Microsoft Is Building Internet Explorer into Its New Chromium Edge
theverge.com
theverge.com
Sounds like a security nightmare. I assume IE mode is vulnerable to XSS attacks that the normal Chromium mode protects against. So a user might be duped into thinking they are safe when they visit a random site that forces IE mode. Because it's "totally seamless" they won't notice. Better yet, it only affects business users, the prime target for XSS.
I believe this is how the feature already works today in Edge anyway, it just opens a new window instead of a new tab.
IE mode doesn't mean it would have random security exploits or wont run in a sandbox, just means it will support the quirks and legacy behavior required to run legacy enterprise apps based on IE.
And of course it will obviously be totally controllable by some enterprise level settings -- what IPs/domains to be enabled on, whether it should be on or off, etc.
Windows environments can be managed pretty well centrally via group policies- it's actually one of the reasons Active Directory is the defacto standard.
If anything, it enables more companies to adopt Edge without concern of breaking support for their legacy applications.
We see that Developers are the ones held back by older versions, and we see this as a huge win for them.
Seems like a no-brainer.
I'd love to see more messaging around the rollout intentions; plenty of us out here still supporting IE11 (non-Government, non-Enterprise) and trying to read between the lines to a point where we can start legitimately calling the time of death.
But costs don't hold us back from developing amazing new features [for developers and consumers] for the future. <3
-- This is largely work that already existed in the older Edge instance, just made more seamless and with a proper allow-list to make it more secure.
It didn't take zero work but it didn't need an overhaul of the DOM or anything like that.
Nor does it have to be the same team/people working on both.
Now I can use Google Chrome or I can use Microsoft-branded Google Chrome. That's how I see it. If they would make worthy improvements, Google will adopt them. Otherwise Google is really company focused on browser, so I have no reason to choose Edge over Chrome now. IMO their decision to drop their own engine was very short-sighted. What next? Drop Windows kernel and adopt Linux with wine as a compatibility layer? Web need more diversity to keep open.
Probably gotta try Firefox once more, if I figure out how to sync it with iOS Safari...
(This really makes me wish IE11 mode had been a feature of Edge from the very beginning. Think of how much time we've lost!)
IE mode is really killer when combined with the fact that the new Edge will run on Windows 7.
According to my site's analytics, 41% of our IE11 users are on Windows 10, plus another 5.63% on Windows 8. (Windows 7 reaches End of Life in January 2020.)
I was afraid that IE11 would literally never go away. Microsoft has said that they'll support IE11 until Windows 10 reached End of Life. But they've also said that Windows 10 is the "last version" of Windows, that they'll continue shipping new updates for Windows 10 in perpetuity.
Now, I have hope.
The relationship is the other way around: the lack of Windows 7 support is what killed Edge in the real world.
Anyway, Microsoft is learning from its mistakes.
For example https://lichess.org/blog/XMvcJSwAADkA0hPE/lichess-v2-is-here
Just like it seemed like a great idea that would be “seamless” last time around, it will again...
Putting unrealistic restrictions (only works in IE, can only use .Net) is going to hinder the progress of its development.
There are times where vetting and change management make sense. But then we have applications that were built before 2008 and realize that in the long run, with the tools of today, it would be easier to use the tools of today than adding another feature to this bloated mess.
Any new projects should have a "migration" or "upgrade" metric associated - how long will it take to upgrade to the next major version of the employed platform? how long will it take to migrate to a different platform? no doubt there are not always simple answers, but it's something which needs to at least be considered. And there are sometimes really "single source" options with no viable competition, but those are possibly more rare than we'd think, and even if not, the risk needs to be called out even more in those project/contracts then.
We had services from ALL major IT companies in the world that still need IE (or Firefox, or Chrome, exclusively) , so this is even not strictly in gov or IE domain only.
Some gov companies are lucky to have somebody that lives in 21st century that is on such position that can change some of it but that is merely a fluke.
[1] https://gds.blog.gov.uk/2012/10/11/what-devices-are-we-suppo...
I was at their Velocity conf presentation and immediately took them as show case on how gov stuff should be done.
We use Vue.js for frontends so 'using JavaScript very sparingly' doesn't even compute to me. Switched from Angular and I totally understand what you mean (given its more JS hardcore and more problems).
We had similar case - few years ago, the tax office switched to electronic VAT tax returns, which was Windows-only. There was a company that continued to fill their returns using the old-fasioned way (paper). In the court, they won, because the filing system was Windows-only, and the state cannot force you to purchase your software from a specific supplier.
Perhaps you can win on court. But what about time and energy you will lose. Nobody wants that. They got sued, thats what I am talking about.
And according to my Kibana presentation on IIS logs there are actually ~100 linux users in entire country (not counting mobile users on Linux of which there are a lot due to Android). This might be related to concrete gov domain (accounting and VAT) tho.
Its principles 100% for me.
This should be as plain and simple as stating that "if there exists a fully functional open-source technology that satisfies a public institution's need, the institution should be forced to use such technology instead of any proprietary alternative, or to demand it's contractors to develop a custom open-source solution, even if it's more expensive then a proprietary alternative" (with some "sane" limit like it can be "up to but not more than 5x as expensive" - there's befits to society from funding "a bit" of os dev from public funds, but not over do it...).
"Software capitalism" and public infrastructure don't mix well. And private companies can still make tons of money developing, customizing/extending and supporting open-source software for use by gov clients.
But if it's paid from people's taxes, it should only be open-source!
Half the stuff a government has contracted out for mils or bils could have been mostly implemented by small shops charging a few hundred K tops.
Unless you still believe a glorified CMS/ERP takes billions to write.
Given that, most would stay in gov I think - the domain is fantastic for serious engineers - entire country of clients, usually all domestic companies or people must be involved, most services should work 24/7, have zero downtime etc. Its as hard as it can get without being at Google and Facebook IMO.
There are other ideas to solve this problem too, but let me not digress here.
Yes, use oracle junk instead of postgre if you want, but software MUST BE open source, its only logical given that is financed by the budget and analyzed, tested and influenced by the gov people. Otherwise, you have private companies that get rich on taxpayer money, and not only that, but monopoly, zero reuse between regional local govs, worst quality and security etc.
You wouldn't believe the resistance I have, trying to introduce this in my country.
CITY: Hey, we paid for this, but these other cities using it aren't funding (chipping in) for further development...
We have to keep supporting IE11 because Java Applets continue to be used for intranet corporate and government stuff. No other browser officially supports them except IE11.