try MyIE2, it makes Internet Explorer BETTER than FireFox.



And just remember, Mozilla wouldn't be so wonderful if it didn't have a chance to learn from Microsofts mistakes.

[DarkPhoenix]

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What is compliance?

Does the W3C dictate what the internet should and shouldn't do?

Basically, yes. It's just like any other standards organization. Unless people follow their recommendations (yes, it's only recommendations) there will be misunderstandings. Just imagine what the web would be like if the TCP/IP standard was incorrectly implemented.. or the HTTP protocol?

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If 90% of us are using Internet Explorer, wouldn't you say that the current web 'standards' aren't 'compliant' with Internet Explorer?

That's an interesting way of looking at it. But I'd say no. It's the other way around. Would you say that if 90% of the population was being thieves, that the police are wrong? Microsoft has, since the standards of the web was set, worked against it, while all other groups crave to do so. After figuring out that people would like standards to be implemented, they appear to try and adjust, and even claim that their browser is compliant. Gah. Like I said, CSS2 has been around since 1998, but Microsoft hasn't implemented it yet. If they just had done it, the web could've looked a lot nicer now. CSS2 has a lot of nice features, but many (and I must say weak) web authors don't do it cause they know that IE users can't see it. Oh yeah, that is surely so sad.

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Look at it from a legal point of view. Was every law ever written correct? Do you follow the letter of the law exactly?

No and no. And I never said any browser did. But compare IE with the ones that update, and you'll see that IE is still in the dark ages when it comes to it.

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People don't like Internet Explorer mainly because of it's security flaws. I'd like to point out that IE will soon be getting an upgrade that will address many of it's problems.

I hope they'll get rid of that horrible ActiveX, but I have strong doubts about it. As for the security flaws, sure, it's bad, but it's not really why I dislike IE. After all, I always place myself behind a firewall and with an up-to-date virus scanner. I also have a feeling that this so-called update is Longhorn's IE7.. and why should people have to pay for a browser?

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Don't like Internet Explorers lack of functionality? Want some tabbed windows or a built in popup blocker? Try MyIE2, it makes Internet Explorer BETTER than FireFox.

Better in what way? The core is still the same. It's just an IE shell. I assume it will still fail to show decently configured XHTML+CSS2 pages, like the ordinary IE. I might have a look at it if you can tell me why it is better... although FYI, I've never tried FireFox, so I can't really compare.

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And just remember, Mozilla wouldn't be so wonderful if it didn't have a chance to learn from Microsofts mistakes.

How do you know? You aren't coincidentially in the Mozilla team, but going against your own and talk bad about it? I think they still would have. You know what? Netscape has mistakes, Opera too, and so does all other browsers. They most likely compare with each other to see what they manage to do right and what they do wrong, and then fix up. But IE does not fix up.

[mutahir]

Hello Dark Phoenix,

First of all I am sorry if you felt offended, but i didn't meant to be sarcastic with you..

Still I like Internet explorer, secondly as you have read the POST that mozilla learned by IE's mistakes,

but why do ppl hate microsoft so much or dislike them?? I think that they have always given users especially the home users a flexibilty to use pc's

i am not talking about computer students/professionals/scientists/and ppl like you but iam talking about ppl who are retired, or didn't learnt or used pc in there lifes but now they can even transfer digital pics and store them on a cd, they can email and everything really!....

now, would a retired person would install mozilla and get into the depth
now would a retired person or a person who don't know pc's would install Solaris, SCO, BeOS, etc.etc. i can bet it would be v.v.v.v.difficult for him to do so and then find his way around...

so, microsoft has really done something for the home markets and they have really given all a chance to use pc's.

so, if internet explorer has the problem u specified or many others, we can be flexible with microsoft and give them a chance....still they are and they always are finding better ways to improve products, otherwise you wouldn't have seen a windows update site...

any way...
once again i say sorry if u felt personally offended...
but a friend's advice is to concentrate on what you can do and develop and learn like mozilla (kidding) and make better browsers,
common man....
cheer up....forgive IE:)

Thanks and regards to all
Mutahir

[DarkPhoenix]

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First of all I am sorry if you felt offended, but i didn't meant to be sarcastic with you..

No problem... don't worry about it.

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Still I like Internet explorer, secondly as you have read the POST that mozilla learned by IE's mistakes,

It may be written.. and it may be true.. but I won't believe it until I get it from a reliable source... unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) I'm a misanthrope and a pessimistic soul. I believe nothing until proof is shown.

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now, would a retired person would install mozilla and get into the depth
now would a retired person or a person who don't know pc's would install Solaris, SCO, BeOS, etc.etc. i can bet it would be v.v.v.v.difficult for him to do so and then find his way around...

I really wonder why this relates to the topic of this post... but anyway, no they wouldn't, and I claim that if people actually were given the choice when they bought PCs, a lot less MS Windows would be sold and a lot more of the others would be provided, not only cause they are free while Windows costs, but because Linux for instance is known to be more stable, secure, etc. And I don't think it would be so hard to use if more people used it, since then more people would update it, fix it, etc. And concerning Mozilla.. once installed, it's just as easy to use as IE. And for a techie, like myself, easier to use, with mouse gestures and other neat plugins installed.

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so, microsoft has really done something for the home markets and they have really given all a chance to use pc's.

If they are so good, why are they so mean? Why don't they let others take part? If Microsoft were the best, they'd win anyway. Instead they have to use dirty tricks and plagiarism to win.

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so, if internet explorer has the problem u specified or many others, we can be flexible with microsoft and give them a chance....still they are and they always are finding better ways to improve products, otherwise you wouldn't have seen a windows update site...

Actually, I think they've given up IE. It seems like it. The only thing they fix are security holes, and only cause it makes them look bad if they don't.

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common man....
cheer up....forgive IE:)

I'll forgive IE the day it is up to date, and lets everyone see my sites as they are meant to look.. until then, I'll say it sucks. And being good at it.

Oh, and yeah.. I do think I'm a little moody today. I still stand by what I said though.

[Ge0ph]

IE opens every single site I visit correctly. No other browser does.
So, I really don't care about anything else other then weather or not the sites I visit render correctly. Most users feel the same way. Why run browser B and then use browser A for a few sites that it is needed when you can just run browser A and veiw all sites.

[mutahir]

[QUOTE]It may be written.. and it may be true.. but I won't believe it until I get it from a reliable source... unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) I'm a misanthrope and a pessimistic soul. I believe nothing until proof is shown.

Well, if proof is the case, then iam using IE long time and i really haven't had any problems as such, you may be right or you are right in saying you have faced errors or it don't show up properly, i agree, but as far as proof is concenred, do u benchmark your machine with other's before buying them, like whatever the specs of ur machine are now, what proof u have got its the best as you are so much picky in browsers, secondly even on the v.basic and in a general way out of this topic, no one can gurantee that this computer's power supply would not fail for life, no proof for that, so in this way we wud always be in search of proofs:)
and in reality there are proof's for certain things but for certain things there are no proofs or they are v.hard to find. don't take it personal, just a general example.

[QUOTE]I really wonder why this relates to the topic of this post... but anyway, no they wouldn't, and I claim that if people actually were given the choice when they bought PCs, a lot less MS Windows would be sold and a lot more of the others would be provided, not only cause they are free while Windows costs, but because Linux for instance is known to be more stable, secure, etc. And I don't think it would be so hard to use if more people used it, since then more people would update it, fix it, etc. And concerning Mozilla.. once installed, it's just as easy to use as IE. And for a techie, like myself, easier to use, with mouse gestures and other neat plugins installed.

Well, as Microsoft makes IE, so it relates to the company....and as far as your claim is concerned, people at that time were busy comparing products and instead of making UNIX(the SO called WORLD's MOST SECURE OS) user friendly and add hardware support to it, they were finding bugs for microsoft to solve. and choice comes when there are more then one product available, who was standing against microsoft at that time, now when they realized SUN is making SUN JAVA Desktop system, Linux is banging there heads on the desks to make it as user friendly as Windows, and i think they are doing good....

As far as the difficulties linux faced when it came out was the video adapter configurations, not many were supported and drivers etc etc. but now they are getting better but i dont think that linux is very stable and secure, coz usually when a hacker hacks, most of the time there mission criticial servers were running UNIX, so nothing is fool proof and everyone gets around someway and finds the way in....i accept that linux has some brilliant features but they can't always package all the best of the world in just LINUX. windows 2000 server and others are very stable as well, i have never heard any corporate organizations moaning about microsoft's product in terms of security. end of the day, it depends on the budget/requirments.

[QUOTE]If they are so good, why are they so mean? Why don't they let others take part? If Microsoft were the best, they'd win anyway. Instead they have to use dirty tricks and plagiarism to win.

Well, they are Not mean they made it, its there's how can we claim to have the source code of it, they employed, gathered ppl under one roof to work on one thing, they didn't connected on the internet and threw news posts to make one so obviously they can't give there source code out, and as far as this mean nature of microsoft is concerned, Would SUN give there Java Desktop system's technology out. well, as far as API's are concerned, even after microsoft gave it to netscape, netscape was still not the v.good of the browsers.

And, they have not given up on IE or anything, no doubt they develop very good things, and IE is really a very gentle and nice browser, ppl shud design properly and with care for IE kidding ok....i can understand your point that your site doesn't show up properly in IE.

Wish you all the best...
and i found myself in comparing products as well, so this is my last reply to this post and I would still Say IE DOES NOT SUCKS, its not one of the best but its the best.

Thanks and take care
Mutahir

[DarkPhoenix]

Ge0ph, on Jun 20 2004, 06:36 PM, said:

IE opens every single site I visit correctly. No other browser does.
So, I really don't care about anything else other then weather or not the sites I visit render correctly. Most users feel the same way. Why run browser B and then use browser A for a few sites that it is needed when you can just run browser A and veiw all sites.

Every single site eh? It does? Try to view my under construction design and tell me that this site looks correct in IE. I don't really have more to say about that. If you'd be comfortable using IE with my site (which validates perfectly as correct XHTML and CSS, and thus is correctly written, and shows up correctly in a DECENT browser) then you're just weird.

The main intent of this example is to show you just that IE does not show every single site correctly. And as time passes, more and more sites will start to look like mine in IE.

[DarkPhoenix]

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Well, if proof is the case, then iam using IE long time and i really haven't had any problems as such, you may be right or you are right in saying you have faced errors or it don't show up properly, i agree, but as far as proof is concenred, do u benchmark your machine with other's before buying them, like whatever the specs of ur machine are now, what proof u have got its the best as you are so much picky in browsers, secondly even on the v.basic and in a general way out of this topic, no one can gurantee that this computer's power supply would not fail for life, no proof for that, so in this way we wud always be in search of proofs:)
and in reality there are proof's for certain things but for certain things there are no proofs or they are v.hard to find. don't take it personal, just a general example.

No offense, but I don't understand what you're trying to say... It may be that my English sucks, like IE.. *hehe*

(I'll just skip the part about Linux and UNIX and security and stuff, it's not like it's not interesting, but it's irrelevant and off-topic)

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And, they have not given up on IE or anything, no doubt they develop very good things, and IE is really a very gentle and nice browser, ppl shud design properly and with care for IE  kidding ok....i can understand your point that your site doesn't show up properly in IE.

Very good.. try to view the link I posted in the previous post of mine too.. it'll show you even more examples of IE being thoroughly out of date.

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and i found myself in comparing products as well, so this is my last reply to this post and I would still Say IE DOES NOT SUCKS, its not one of the best but its the best.

Ok.. thanks for sharing your views and opinions... although I agree with basically none and disagree with basically all, but that's the lovely thing about debate.

[neosapience]

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Basically, yes. It's just like any other standards organization. Unless people follow their recommendations (yes, it's only recommendations) there will be misunderstandings. Just imagine what the web would be like if the TCP/IP standard was incorrectly implemented.. or the HTTP protocol?

You're missing the point. Just because someone follows the W3C guidelines it does NOT make them more 'right'. TCP/IP and HTTP are protocols and, guess what, not everyone uses them. You need to realize that there were other 'suggestions' that people didn't like. Can you guess why TCP and HTTP became dominant?

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That's an interesting way of looking at it. But I'd say no. It's the other way around. Would you say that if 90% of the population was being thieves, that the police are wrong? Microsoft has, since the standards of the web was set, worked against it, while all other groups crave to do so. After figuring out that people would like standards to be implemented, they appear to try and adjust, and even claim that their browser is compliant. Gah. Like I said, CSS2 has been around since 1998, but Microsoft hasn't implemented it yet. If they just had done it, the web could've looked a lot nicer now. CSS2 has a lot of nice features, but many (and I must say weak) web authors don't do it cause they know that IE users can't see it. Oh yeah, that is surely so sad.

You're suggesting that what MS is doing with IE is wrong. Gong against someones recommendation is not wrong. MS has far more important things to worry about than making your web site look prettier. The law doesn't set the standards on how fast a car can safely travel, the cars and the drivers do.

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and why should people have to pay for a browser?

You're absolutely right, why should people have to pay for anything? Capitalism is teh suq!

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How do you know? You aren't coincidentially in the Mozilla team, but going against your own and talk bad about it?  I think they still would have. You know what? Netscape has mistakes, Opera too, and so does all other browsers. They most likely compare with each other to see what they manage to do right and what they do wrong, and then fix up. But IE does not fix up.

I have never said anything bad about Mozilla or Opera.

MS does indeed update IE. But if they don't rush to keep up with the suggested CSS standards, I'm sure it's simply because they have more important things to deal with.

If you like Mozilla (or whatever) and it works for you, by all means, use it. Just remember, programmers will always support the most dominant browser, and that's IE. So guess what the internet will look like when you use Mozilla?

[DarkPhoenix]

(Why do I like people that are against me? Most likely cause I love debate, and it takes a person opposing my views to get a debate going... in other words, you're cool neosapience.. yah, and you too mutahir.. but don't go thinking this is propaganda for making you like me more. *hehe*)

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You're missing the point. Just because someone follows the W3C guidelines it does NOT make them more 'right'. TCP/IP and HTTP are protocols and, guess what, not everyone uses them. You need to realize that there were other 'suggestions' that people didn't like. Can you guess why TCP and HTTP became dominant?

Yeah, I know they are protocols... I just blurted out with the first things I could come up with. It could've been a formal letter standard for all that matters. TCP most likely became dominant because most people chose to use it.. I know of the IPX and what was it.. NetBIOS standards that are choices in old DOS games for muliplayer... I think NetBIOS still lives though (not my game really.. isn't that what the file sharing in LANs are based on?). And HTTP had competition too, by stuff like Gopher and CompuServe... but HTTP was by far the most useful one.. and so it won. At least that's what I think happened. That's what I've read.

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You're suggesting that what MS is doing with IE is wrong.

I feared it might be interpreted that way cause I used police and criminals as examples.. It was, once again, the first thing I came up with.. my point was, if we leave examples out, that everybody else try their best to follow the web standards. (which makes the web, as the W3C calls it, interoperable) So why can't just Microsoft do the same? That's the real question. It wouldn't be hard for them, and the W3C standards are very carefully thought out, by many people, and when correctly implemented, and correctly used (by authors), you can make wonderful designs, neat effects and so forth with it. And it will work with all browsers that follow their standards. That's the idea of a standard... that everyone, no matter which browser, OS or even which disabilities they have, should be able to enjoy the internet and the web equally.

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I have never said anything bad about Mozilla or Opera.

Yeah, I know.. unlike me with IE. After all though, I am biased. You seem more neutral. I don't want to be though.. I dislike IE. Mostly because it proves that as long as enough people use something, no matter how bad it is, it's the most accepted practice.

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But if they don't rush to keep up with the suggested CSS standards, I'm sure it's simply because they have more important things to deal with.

True... though I thought they had their own IE team... really, I read today that Bill Gates has more money than Norway spends in a whole year... ... so he could've afforded it.

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If you like Mozilla (or whatever) and it works for you, by all means, use it. Just remember, programmers will always support the most dominant browser, and that's IE. So guess what the internet will look like when you use Mozilla?

Actually, I still haven't seen a page that looks bad in Mozilla.. although I usually surf around CSS and XHTML resources, where people usually do correct coding... but I also visit bad pages... where this mode called Quirks mode kicks in, and sorta repairs the errors with the site as best it can.

[neosapience]

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(Why do I like people that are against me?  Most likely cause I love debate, and it takes a person opposing my views to get a debate going... in other words, you're cool neosapience.. yah, and you too mutahir.. but don't go thinking this is propaganda for making you like me more. *hehe*)

Everyone is entitled to their own opinions. But when you bash a program that other people use and like, you're asking for an argument.

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Yeah, I know they are protocols... I just blurted out with the first things I could come up with. It could've been a formal letter standard for all that matters. TCP most likely became dominant because most people chose to use it.. I know of the IPX and what was it.. NetBIOS standards that are choices in old DOS games for muliplayer... I think NetBIOS still lives though (not my game really.. isn't that what the file sharing in LANs are based on?). And HTTP had competition too, by stuff like Gopher and CompuServe... but HTTP was by far the most useful one.. and so it won. At least that's what I think happened. That's what I've read

My point is exactly that - people usually use whatever works best. MS doesn't ignore things that are important, they're just a tad slow sometimes.

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So why can't just Microsoft do the same? That's the real question. It wouldn't be hard for them, and the W3C standards are very carefully thought out, by many people, and when correctly implemented, and correctly used (by authors), you can make wonderful designs, neat effects and so forth with it.

What MS needs is more competition, not more regulation. Which would you find more motivating - someone trying to bully you into doing a better job, or someone trying to do a better job than you? The fact of the matter is, CSS is not that important. MS is currently focusing on security and functionality.

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Yeah, I know.. unlike me with IE.  After all though, I am biased. You seem more neutral. I don't want to be though.. I dislike IE. Mostly because it proves that as long as enough people use something, no matter how bad it is, it's the most accepted practice.

Unfortunately, most people have the 'if it doesn't work, use something else' mentality. I preffer to fix the things I use, rather than switching to a whole new system. If I can't fix it, then I'll move on. So far, IE hasn't had any problems I couldn't deal with.

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I read today that Bill Gates has more money than Norway spends in a whole year...  ... so he could've afforded it.

Most of Bill Gates' money is tied up in his company. In a business model, if you throw money at one project, you'll end up taking it away from another. Like I said, it's all a matter of priorities with them.

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Actually, I still haven't seen a page that looks bad in Mozilla.. although I usually surf around CSS and XHTML resources, where people usually do correct coding... but I also visit bad pages... where this mode called Quirks mode kicks in, and sorta repairs the errors with the site as best it can.

Most people aren't tech oriented like us. They browse sites like launch.com, which simply doesn't work with Mozilla.


Anyway, I understand your point of view. MS is lazy and IE doesn't do what you want it to.

I find it's better to try and help people with problems, than to simply ignore them in favor of less problematic people.

[DarkPhoenix]

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What MS needs is more competition, not more regulation. Which would you find more motivating - someone trying to bully you into doing a better job, or someone trying to do a better job than you? The fact of the matter is, CSS is not that important. MS is currently focusing on security and functionality.

Unfortunately, if I may say so, Microsoft won't be getting much competition as long as all of the larger companies keep adjusting their sites and programs to Microsoft's methods. Something that would've been really amusing would be if some, or many of all the larger sites just collectively started working against Microsoft, by for instance making their web pages with so new standards that it'd look like crap in IE. After all, if everybody did it, it'd convince more people to switch browser. The real problems, if you ask me, are these:

• Too many sites adjust to Microsoft IE
  
  
  
• There are no ads for other browsers
  
  
  
• There are no lobbyists that work for the use of other browsers

I mean, imagine the effect it would have if Google started showing Mozilla ads on some pages. I'm darned convinced that it'd cause at least some people to switch. The trouble is to make them actually read why it is better and so forth. And what about lobbyists? Professionals "lurking" in the halls of big companies, telling them stuff. I betcha, Microsoft does this all the time.

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Most people aren't tech oriented like us. They browse sites like launch.com, which simply doesn't work with Mozilla.

Well, I'd say. The moron who programmed that page is most likely below average. Just the source code of this page makes the tech part of my brain go wacky..
Well, there's one way to circumvent Mozilla's

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Error

Sorry, we do not support Netscape on the Windows platform.

Error Code: 25 - 0

message... or Opera's

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Error

Sorry, we are unable to support this browser at this time.

Error Code: 12 - 0

Here it is, Launch.com Radio, possible to open in all browsers.. it won't play music in anything else than IE though, but if you take a small peek at the source code, you'll most likely get as dizzy as I got. And you'll most likely also understand why it doesn't work in anything else than IE. Though I'm sure it could if the dork(s) who made it thought it out a little more carefully. It just uses Windows Media Player as a base, and I've had that work in both Mozilla and Opera before.

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Anyway, I understand your point of view. MS is lazy and IE doesn't do what you want it to.

Yep.. there's really not much more to it.

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I find it's better to try and help people with problems, than to simply ignore them in favor of less problematic people.

What do you mean? I'm trying to help people. On my web pages I always tell them that my page won't work with IE, and tell them why they should switch into something better. It may not help immediately, but there are others who also do this, and when enough people do it, there may be a possibility that people "See the light". After all, whenever I visit friends, and I see them use IE, I tell them that there are better ways to surf, and show them Opera or Mozilla, and I can say that 90% of the people I've helped switch browser are grateful that I did. The only problem is that I have to be there in person.. it seems that just telling people in a note on a web page won't help much.

[neosapience]

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Unfortunately, if I may say so, Microsoft won't be getting much competition as long as all of the larger companies keep adjusting their sites and programs to Microsoft's methods. Something that would've been really amusing would be if some, or many of all the larger sites just collectively started working against Microsoft, by for instance making their web pages with so new standards that it'd look like crap in IE...

That's not the kind of competition I'm talking about. In fact, if people did that it would be called 'unfair business practice'. In order to beat MS, the competition has to start distributing their browsers along with new computers, which isn't going to be easy. To the average consumer, ease of use is far more important than web standards. IE is by far the easiest browser to use, simply because it's part of Windows. Besides, most people couldn't care less what browser they're using, it's the content on the websites they want. IE is capable of displaying that conent just as easily as any other browser. Like I said, MS has more important things to worry about than aesthetics.

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What do you mean? I'm trying to help people. On my web pages I always tell them that my page won't work with IE, and tell them why they should switch into something better...

This is exactly the type of thinking I don't like. "If it doesn't work, throw it away and use something else". If your car didn't work, would you go to england and buy a different one? Of course not, it's not practical. You'd spend a ton of money just to have your steering wheel on the wrong side of the car. It's far easier just to fix the car you have and keep it running. Programs are the same way. In fact, MS has just announced that they are re-constituting the Windows IE team. Why? Because it's better for them to fix IE, rather than try and switch to Mozilla.

The main problem with the W3C changing web standards has to do with existing websites. If everyone switched to Mozilla, there would suddenly be a lot of messed up content. Like it or not, MS has already set the internets standards.

[mutahir]

Well, This is going on and on

But its interesting ...

what i would say is ... that Microsoft on its own is a superb software vendor...
They have brought a charm in pc's ...

As dark phoenix is mentioning that it won't happen, the competition thing...the reason can be that they are too busy in finding bugs and throwing dirt over microsoft, so how can they do a creative thing when they are doing this...

and Yes you are right NEO, that its going to be a unfair business practice if they tried to do so, and they have done a similar sort of thing in the past, which proves that they are accepting that they are nothing infront of microsoft....LOL

well, to be honest, SUN microsystems has its own uniqunes, oracle, ibm, microsoft, they are all pioneers, Microsoft got famous and famous coz they targeted the home market, which includes ppl from all walks and age of life...kids,adults and all...

Now sun is saying that they have launched there Java desktop system and its quite interesting to see there net talk event on the website...i'll post the link of that website so that you can watch as well, they mention again and again microsoft, microsoft, and the good thing they have done is that they had made it interoperable to microsoft in many ways, So Now this is the start of a competition for MS and SUN, that who rules or who gets the most share of the desktop market...

coz they are betting on there SUN OFFICE, i haven't used it....but as far as iam concerned When i see Microsoft office i can't think of anything more then that:)

But, now its time for the giants to think about each other and Home user's to get benefit

Lets c....

But dark phoenix, Neo is saying right that Ms has set the standards

Best of Luck to Microsoft and Thumbs UP!!!

Take care and take it easy
Mutahir