Microsoft Previews IE9 — HTML5, SVG, Fast JS 473
suraj.sun sends this excerpt from CNET on Microsoft's preview of IE9 in Las Vegas just now. "At its Mix 10 conference Tuesday, Microsoft gave programmers, Web developers, and the world at large a taste of things to come with its Web browser. Specifically, Microsoft released what it's calling the Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview, a prototype designed to show off the company's effort to improve how the browser deals with the Web as it exists today and, as important, to add support for new Web technologies that are coming right now. Coming in the new version is support for new Web standards including plug-in-free video; better performance with graphics, text, and JavaSript by taking advantage of modern computing hardware. One big change in the JavaScript engine Hachamovitch is proud of is its multicore support. As soon as a Web page is loaded, Chakra assigns a processing core to the task of compiling JavaScript in the background into fast code written in the native language of the computer's processor." Microsoft didn't say what codec they were using for the HTML5 video demo, but the Technologizer says it's H.264.
H.264 (Score:4, Funny)
Of course it's H.264. That's the superior standard! And by superior I mean it allows a superior level of control over the once free and open Internet.
Re:H.264 (Score:5, Informative)
Once free and open Internet? What is Flash then? It's both proprietary closed platform and H.264.
It's of course H.264 but for different reasons - Windows 7 has build-in support for H.264, and Theora kind of lost the war already.
Re:H.264 (Score:5, Interesting)
Flash is an optional addon. There is no optional addon to play h.264. The support for the video is built into the browser, and once it's built in the browser cannot be redistributed due to patents. This is why Firefox can't play H.264, and the reason Theora doesn't have support from some key players. Without the patents, there is no control.
Re:H.264 (Score:4, Interesting)
GIF is also patented format and had an uproar before as they required license fees from applications that output GIF.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_Interchange_Format#Unisys_and_LZW_patent_enforcement [wikipedia.org]
In August 1999, Unisys changed the details of their licensing practice, announcing the option for owners of Billboard and Intra net Web sites to obtain licenses on payment of a one-time license fee of $5000 or $7500.[15] Such licenses were not required for website owners or other GIF users who had used licensed software to generate GIFs. Nevertheless, Unisys was the subject of thousands of online attacks and abusive emails from users believing that they were going to be charged $5000 or sued for using GIFs on their websites.[16] Despite giving free licenses to hundreds of non-profit organizations, schools and governments, Unisys was completely unable to generate any good publicity and continued to be vilified by individuals and organizations such as the League for Programming Freedom who started the "Burn All GIFs" campaign.[17]
The US LZW patent expired on June 20, 2003.[18] The counterpart patents in the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy expired on June 18, 2004, the Japanese counterpart patents expired on June 20, 2004 and the counterpart Canadian patent expired on July 7, 2004.[18] Consequently, while Unisys has further patents and patent applications relating to improvements to the LZW technique,[18] the GIF format may now be used freely.
I don't think MPEG-LA is so stupid that it will try anything similar. In that case they also even didn't try to get licenses from 99% of websites. MPEG-LA has a long history in video formats and their usage on the Internet and other devices, it would be stupid of them to start charging individual websites and users.
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If they really felt this way then they would allow players and transmission without patent royalties. They would make it official and permanent. They have not. "I don't think", "99% of websites", and
"It would be stupid of them" doesn't cut it. If you want to put faith in them, go ahead. I'd like to think we know better then that.
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Re:H.264 (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:H.264 (Score:5, Informative)
And some early version of IE (5 maybe?) showed PNG colors slightly incorrectly and with no transparency support, making it pretty much unusable. I still have nightmares about those slightly incorrect colors and keep thinking I should use GIF/JPG instead of PNG.
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However, right now any implementation of H.264 in the core of firefox is not going to happen.
No-one is asking for that. In fact, you yourself go on to say...
Maybe it will be possible to have a pluggable video decoder for Firefox for the HTML5 Video tag so you can hook up your own solutions. That might solve the issue for everyone.
It would have solved the issue for everyone. The problem is that Mozilla explicitly refuses [mozillazine.org] to do that for ideological reasons! They don't want to give users freedom of choice, if that freedom may lead them to choosing "unfree" codecs.
(note also that most claimed technical problems with DirectShow in that blog post are pure FUD)
In fact, there already is a patch [mozilla.org] to enable GStreamer support for video codecs, but so far it's only been accepted for
No, PNG was primarily created to be patent-free (Score:5, Informative)
Re:No, PNG was primarily created to be patent-free (Score:4, Funny)
[Citation Needed]
Re:H.264 (Score:4, Informative)
Flash is an optional addon. There is no optional addon to play h.264. The support for the video is built into the browser, and once it's built in the browser cannot be redistributed due to patents.
There's nothing precluding the browser from using the OS centralized codec repository, to which an H.264 codec can then be added (if not there already).
In fact, Opera 10.50 does just that on Linux (it uses gstreamer). In fact, it also uses its own copy of gstreamer on Windows and OS X, to which you can add codecs if you want to.
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However, anyone who uses an unlicensed h.264 decoder are still technically breaking the law (at least in the U.S.). I'd rather not have to break the law to watch a video online
I fully expect there to be licensed H.264 codecs for Linux being offered for a reasonable price, just like you can buy a licensed MP3 decoder or DVD player for Linux today.
Re:H.264 (Score:5, Insightful)
Or people who feel strongly about it will continue to use open formats and petition against software patents.
Good luck with that.
8 years ago, I've bought into Vorbis hype (coincidentally, it was about the time when I switched to Linux as primary desktop OS). My music collection was 100% Vorbis. I only bought players that could play it (e.g. iRiver).
Fast forward to today... only about 10% of my music is still in Vorbis, and I still have trouble with that (e.g. my car won't play it, so I have to recode). I'm afraid that MP3 has won, and AAC is picking up from there.
And that was with Vorbis, which was actually technically better than MP3 in many aspects (better compression, extensible meta-information with proper Unicode support etc). And Theora is technically inferior to H.264...
Still, good luck.
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Not really. By choosing to exclusively support a patented proprietary format they are doing it with their actions, no loudspeakers required.
Google supports both H.264 and Theora in Chrome out of the box.
Apple uses QuickTime framework for video playback in Safari, so it'll use Theora codec if it's installed.
We have no idea as to how it will work in IE9, yet. Judging by how IE works today, expecting it to use DirectShow would be quite reasonable - which, again, allows the user to install Theora codecs and enjoy full support.
So, where's the exclusivity?
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>>>Flash is an optional addon.
Yeah except not really. I'm on dialup with my laptop and sometimes block Flash to speedup the connection, but there are many sites that simply don't work. You need to either use Adobe's software or an open-source Flash Alternative.
Also H.264/MPEG4 is really no different than the MPEG2 we used in our HDTV/DVDs or the MPEG4 in our HD Radios/Bluray players. These formats are "proprietary" but open standards which are maintained by a neutral non-profit organization. I
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>neutral non-profit organization.
The MPEG WG and the MPEG IF may be non-profit (I don't see how they would qualify as neutral in any useful way), but that is irrelevant, as the MPEG LA is most definitely not nonprofit.
Re:Firefox not playing h264 is a political decisio (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not that they think Theora will win in the end. It's that they want some free standard to win in the end, and they know that won't happen if they (of all people) fold on H.264.
The money they'd have to pay for including it in their distribution isn't the issue. It's the fees people in future would have to pay for creating and distributing movies. They want the Web to be democratic, and that means everyone gets to contribute, whatever their financial means.
Re:Firefox not playing h264 is a political decisio (Score:5, Interesting)
You don't get it. If Firefox had h.264 support, it could not be redistributed. Period. Everyone would have to download the 'offical' version from Mozilla. No Linux distro could include it. No one could change the code and distribute it. It would cripple Firefox. Why the hell doesn't anyone understand this?
Re:Firefox not playing h264 is a political decisio (Score:5, Interesting)
Ubuntu doesn't seem to have a problem redistributing H.264 support in libavcodec.
Re:Firefox not playing h264 is a political decisio (Score:4, Informative)
You don't get it. If Firefox had h.264 support, it could not be redistributed. Period. Everyone would have to download the 'offical' version from Mozilla. No Linux distro could include it. No one could change the code and distribute it. It would cripple Firefox. Why the hell doesn't anyone understand this?
That's not true. h.264 can be implemented as a plugin. Firefox needn't include this plugin by default. There are plenty of third-party h.264 implementations to choose from. Mozilla themselves could even create such a plugin as an add-on, and make it freely available (sans source, if necessary).
Mozilla are shooting themselves in the foot if their present stance is anything but bluster. The h.264 train is leaving the station, and Apple, Google, and even Microsoft are on board. Firefox's market share will plummet without an h.264 solution.
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Why the hell doesn't anyone understand this?
Because it's false.
Firefox needs only to ship with generic gstreamer support for it's video element, just as Fennec will be doing. Then you can install any damn gstreamer codec implementation you want, and it'll be available to Firefox. Problem is, the Firefox devs decided they don't want to do that for political reasons, and so Fennec's implementation won't be ported to Firefox. Thank you asshole developers!
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Once free and open Internet? What is Flash then?
Not part of the official standard.
If you and a thousand idiots want to run their lolcat websites with h.264 videos, be my guest. Just keep your own goddamned patented technology *off* the official standard.
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Once free and open Internet? What is Flash then?
Not part of the official standard.
Neither H.264 nor SWF/FLV is part of the official standard, but the <video> and <object> elements respectively are.
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Compare to the img element (Score:4, Insightful)
What good is a standard embedded video tag if there is no standard coded with which to play with it?
What good is a standard embedded image tag if there is no standard coded with which to play with it? Notice that HTML's definition of the <img> element [w3.org] doesn't require support for any specific image format.
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It's of course H.264 but for different reasons - Windows 7 has build-in support for H.264, and Theora kind of lost the war already.
Pretty much everyone is on board for H.264. AVC/H.264 Licensees [mpegla.com]
773 of the biggest names in media and tech. Canonical is on the list. Lockheed Martin is on the list.
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just because people are licensees doesn't mean they're going to implement it. I think you fail to understand what the significance of that list is. Maybe you should read at the bottom when it says (my bold/italic)
It's more likely that people have to be licensees to be able to read the i
No, everyone is NOT on board with H.264 (Score:3, Informative)
No, everyone is NOT on board. For example, Wikipedia explicitly forbids MP3 and H.264, and only accepts Ogg Theora and Ogg Vorbis [wikipedia.org]. If you want to hear audio or see videos on Wikipedia, one of the world's most popular web services, then you MUST use Ogg Theora and Ogg Vorbis. And as you know, Firefox (one of the most popular web browsers and growing) includes built-in support for Ogg and NOT for H.264. Many sites, and many operating systems (such as Fedora, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Debian, etc.) do NOT s
Oh bollocks (Score:2)
firefox is getting old (Score:5, Informative)
It seems that even IE beat Firefox in Javascript performance [com.com] now. Firefox sure has been slacking recently. There's still road ahead though, Chrome and Opera are leading.
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Re:firefox is getting old (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems that even IE beat Firefox in Javascript performance now. Firefox sure has been slacking recently.
The chart you linked shows IE 9 and FF 3.7 more or less at a dead heat. So, even if this were an unfortunate turn of events, it's not as if IE 9 had a terrible lead.
But I'm not sure it's unfortunate. High performance javascript in what will likely be the world's most highly used browser for a while? Sounds pretty good to me.
Re:MS stole stuff in the past. now its easy to do (Score:5, Informative)
What happens if they cut-and-paste OS into their commercial products?
They get busted and have to release their formerly closed source product into OS [microsoft.com].
Problem solved.
MS is visibly arrogant and arguably evil, but stupid? Nyet. Count on their legal eagles making DAMN sure the little fiasco outlined in the linked article never happens again. They may be inclined to do anything they think they can get away with, but this is something they understand they can't get away with.
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The thing is: Firefox does not have multicore support IE got.
And that's quickly changing. The ff efforts to bring each tab its own process means multi-core support - if albeit, coarse grained.
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Opera 10.5 uses GPU acceleration when available.
Re:firefox is getting old (Score:5, Insightful)
All that skepticism aside tho, if this is the truth (that IE9 will be standards based --and push the performance envelope--) then MS may be on the road to redeeming themselves... But the question remains, how tight will it be to the OS? Would a simple security flaw give a bit of JS access to the kernel? Or are they going to significantly sandbox the JS, and try to do everything right (as opposed to just the rendering)... Only time will tell if IE will become a browser friendly to geeks and developers (although something tells me it won't)...
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IE has been pretty good with security with 7 and 8, IMHO. Coupled with DEP (which ships turned on in Windows 7), and the protected mode that the browser runs in (so if it does get hijacked, malicious software doesn't have access to the user's file or Registry, much less the system's) have given the browser a significant security boost.
This isn't to say that IE is perfect, but because it is the focal point of almost every single intel agency, botnet client maker, malware writer, and blackhat on the surface
Re:firefox is getting old (Score:5, Informative)
But the question remains, how tight will it be to the OS? Would a simple security flaw give a bit of JS access to the kernel?
This kind of thing isn't possible on NT family operating systems since inception. IE does not run in the kernel, and never did.
Of course, it is possible to have a remote code execution vulnerability in JS engine, combined with a local elevation exploit, giving one root access - and from there patching OS files to get kernel access - but that is something that is possible on any OS, and not something you can fully mitigate by sandboxing (since sandbox can have its own vulnerabilities).
Or are they going to significantly sandbox the JS, and try to do everything right (as opposed to just the rendering)
IE has been sandboxing browser engine (including JS) to run in reduced elevation mode (so that it doesn't even have the privileges of user who runs the browser - so it can't access the files of that user, for example) since IE7/Vista.
Re:firefox is getting old (Score:5, Interesting)
Recently? Firefox ceded the "lightweight alternative" throne to Opera years ago and it seems like ever since Chrome dropped they've just been rearranging deck chairs instead of trying to get out of the hole they're in.
When did we decide it was a good idea for a browser to interrupt its own startup procedure to ask you about reopening tabs and updating extensions?
When I clicked the icon, I wanted to go to a web page! Do all that other crap after you service my initial intent.
I knew Firefox was on its way out when I got a nag screen on startup asking me to upgrade. When I declined, it didn't go away and launch the browser, no, it popped up a survey web page, inside a modal dialog which was way too small and could not be scrolled or resized.
WAY TO GO, FIREFOX
Reopening tabs (Score:2)
When did we decide it was a good idea for a browser to interrupt its own startup procedure to ask you about reopening tabs [...] When I clicked the icon, I wanted to go to a web page!
How does it know you didn't want to go to the last web page you were looking at when you closed the program?
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Which is better default behavior?
1. Open the browser as quickly as possible and let the user click the page they want from the history / most visited list (Safari, Chrome, Opera do this)
2. Open the browser and check all the plugins for updates, check to see if pages were open when the browser was last closed, stop loading, present a dialog asking the user if they want to load the browser (which is going to happen anyway regardless) or load the browser _and_ try to open N tabs simultaneously.
If you said
Re:Reopening tabs (Score:4, Insightful)
What if there was an option to not check for updates and to not load the previously loaded tabs?
Re:Reopening tabs (Score:4, Insightful)
Let me rephrase then.
What is the better default behavior given that there is an option to alter said behavior if you don't like it?
The default behavior attempts to keep Firefox as up to date as possible. It also tries to recover from the browser crashing or some other misfortune. If I need to go in a hurry, I can close the browser and it will reopen where I left off.
Your argument seems to be that people are imbeciles if they don't have the same priorities you do. I don't subscribe to that point of view.
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Firefox has suffered the problem of forgetting what their original goal was: create a lightweight and fast browser to replace Mozilla. Now Firefox is as feature laden and bloated with feature creep as Mozilla once was. Now Chrome and Opera are delivering that niche of a fast lightweight browser.
Re:firefox is getting old (Score:4, Interesting)
Does it have real adblock or is it just hiding elements but still loading them? I use all three browsers on a fairly regular basis on Ubuntu, but have found Firefox's Adblock extension to have a better UI and better automatic integration of existing blocklists. Opera's blocking seems to work, but it's UI to select what to block I find awkward. And last I knew (maybe that's changed?) Chrome's adblock didn't actually stop the elements from being loaded on the page, it just hid them via CSS.
Uphill Battle (Score:5, Insightful)
That's great and all, but Microsoft isn't competing with other browsers for market share, it's competing with its own older browsers. Anyone who knows anything about browsers is already using Firefox or Chrome or Opera, and anyone who knows nothing about browsers is using whatever came pre-installed on their computers:
IE6 if they're still on XP, Safari if they have a Mac, or IE 8 if they're running Windows 7.
Unless this is a mandatory upgrade to IE 8, it's not going to gain any ground.
And of course, the 30% of users still using IE6 will continue to do so until their computers die, or a techie relative replace it with Firefox.
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Users aren't using IE6 because they haven't been prompted to update (they are with Windows Update), they're using IE6 because it's a workplace and a lot of intranet web applications only work with it. Other than that, Firefox surpassed IE6 in market share already.
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I follow the same philosophy - Except I probably wouldn't even offer to replace Photoshop with Gimp - if they shelled out the money for PS already, its worth having.
Then I tell them about my "First Ones Free Policy". Which is exactly how it sounds. The first one I clear all their Malware off and set them up on more secure standards. If they somehow manage to catch something then - Thats when I start charging by the hour.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
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IE dropping below 50% market share is a big milestone for the web
Just as important is IE 6 dropping below 20 percent of total share. It's currently at 21.18%. IE 7 is still new enough to show web sites almost as intended. And unlike with IE 6 to 7, any OS that can run 7 can also run 8.
since MS will no longer hold the theoretical "majority vote" concerning web standards and web technology.
To continue the voting analogy, it takes 20 percent to force a roll-call vote in the U.S. House of Representatives or Senate.
Re:Market Share (Score:4, Interesting)
To continue the voting analogy, it takes 20 percent to force a roll-call vote in the U.S. House of Representatives or Senate.
I just recently learned about that practice. It's rather disturbing to think every little detail is recorded when you go to court for a traffic ticket, but no record is kept of who voted for what in our Legislature unless 20% of them agree to allow it.
It's not surprising they rarely do roll-call. By not keeping records, they can claim to have voted in whatever manner the group they are currently speaking to finds most acceptable... a very useful tool for each and every one of them.
Now THAT is Inovation (Score:4, Funny)
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You can't say it isn't forward thinking if it won't let you go back.
Clearly the designers were familiar with the first rule of Italian racing.
Re:Now THAT is Inovation (Score:5, Funny)
The real question... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:The real question... (Score:4, Funny)
plug-in-free video? (Score:5, Interesting)
Meaning Microsoft controls the kinds of video IE can stream?
This is a big opportunity for Microsoft to force the Internet media standards AND generate some meaningful license fees. Those fees would be paid to Microsoft to enable streaming your hot-new-VC-backed media format. Microsoft would never have to deal with those pesky media streaming competitors they used to call partners.
If I made decisions at Microsoft, that's how I'd do it.
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MS just got slapped by a fine in excess of 5 billion dollars in EU for anti-competitive practices. If you were an MS executive, would you seriously be willing to do something that would piss off the very same people who came up with that fine, and who are likely to apply some punitive multipliers for repeated offense?
If it comes right up to the line the EU drew in the sand, dances on it, leans a little, but never really goes over... yes.
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Let's try that again.
Microsoft has been fined in EU specifically for abusing the web browser market.
Do you think that EU would turn a blind eye if MS would now use the dominance it has on that market (which, according to EU, was achieved by illegal means) to harass a market that is directly related?
Also, there's no line in the sand. EU itself has redrawn it several times, as it wasn't happy with MS behavior during the trial. It may well redraw it once more.
So... what is the catch? (Score:2, Insightful)
The demo looks good so far, but I know my MS, there is an angle. There always is. Some subtle way in which they screw it up. Royally. There must be. They have done it for over two decades. No ways after 8 major versions and several minor ones are they suddenly going to play nice.
Paranoid? It ain't paranoia if they are out to get you.
They seem to be really honest this time about following standards, admitting they are not there yet and that it is time they did... so where is the closed source proprietary c
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I know the catch. The catch is obvious. I know people who use IE 6.
IE 7 came out 4 years ago. IE 8 came out a year ago, not including the long public beta.
No matter how good IE 9 is, we'll all have to continue to support IE 6/7/8 for the next 6+ years. It doesn't matter if IE 9 was FireFox with a skin, the curse of IE will continue to haunt anyone doing web development for years.
Holy shit (Score:3, Insightful)
I had to stare at the headline for like 5 seconds before it even parsed. It just didn't seem like a reasonable configuration of words.
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I had to stare at the headline for like 5 seconds before it even parsed. It just didn't seem like a reasonable configuration of words.
Oh don't worry, I'm sure by the time they release IE9 that we'll find the JS is slower than IE6, SVG support broken and HTML 5 support nonexistent.
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I had to stare at the headline for like 5 seconds before it even parsed. It just didn't seem like a reasonable configuration of words.
Next week: GPLed source code to linux drivers for all MS hardware in a GIT repository.
New Javascript Record (Score:5, Funny)
This should be able to serve over 2000 popunder ads per second.
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This should be able to serve over 2000 popunder ads per second.
Blasphemy! It will be OVER 9000!
Standard compliance? (Score:2)
So with all of the nifty, new stuff they are finally compliant, right? I mean no more body {text-align: center;} instead of body { margin: 0px auto; } to center a fixed width layout, right?
I'm sure anyone else who needs to output HTML would love it if MS would just fix their damned browser. Then they can look at adding new features. Or better yet, just drop Trident and replace it with WebKit.
Re:Standard compliance? (Score:4, Insightful)
So with all of the nifty, new stuff they are finally compliant, right? I mean no more body {text-align: center;} instead of body { margin: 0px auto; } to center a fixed width layout, right?
Those are two different things. text-align: center centers stuff in a div. the margin: 0 auto you set to a div to center that block (the div) in its container. Even IE6 works correctly with this, so I don't know what the issue is here.
For those having box-model issues with IE6, you can easily fix this by using the HTML 4.01 Strict DTD, FYI.
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When Internet Explorer 6 was released, way back in 2001, it included two different rendering modes. The old 5.5 rendering mode, retroactively dubbed "quirks mode", and the new 6.0 mode. The new mode was only triggered on pages that included a modern doctype. The new mode gets centring right. The old mode gets centring wrong. So wh
Please tell MS to support Ogg Theora/Ogg Vorbis (Score:3, Interesting)
Nonsense and nonsense. (Score:3, Insightful)
Nonsense.
First of all, Microsoft does *not* have "nothing to worry about" with H.264. Just because it pays tribute (er, licenses patents) from one organization does *NOT* mean that it's protected from all other organizations. In fact, once you demonstrate that you're willing to pay to one organization, others will start to show up to get some money too. For an analogy, look at the history of the Vikings; once people started paying tribute, the odds of looting parties showing up INCREASED. And we don'
Slew of recent marketting... (Score:5, Interesting)
I know this is going to sound trollish, but hear me out.
I can't be the only one noticing that there is a recent upswing in what I'd call Microsoft "prototype news." All the blogs are full of Win Mobile 7 System Phone (or whatever they are calling it...), something called Courier that's probably vaporware, Natal, and now IE enhancements that aren't quite done yet. It feels to me like Microsoft shifted a good chunk of change into marketing for some reason.
It kind of feels like they are saying "Oh, don't look at that, we'll have something soon..."
Re:Slew of recent marketting... (Score:4, Informative)
Looking at MS history, it's been their modus operandi to keep customers from using competitors by promising technologies that they may or may not deliver.
1991: Don't look at other OS like nEXT, Mac, or OS/2. Our Cairo system will have an object oriented file system. . .
1996: Well, Cairo was more of a design prototype. It was never meant to be a product.
1995: Don't look at Quicktime for video. AVI is what you want.
1996: Don't look at Quicktime for video. Don't use our AVI either. Active Movie is the format you want.
1997: Don't look at Quicktime for video. Don't use our Active Movie. Active Movie 2 is the format you want.
1998: Don't look at Quicktime for video. Don't use our Active Movie 2. DirectShow is the format you want.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Nothing new. Just read this:
http://lxer.com/module/newswire/view/57261/ [lxer.com]
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000339.html [joelonsoftware.com]
And spread the news to other newbies!
Re:Slew of recent marketting... (Score:5, Informative)
From the very beginning, in fact. Microsoft got started by Gates and Allen saying that they were working on a BASIC interpreter for the Altair 8800, when, in fact, they neither had the hardware nor were writing code for it. That is to say, Microsoft made vaporware even before it was founded.
Increasing speed (Score:5, Funny)
MS also announced demos of IE10, IE11 and IE12.
"A new release every month! That's our goal!" said sweaty, vaguely simian MS CEO Steve Ballmer. The new Hachamovitch Javascript engine will interface with the Millajovovich subsystem to spawn independent processes to more effectively deliver those animated ads everyone loves!"
"Like that punch the monkey ad! I love that one!" Ballmer said and began his patented monkey dance. "C'mon everyone! Punch the monkey!"
When asked about MS simply adopting WebKit and making everyone's life easier and even saving themselves piles of money, Ballmer pulled out a shotgun and killed the reporter.
"Oops! Thought he was zombie," said Ballmer and shot the reporter's body again. "Double tap!"
Doesn't install on XP (Score:3, Informative)
This probably goes without saying, but the IE9 preview does not install on Windows XP.
You've got to give Microsoft some credit (Score:3, Funny)
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If the JavaScript is under a certain size, then it probably compiles so fast on modern* PCs that users won't notice.
* Meeting recommended hardware specification for Windows 7.
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idk just seams like it would only work better for when the java script is a certain size...
What does this even mean? Size has nothing to do with it, and how is IE supposed to "pre-compile" javascripts it fetches from the websites?
But overall compiling (quickly, and taking advantage of multi-cores) then running is a lot faster approach than running non-compiled code all the time. Especially with AJAX sites most of the javascript isn't even executed right away but when user clicks something, and then it's already compiled and fast code.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Even if you wait, it's 55/100. But the IE9 preview page is upfront about this - it will actually tell that much before it redirects you to Acid3.
I guess that's why it's called an "early preview", eh?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You've missed the overall point. This isn't even alpha quality software, it's in development. They aren't claiming they passed, they are just showing that they are making progress.
What you're doing is kinda like picking on a 2 year old for not having an expansive vocabulary.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I know they're not claiming they've passed. But you've assumed something pretty big: "hey are just showing that they are making progress". If they've only got to 55, and the process of reaching 55 does not fulfil the rest of the test (being smooth, namely) then it actually hasn't even got to 55. It may as well be at zero.
To be fair, you're also making a big assumption: that someone cares what you consider the score that an alpha browser achieves against a test it's not trying to pass is.
I mean, this is a s
Re:Nice try with ACID3, Microsoft (Score:5, Informative)
No, you've missed my point: They're excusing something that's part of the test. Nowhere else do they explain away the current score or what's missing. The text on the page seems to give the impression the pause is acceptable or 'as intended'. But it's not - it has failed ACID.
They don't claim it passed ACID3. In fact, after continuing from 39, it never gets past 55. Read the IE9 arstechnica article from a few hours ago to see their comments on ACID3, mainly that they don't put any priority on passing it but that their score is going up as they improve their standards compliance.
Re: (Score:2)
And honestly, I don't think that should bother us all *that much*. ACID3 was not meant to be the be-all and end-all of browser tests. It's just one tool that browser developers can use to measure their progress towards standards compliance, but compliance is the goal.
So the real issues: Are how compliant is IE? Is it making good progress towards compliance? Is it an honest attempt by Microsoft, or are they giving a shady half-measure while sabotaging the standards?
I don't know the answers to those que
Re:Nice try with ACID3, Microsoft (Score:5, Informative)
It's scoring a 55. That's a fail no matter what. You're latching on to the wrong point. The important part, which you've glossed over so neatly, is that Microsoft included that 55/100 on ACID3 as part of the actual news. They're freely admitting upfront, "hey, on this test, we're still doing badly, but we are working on improving. It's just not our focus."
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They're not "upgrading," 9 is different from 8 which is different from 6. They're not running the same core. They're just keeping the name.
Re:Microsoft should stop (Score:4, Insightful)
As a web developer, I'm really glad that every version of IE has been more standards compliant than the last.
It would be nice if the everyone magically installed FireFox or Safari or Chrome, but that doesn't seem to have happened yet.
Our best hope for killing off older versions of IE is newer versions of IE and an automatic upgrade path.
Frankly 8 doesn't seem that bad to me. Most of my code just works with IE 8. I'm really excited about HTML 5 and SVG in IE 9.
Re:first comment! (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
It could be worse. The name could be Internet-Complaint Explorer 9, but that would be redundant.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If you don't want Active-X, disabled it.
Re:Webkit (Score:4, Interesting)
Homogenisation leads to stagnation, even when it's not Microsoft driving it.
People need to realise that it's a *bad* thing if everyone's using Firefox or all the browsers are using webkit as their rendering engine or everyone's running AMD processors. Variety provides competition, which results in progress.
Agreed, everyone missed that (Score:4, Interesting)
With all the idiots fighting over the usual crap no one mentioned that it doesn't seem to support the canvas element. Microsoft has specifically tried to get the canvas element removed from the HTML5 spec. (as per here [canvasdemos.com]). And I know why Microsoft doesn't want the canvas element in there: because it's a direct threat to Silverlight.