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Windows Operating Systems Software Internet Explorer The Internet

No IE7 For 2k, Now In Extended Service 469

Posted by Zonk from the not-quite-do-it-yourself-but-close dept.
Yankovic writes "Looks like MS will not support IE7 on Windows 2000. 'It should be no surprise that we do not plan on releasing IE7 for Windows 2000... [S]ome of the security work in IE7 relies on operating system functionality in XPSP2 that is non-trivial to port back to Windows 2000.' While security fixes will still be available until 2010, I guess that means the only browsers with tabs for W2k will be Opera and Firefox." All the details about an MS product's fall into senility available at the lifecycle page.
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No IE7 For 2k, Now In Extended Service More

No IE7 For 2k, Now In Extended Service

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  • One More Reason to Keep Win2K (Score:5, Insightful)

    by geomon ( 78680 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:43PM (#12672395) Homepage Journal
    My choice is to upgrade from Win2K to WinXP for IE?

    Hah! I'll keep Win2K and Firefox, thanks.

    • My choice is to upgrade from Win2K to WinXP for IE?

      Hah! I'll keep Win2K and Firefox, thanks.

      Yeah, I'll second that emotion... Although my primary machine is a PowerMac G5, my secondary runs Win2k for games, and stuff that "only happens on Windows" (which ain't too much anymore.)

      If I'm completely crazy, somebody slap me, but wasn't Microsoft convicted of anti-trust violations relating to their monopoly on the browser? Wasn't a serious issue of their case the "need" to integrate Internet Explorer wit

      • Of course they could make a 2k version, thats not the point they were making. The point is that 2k starts its EOL cycle in June and goes into extended support (security updates only). Why would they spend all this time back porting stuff from XPSP2 to an EOL product. Guess what, 98 isn't getting IE7 either, is that an anti-trust violation or simply because 98 is in EOL status?
        • Ah, but if IE was just another application, it shouldn't matter which OS's it can be used on. Firefox doesn't try to be anything but a web browser and it runs on 98.
          • That's not exactly fair. I don't like MSFT any more than any other company, but you can't force companies to support products forever. There are several applications that only work on certain OSes (even Mac programs sometimes require 10.3 and some Unix software requires at least a certain KDE or Gnome version). Some require certain libraries/DLLs or something like Cocoa Bindings (and in the future CoreData) that just aren't available on earlier OSes.

            Personally, if you need to sacrifice compatibility, I
          • Ah, but if IE was just another application, it shouldn't matter which OS's it can be used on.

            Bollocks. There are numerous examples of "applications" on every platform that are tied to certain versions of the system libararies, tools and kernel.

            Safari+WebCore on OS X, to name just one directly comparable example.

        • Re:One More Reason to Keep Win2K (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Patoski ( 121455 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:53PM (#12672827) Homepage Journal
          The point is that 2k starts its EOL cycle in June and goes into extended support (security updates only). Why would they spend all this time back porting stuff from XPSP2 to an EOL product. Guess what, 98 isn't getting IE7 either, is that an anti-trust violation or simply because 98 is in EOL status?

          Maybe because ~60% of their corporate userbase is still Win2k? Or how about the fact that they haven't released an enhancement to Win2k in over two years? C'mon folks, Win2k is only 12 months older than XP. The question real question is why wouldn't MS give Win2k users some love considering that the browser wars are starting to heat up again?

          So let's sum up the past two years of "Mainline Support" from MS for Win2k users: no Service Pack 5, none of IE6 security enhancements in XP will make it to Win2k and no IE7 for Win2k users.

          MS is really giving Windows 2000 users the middle finger. MS is partly responsible for the security mess that is Windows 2000 and they should do *something* to help fix the situation. It isn't my fault as a user that MS hasn't released an operating sysytem for going on four years now. Why would I now pay for an OS that is over 3.5 years old?

          It is really starting to feel that, at least part of the reason MS is going on an on about security is just another ploy to try to get customers to upgrade to the next greatest version of their product more quickly.

          If this story is accurate, then this is a huge misstep by MS. MS is really opening the door for Firefox to further accelerate its adoption.

          • Re:One More Reason to Keep Win2K (Score:5, Insightful)

            by IntlHarvester ( 11985 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @08:41PM (#12673057) Journal
            Agreed -- That gets the real issue. Not IE7, but the fact W2K is going into "extended support" 1-2 years before Longhorn ships. If anything, it should be the other way around -- companies should have at least a solid year to evaulate Longhorn before being moved off 2K.

            Most corporations running W2K were early adopters for Microsoft, companies who either moved quickly onto 2K or upgraded from NT4. WinXP was sold as a consumer upgrade that provided almost no additional features for the corp user, so they passed. Now they (we) are being punished for the fact that Longhorn is years behind schedule. W2K might be old, but it's users are very entrenched customers.

            Note, normally I wouldnt stand for people bitching about a 5-6 year old OS, but in this case Microsoft has not delievered an upgrade and should extend the support window until they do.

          • Re:One More Reason to Keep Win2K (Score:4, Insightful)

            by cwensley ( 741704 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @09:54PM (#12673420) Homepage
            Wait one minute.. WinXP *IS* the upgrade for 2k. Do you see OSX users getting new functionality for older versions? No. They must buy the _next version_ of the os to get new features. I expect this is the case for about 99.9% of the software out there.
        • Every other major browser works in 98. It's not unsupported because of technical difficulties. It's unsupported because they want users to upgrade. With a lot of the software they release, the primary source of backward incompatibility is that it'll refuse to install. XP for the most part is 2K. 98 is much different, but nearly compatible.
      • You're right - MS should be forced to support all its software for all eternity, back-porting everything to every version of Windows that they've ever released.

      • anti-trust violations (Score:4, Interesting)

        by edxwelch ( 600979 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @09:01PM (#12673167)
        Slightly off-topic... but do you realise that the Doj - Microsoft settlement is due to expire next year?

        Source: http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f9400/9462.htm [usdoj.gov]

        "V.Termination

        1. Unless this Court grants an extension, this Final Judgment will expire on the fifth anniversary of the date it is entered by the Court."

    • My choice is to upgrade from Win2K to WinXP
      That's a downgrade to the cut down home user version of the OS - the upgrade would be to server2003.
    • I stuck with 2000 for the longest time and spat on XP. I don't care for 2000, but since I had to have a couple windows boxes around, I demanded that they be 2000. But after having to account for extended LBA (for drives larger than 127gb) and other issues, I decided to give XP Pro a try. You know what? I actually am pleased with it. I'll still take my Debian or Gentoo, thanks - but for Windows, XP ain't all that bad.

      Just change your settings to get rid of all the XP GUI crap and change back to classical ev

  • Terrible Sunday News (Score:5, Insightful)

    by fembots ( 753724 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:43PM (#12672396) Homepage
    Does that mean I'm stuck with Firefox, and cannot utilize Microsoft's intelligent autoupdate which automatically downloads security patches once every 3 days?

    This raises an interesting question - Why/How can Firefox, which runs happily on W2K and others, offer better security, while IE cannot do the same on an OS developed by MS itself?

    I'm sure Firefox will be laughed at if it said it could not develop a browser for Windows because some of the security work in Firefox relies on operating system functionality in Linux that is non-trivial to port to Windows.
    • Because it's part of the OS. Even on OSX!
    • This raises an interesting question - Why/How can Firefox, which runs happily on W2K and others, offer better security, while IE cannot do the same on an OS developed by MS itself?

      Like the arcticle says IE replies on features of Windows for some apsects of it's security, the modern implementations/fixes are not being backported to Win2k so the browser wont be able to take advantage of fixed libraries/functionality. It's not that they can't do it - they have just chosen not to.

      Firefox supplies a lot of
    • Why/How can Firefox, which runs happily on W2K and others, offer better security, while IE cannot do the same on an OS developed by MS itself?

      That one's easy.

      It's a strategic decision of Microsoft's to provide poor security on older products, since their business model is extremely focused on getting recurring revenue from people upgrading to newer versions. Since businesses are running fine on the old versions, Microsoft needs to create problems with the old stuff to force them to upgrade.

      Fortuna

    • Re:Terrible Sunday News (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Ride-My-Rocket ( 96935 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @08:32PM (#12673020) Homepage
      Why/How can Firefox, which runs happily on W2K and others, offer better security, while IE cannot do the same on an OS developed by MS itself?

      According to Microsoft, IE is integrated into the operating system itself -- it is no longer a standalone application [microsoft.com]. Ostensibly they did this to allow greater desktop-to-Internet integration, but given the inherent insecurity of ActiveX, the tendency for the forces of evil to use it maliciously, and the inability of users to lock it down, it's not exactly a hot selling point these days [answers.com].

      Firefox, on the other hand, stands to benefit immensely from all this. It offers a free, lightweight, standalone browser whose programming environment makes it easy for developers to extend its functionality [roachfiend.com] without coopting its security (so far). It does this without any hooks into the operating system, and offers a variety of ways to combat malware, popups and generally obnoxious behavior (Flash movies [mozdev.org], rampant advertising [mozdev.org], etc).

      Microsoft might claim that they won't be releasing any further security patches or functional upgrades to Windows 2000 or IE6. But as of September 2004, ~49% of Windows users still use Windows 2000 or lower (98, 95, NT, etc) [zdnet.com]. Trying to scare users into upgrading their OS, so they can take advantage of a marginally improved, questionably more secure Windows, doesn't seem to be working anymore [freerepublic.com]. And I'm by no means a Linux zealot -- I'm an ASP/SQL programmer, have been using Windows since v3.1, and am a huge fan of Microsoft's development tools / languages.

      Besides landing my most recent job, discovering Firefox was the best tech-related thing that's come along in recent memory. It's inspired me to start learning more about client-side development again, after seeing what's possible with AJAX (Asynchronous Javascript And XML) [wikipedia.org], standards-compliant CSS and XHTML. Once Dean Edwards' CSS-based IE7 stylesheet [edwards.name] matures a bit more, developers will be able to instantly upgrade the set of standards-compliant available to IE 5/6 users. At that point, who will need IE 7? The days of developing wonderful new HTML and CSS tags that are only supported by one browser are in decline...... Firefox's market share has risen to just under 10% in the past year, while Microsoft's market share has dropped to under 90% for the first time since Netscape was still relevant. IE7 won't become ubiquitous for a long, long time, especially if Microsoft doesn't plan on making it available to users of its older operating systems. Why would developers of any web applications besides IE-only Intranets/Extranets create products that utilized features only available to a very small set of the installed user base?

      So whatever, Microsoft. Dig your own grave, if you insist upon doing so. I'll continue to use your server-side tools, provided something better and easier-to-use doesn't come along, but at this point, you've lost me as a client-side developer of IE. Not that you should care, of course..... but if you can lose a devoted developer like me, I have to wonder how many others you've push away. It appears it's not all about "Developers, Developers, Developers!", as Steve Ballmer & Co. would have us believe.

  • I... can't tell (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:44PM (#12672402)
    Is this a good thing or a bad thing for the Win2K users?

  • When (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Turn-X Alphonse ( 789240 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:45PM (#12672404) Journal
    When games I want to play stop working in Windows 98 then I'll buy a new OS. Untill then going "oh no, you need the new IE you must upgrade" isn'tgoing to get my money.

    • Re:When (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:48PM (#12672434)
      Games like "How many Botnets can my computer participate in at one time?"
  • I guess that means the only browsers with tabs for W2k will be Opera and Firefox.

    So what, the statement is incorrect anyway but so what. Tabs are nice but the are not the be all and end all of browsing. Some people like them, some hate them, they are not a big deal.
    • Yes it's quite a silly statement, I agree.

      MyIE [myie2.com] for instances lets IE have tabs. Whats wrong with this for tabs?

    • Re:What is this obsession with tabs? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Meshach ( 578918 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:58PM (#12672507)
      There are lots of ways to have tabs in earlier versions of IE without upgrading the operating system

      SlimBrowser [flashpeak.com] is on that integrates into IE seamlessly and gives you tabs, pop up blacking, and all the other "obvious to everyone but ms" features

      Of course the better [mozilla.org] alternative [mozilla.org] is still available

    • Re:What is this obsession with tabs? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by linguae ( 763922 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:02PM (#12672531)

      This isn't about tabs. A new version of Internet Explorer hasn't came out since 2001, which is a very long time in computing years. Unless Windows 2000 users use an alternative browser, they would be stuck with Internet Explorer 6 as the latest IE browser.

      This isn't a good idea on Microsoft's part, because there are still many users using Windows 2000 (in fact, Windows 2000 is still supported; and I believe that Windows 2000 is the best version of Windows that was ever released), and if Microsoft abandons all of its Windows 2000 users in the broswer market, where are all of these people going to move to? They're not going to spend $$$ upgrading to XP over a broswer; they would more than likely switch to Mozilla/Firefox/Netscape/KMeleon/Opera/etc.

      During the original broswer war, IE was on almost every major platform. It was available on Windows as far back as Windows 3.1, Mac OS 7.5 and higher, and even Solaris; the only sizable community that didn't get IE was the Linux/BSD group (that community used Netscape 4.x until Mozilla or Konqueror became usable; I don't know which came first since I was a Windows user back then). It seemed to me that Microsoft wanted to control the broswer market, so instead of only offering IE to its latest Windows offerings, it offered it to a wide array of operating system (even though Netscape had a wider array; it included Linux).

      Now in the second Broswer Wars, Microsoft is completely ignoring its older Windows versions, the Macintosh, and *nix. Yet Firefox is available on a wide array of platforms. For example, even though Mozilla doesn't have official support for Firefox on *BSD, using *BSD ports (which applies the appropriate patches to the source), it compiles nicely and runs well. If I were Microsoft, I would be a little scared. Just about every platform can use Firefox, and if it isn't available on that platform (such as Mac OS Classic), somebody can port it. If Linux or Mac OS X takes off, then Microsoft would lose its stranglehold in the browser market. If Microsoft wants to win this broswer war, it should port IE 7 to just about every operating system imaginable. Old Windows versions, Mac OS X, Linux, *BSD, Solaris; you name it, Microsoft should port it to that platform. If Microsoft really wants 95% marketshare, it should stop ignoring old Windows versions and other operating systems and start porting.

      • OS Platform Stats (Score:3, Informative)

        by westlake ( 615356 )
        OS Platform Statistics [w3schools.com] April:

        In two years, Linux and the Mac have shown little growth at all, while XP's share has doubled.
        If this is what the world looks like to a web developer, I don't think Microsoft has much to fear in the mass consumer market, where the browser wars translate into serious money and power, W2K was never a factor, and where Win XP has been the default OEM install since August of '01.

        Win XP... 64%
        W2K........20%
        Win 98......4%
        Linux.........3%
        Mac...........3%
        Wi n.NET.. 1%
        Others.......0%

      • Microsoft doesn't have to branch out to other platforms to enforce that kind of marketshare. They just have to make sure that users of Windows can't remove IE from their machines, and make it as difficult as possible to use something else. With increasing dependence on Windows Update, it's freaking impossible to get rid of IE. And how many stupid apps use the IE engine internally, or forcefully open IE even when it's not your default browser?

        Jasin Natael

      • During the original broswer war, IE was on almost every major platform. It was available on Windows as far back as Windows 3.1, Mac OS 7.5 and higher, and even Solaris; the only sizable community that didn't get IE was the Linux/BSD group (that community used Netscape 4.x until Mozilla or Konqueror became usable; I don't know which came first since I was a Windows user back then).

        In addition to Solaris, IE was also available for HP-UX though not Irix. I was seriously considering picking up a used SparcS

  • bad move on Microsoft's part (Score:5, Insightful)

    by kalpol ( 714519 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:46PM (#12672419)
    Many people are sticking with Win2K because of the draconian licensing and validation process required with WinXP. They will begin to lose a significant portion of the browser market as people realize how easy it is to get Firefox and the benefits it offers over Explorer.
    • Exactly.

      In addition to this, imagine that in about 2 years we have a majority of PNG-capable browsers (IE7, Mozilla, Opera, Konqueror; pretty much everybody except IE5+6) and you want to use transparent PNGs.

      Will you write:

      If you run WinXP Service Pack 2, download IE7, if you run WinXP with an earlier version download Firefox, if you run Win2K or Win98, download Firefox and if you run MacOSX or Linux download Firefox.

      or will you just write:

      Download Firefox

      Firefox works everywhere.

  • The M$ resopnse... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by hubang ( 692671 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:48PM (#12672427)
    "Besides, if we supported our products with our products, nobody would have reason to buy our new products."

    Dramatized for your enjoyment.

  • The cost of Internet Explorer (Score:5, Insightful)

    by yotto ( 590067 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:48PM (#12672435) Homepage
    So, Internet Explorer is no longer free, to get a secure Microsoft Browser (Yeah, I'm making a few assumptions here, but let's just live in the hypothetical word for a moment) I have to buy a new version of the OS? Or I can get a secure version of Netscape (That they call Firefox these days) for free. I wonder what I'll choose.
  • When they said USB would not be supported for NT 4.0. They said it was non-trivial to back port the code.

    And yet USB for NT 4.0 exists and works just fine (I know, I've got it running for a USB keyboard, mouse and old Canon printer.)

  • Wait a minute... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by caryw ( 131578 ) <.carywiedemann. .at. .gmail.com.> on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:49PM (#12672441) Homepage
    [S]ome of the security work in IE7 relies on operating system functionality in XPSP2
    So does that mean I won't be able to run it on XP with SP1 either? I mean obviously I use Firefox, but if I'm going to be forced to have Microsoft's shitty browser installed, I'd rather it be the latest, greatest and most secure. And I still don't trust SP2 and all the crap it dumps on your box.
    Just a thought.
    --
    NoVA Underground: Northern Virginia message boards and chat, with Fairfax County public ticket/arrest search [novaunderground.com]

    • Re:Wait a minute... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by gad_zuki! ( 70830 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:01PM (#12672527)
      >And I still don't trust SP2 and all the crap it dumps on your box.

      "Crap" like pop-up blocking for IE6, a better wireless manager, NX support, firewall on by default, etc? It blows my mind that all these windows users hate the system they use and complain when they get a bunch of needed features. Of course, there are issues with the update, but thats true of any modern OS.

      If you're using windows XP you should have migrated to SP2 long ago if you cared about security and stability. Then again this is slashdot, enjoy your ill-informed karma whore points.

      • Re:Wait a minute... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by caryw ( 131578 )
        Oh joy pop-up blocking for IE! Like I need IE hogging MORE resources. Oooo, and a FIREWALL. Tiny Personal Firewall does a better job than a Windows firewall ever could. Stability? XP is pretty damn stable. My only real issue is all the ram it hogs after a box has been up for a couple weeks or so.
        Yeah yeah, "switch to linux." I don't even want to start that thread here. Linux is definitely my choice for a server operating system. Nothing beats it hands down (well, maybe FreeBSD for some implementati

      • ...and if the "crap" the original poster is talking about is merely notifications from the new Security Center, those can be turned off. In the left hand column (Resources), click "Change the way Security Center alerts me," then uncheck any or all the options.

        There, now people can stop saying they hate SP 2 because it "babies" them with stuff like this.

  • Well thats going to be a big boost for firefox (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mpcooke3 ( 306161 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:51PM (#12672457) Homepage
    Most normal users never upgrades their OS and a lot of geeks prefer 2k to XP.

    I suppose they have to release something new in Longhorn, they could make the window borders even bigger and more ugly and cripple the performance a bit more but with all the things they've dropped from longhorn they need some killer feature like copying firefox tabs to justify forcing another pointless upgrade on the corporate world.
    • Most normal users never upgrades their OS and a lot of geeks prefer 2k to XP.

      Of course, those geeks tend to be the ones too stupid to figure out how to set the style into "Classic" mode. XP doesn't have to look like a fisherprice toy - and I don't know of any other reasons why one would want to run Windows 2000 instead of XP. Except maybe activation (oh, boo hoo).

  • Lazy FUDer (Score:3, Informative)

    by FredThompson ( 183335 ) <fredthompsonNO@SPAMmindspring.com> on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:52PM (#12672464)
    Tabbed IE variants have existed for more than 4 years.

    http://www.snapfiles.com/freeware/misctools/fwbrow ser.html [snapfiles.com]

    • I prefer Maxthon (formerly MyIE2).

      http://www.myie2.com/html_en/home.htm [myie2.com]

      The IE rendering engine with most of the features people get all gushy about in the Mozilla/Firefox browsers.

      • Re:Lazy FUDer (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 29, 2005 @08:22PM (#12672974)
        The IE rendering engine with most of the features people get all gushy about in the Mozilla/Firefox browsers.

        Funnily enough, one of the things most people love about Mozilla/Firefox is that they don't use the IE rendering engine - they use one that can cope with ancient 1990s technology like XHTML and transparent PNGs and CSS layout instead.

        And, not to rain on your parade, a glance at the MyIE page shows that the wonderful features you're expecting me to be impressed by are... tabbed browsing and mouse gestures. Sorry, but as far as I'm concerned those are basic minimal features required for a browser to qualify as usable. I couldn't find anything there about a MyIE equivalent of Greasemonkey. Or Flashblock. Or EditCSS.

        Seriously, you should give Firefox a try (or another try, as appropriate). It's got all the features people get gushy about in MyIE, and many more, and - as an added bonus - it doesn't use the IE rendering engine. :p
  • MS is forcing corporations to upgrade to XP.

    But it begs the question: what's needed for a secure browser?

    First and foremost, don't let outsiders penetrate my system. MS failed this. Firefox failed this. What does it take to get this right?

  • It's OK Windows 2000. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Comatose51 ( 687974 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @06:54PM (#12672479) Homepage
    There, there... It's OK. Firefox [mozilla.org] loves you. Firefox won't judge you. Just because you're 5 years old, it doesn't mean you can't have tabs.

    Come on. Just download Firefox and you can hang out with the other cool kids.

    Aw... Is that a smilie emoticon I see in your window?!

    [Mr. Burns] Excellent... [/Mr. Burns]

  • I'll not miss IE7 since I am using Windows 2000 in addition to SuSE Linux 9.2. My problem which is very well known I guess, is how to get rid of the version of IE installed on my system. I kind of gave up! I have Firefox 1.04 installed and even went ahead to make it the "default" browser.

    My problem comes when using third-party software. You see, in some of these software(s) like Adobe's latest release (7.0), CCleaner and the like, when you try to visit the web from within the software, IE is started! This

  • [S]ome of the security work in IE7 relies on operating system functionality in XPSP2 that is non-trivial to port back to Windows 2000.'

    Oh, BS. This is just another way to justify getting us to pay for a new version of Windows.

  • And Standards Compliant (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jtwJGuevara ( 749094 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:02PM (#12672529)
    "I guess that means the only browsers with tabs for W2k will be Opera and Firefox."

    And the only browsers that will be standards compliant for Windows 2k will be the aforementioned Opera and Firefox.

  • Winning Combination (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Doc Ruby ( 173196 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:05PM (#12672546) Homepage Journal
    Just in case anyone wonders why Microsoft lets its OS support so many bugs and insecurity holes, this is your answer. Some bugs get fixed in new versions, which require the upgrade of the other components. The planned (passive) obsolescence of one component forces repurchase of all the others. When you've got a monopoly, and abuse it with forced bundling, there's so many ways to win, and so few to lose.

  • It is about forcing people to buy XP (Score:5, Interesting)

    by beforewisdom ( 729725 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:06PM (#12672552)
    Previous slashdot articles have reported that businesses are intentionally not spending more money and not buying XP. Win 2000 works fine for them.

    During the American antitrust case against MS several experts testified that IE could be separated from the OS in a matter of weeks.

    Refusing to make a version of IE7 a part of win 2000 is as much a business decision as a technical one.

    They want businesses who are not buying XP to get off win 2000 and buy XP.

    I am not bashing MS, but it seems from what I have seen that XP is incredibly vulnerable to attack. In addition to managers not wanting to fork out the money for XP, their network people, many of whom are microsoft weanies, do not want to put their networks in harms way by using XP for their servers.

    At some point the managers and network will capitulate. MS will stop supporting 2000 completely.

    The question is how long the managers and network people will drag their feet, how much resentment towards MS this will generate, and what the effect of that resentment will be.
    • That's not it at all. In fact, after XP was announced, business didn't upgrade [com.com] their 2000 clients in anticipation of waiting to upgrade to XP.

      XP incinerated previous records [microsoft.com] and sold 17 million copies in its first two months.

      I am not bashing MS, but it seems from what I have seen that XP is incredibly vulnerable to attack.

      What you have seen? Which of the two do you use? Neither? Speculation is one thing. Making an argument is another. I've seen much the opposite. Granted, there have been issues, and SP

      • Re:It is about forcing people to buy XP (Score:5, Interesting)

        by beforewisdom ( 729725 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:49PM (#12672803)
        I use and have used windows 2000 40 ( and then some ) hours a week for the past 4 years.

        Your phrase "Granted, there have been issues" is what my original post is about.

        I make friends with the network staff at every job I go to. I have heard a lot of noise from them about XP and how they are going to hold onto 2000 as long as they can. In my private life I have had a number of friends( and even more anecdotal accounts from friends of friends ) of XP getting sacked by all manor of opportunistic programs in a very short span of time after being put into operation.

        You could blame it on the internet being a more insecure place then it used to be, but if that was true all of the 2000 boxes I use and all of the 2000 boxes my friends in networking take care of should be getting sacked just as bad as the XP boxes.

        It isn't happening.
      • What you have seen? Which of the two do you use? Neither? Speculation is one thing. Making an argument is another. I've seen much the opposite. Granted, there have been issues, and SP2 threw in some additional kinks, but the ones complaining the loudest appear to be those that don't even use Windows!

        I'm one of those admins that didn't upgrade to XP and won't until forced to do so.

        From personal experience I have to patch XP systems weekly at the very least - depends on how often MS releases a "Critical Up
    • Refusing to make a version of IE7 a part of win 2000 is as much a business decision as a technical one.

      Yes - Win2k is *old*. It's going into extended support (== only security updates) in a couple of months. Does RedHat actively support RH from 5-6 years ago? Does *anyone* support back-porting new features to versions of their products that are that old?

      their network people, many of whom are microsoft weanies, do not want to put their networks in harms way by using XP for their servers.

      Two things:

      1)

  • typo (Score:2)

    by Sparr0 ( 451780 )
    ...[S]ome of the security work in IE7 relies on operating system functionality in XPSP2...

    more accurately, this should read: ...[S]ome of the insecure work in IE7 relies on operating system functionality in XPSP2...

    When will MS realize that integrating the browser with the OS is never a good thing.
  • That will kill most gamers and force them to upgrade.. Doubt they will be offering newer versions of that for W2K.

    Already seen that with 98.. Wouldnt fly...
  • Yet again, Microsoft can't be arsed to do a proper job with a product. It's hardly as if it's a couple of guys in a garage, it it?

    So what are they saying? W2K is so fundamentally buggered that we can't fix it? Or is it really a case of we'd like you to pointlessly trade up to another OS which will offer you very few additional features if you're a desktop user?

    However, Microsoft have yet again shot themselves in the foot. Their whole recent history with IE in fact has been a disaster and I would have h

  • Integrated with OS? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by iamlucky13 ( 795185 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:19PM (#12672624)
    [S]ome of the security work in IE7 relies on operating system functionality in XPSP2 that is non-trivial to port back to Windows 2000.
    There had been speculation that IE 7 would be real, independent web browser, safely seperated from the OS. I guess this blows that theory out of the water?

  • "Can't be backported" (Score:3, Insightful)

    by betelgeuse68 ( 230611 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:33PM (#12672696)
    Haven't we heard such sh*te before?

    "Yeah, the latest version of Windows Media Player can't be stripped from Windows because it's part of the OS." Only to be proved dead wrong.

    I mean, we're talking about "user interface" changes and catching up withthe W3C times such as truly supporting the latest CSS standards.

    Why on earth can't Windows 2000 do this?

    MS should just tell it as it is, we hope you upgrade to take more money from, albeit in more euphemistic way OR simply state another valid reason. We'd rather not have to do regression testing on an older platform. Again, find a euphemism.

    -M

  • Lingering Exploits (Score:3, Interesting)

    by nurb432 ( 527695 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @07:56PM (#12672846) Homepage Journal
    That means as time goes on, W2K will become more and more of a security risk.

    But that is their plan, force people to 'upgrade', even when what you have does the job you need. Gotta milk the consumer for every dime.

  • Give 'em a break (Score:3, Funny)

    by inkswamp ( 233692 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @08:03PM (#12672877)
    [S]ome of the security work in IE7 relies on operating system functionality in XPSP2 that is non-trivial to port back to Windows 2000.'

    Too bad MS isn't a massive software corporation with loads of resources and cash to throw at such a thing, but since they're young and struggling and don't have the staffing to port things back to widely used versions of their OS, I think we should all cut 'em some slack.

  • I'm surprised they made IE6 available for Win2K (Score:3, Interesting)

    by rayd75 ( 258138 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @10:35PM (#12673562)
    Hell, they went on and on about how Windows 2000 was the future of the platform and spent huge amounts of money and effort getting customers to migrate to it. How much time lapsed between the release of 2000 and XP? 18 months? As soon as XP hit the streets they stopped serious updates to 2000. Decent, integrated wireless support is the first thing that comes to mind but there are countless others. And then no service pack five? WTF? There are tons of real bugs remaining that don't require obscure configurations to surface. Hell, just the other day I found that I can't have a (long) group policy-defined logon banner that works on 2K and XP machines simultaneously without an unreleased QFE patch for 2K. Windows 2000 was essentially a preview or beta of XP as far as Microsoft is concerned. It was more stable and secure by sheer luck... they hadn't yet had a chance to integrate the portions that made XP so unreliable. As soon as the "final" product made it to market, Microsoft was ready to kill off Windows 2000. Every tool, utility, add-on, and feature update they have done since XP's release has been handled accordingly.

  • Software and Driver Installation? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Volvogga ( 867092 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @10:50PM (#12673642)
    Sorry about coming into this way late, but I have a preminition that scares me.

    When installing a new HP printer I got (HP 5700 series), I ran into some problems when I tried to install the drivers/software for the thing in Win98. HP required that I have IE6 to install the thing (bullshit, I know). Well, I installed IE6 and it went fine, but what if I didn't have access to IE6 in 98?

    Will I be prevented from installing software and drivers for products in the future because MS is deciding to buttf*ck me for not going to their "latest and greatest" system?

  • Win2k vs Linux? (Score:3, Informative)

    by OneFix ( 18661 ) on Sunday May 29, 2005 @11:59PM (#12673932)
    Its no stretch to say that the only win2k installs left out there are being used either on servers (why are you using a browser on a server??? Or even better yet, why are you using Windoze on a server??? :)

    The other group (ans these are the ones Im talking about) are those that for one reason or another belive that win2k is the best Windoze OS (better than XP, better than 2003)...most of these will state stability as their reason for using win2k...others will say that XP has too much bloat and/or eye candy. What M$ is banking on is that these users will switch to a new version of Windoze (XP or 2003)...but what is keeping these users from switching to a Linux distro?

    It pretty safe to say that the majority of these users will be looking for office support and not exactly games support...if the argument is that Lotus Notes doesnt work or I need M$ Office, you can always buy a copy of Crossover Office [codeweavers.com] for $40.00...much cheaper than even an upgrade to XP/2003.

    And for most Windoze apps, you dont even need to purchase Crossover Office...all you need is a script like This [sidenet.ddo.jp] one.

    They have played this move before, but this time it could come back to bite them.

    • Re:Win2k vs Linux? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Animats ( 122034 )
      win2k is the best Windoze OS (better than XP, better than 2003)...most of these will state stability as their reason for using win2k

      I'm one of them. You run Win2K. Windows XP runs you, by remote control from Redmond. There are still corporate sites installing new Win2K systems. It's more reliable than Windows XP, because Microsoft keeps putting new stuff into Windows XP and breaking it. The XP machines require significantly more attention than the Win2K machines.

      And all our real work is on QNX,

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