Posted on 03/22/2009 9:32:50 PM PDT by Swordmaker
Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 has now been available, downloaded, installed and tested around the world and, so far, the reviews have been OK if not mixed. But a mini-storm could be brewing on the horizon. When IE 8 dropped on Thursday, many in the development community rushed to download it, install it and try it out on the Acid 3 Test, developed by The Web Standards Project. All over the world, the score was turning up the same for almost everyone. Out of a possible score of 100, IE 8 rang up 20. It failed the test and failed it badly.
What's the early reaction to IE8's performance on Acid3? Well, on Twitter, there's this:
Ugh! Activating that ActiveX control did nothing. IE8 is still 20/100 on Acid3. What a waste.
Or this:
Acid3 test FAIL in Internet Explorer 8. Actually crashed the browser.
Or this:
I did the acid3 test on my wife's phone with 2.2 and got 74/100.
Or this:
So IE8 scores 20/100 on the Acid3 test. The next 8 years should be fun trying to work around the usual IE incompatibilities... :/
Is this all just a bunch of developer psychodrama?
Consider this: Developers cast a vote every day for the technology that will ultimately win out in the marketplace - - the technology that can more than most help them to be successful. Standards help them to be successful. And while IE 8 is scoring 20 out of 100 on the Acid 3 standards test, a company down the coast, in Cupertino, Calif., did just a tad better. Apple's Safari 4 browser scores 100 on Acid 3. They also have a little product called the iPhone that uses Safari, that's enjoying some success.
In and of itself, standards compliance for free software like a browser won't determine the king of the marketplace. But Microsoft is losing market share on the desktop, and its desktop business actually shrunk during its most recent quarter. Right now it could use all the friends it can get. And in a community critical to the technology industry, its longtime rival Apple now has a big advantage.
Every time you start or reboot your computer, the system itself will open a Notepad automatically at startup. Actually that's because the desktop.ini has been put into the wrong place.Here is the fix.
*Explorer - Orgnize - Folder and search opition - view
*uncheck "Hide protected system files"
*check "Show hidden files,folders and drivers"
*Navigate to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup
*Delete the desktop.ini file
*Done
Microsoft violates standards intentionally as an anti-competitive practice. Making its products as incompatible as possible with others is a way of forcing consumers to remain with Microsoft rather than choosing software on the basis of price and performance.
Using Firefox and a purchased version of AVG 7.5, I managed to get the Vundo rootkit virus. That virus was a royal pain to remove.
One of the things I really dislike about the most recent version of firefox is that they've changed the way bookmarks are managed. Used to be, you've have a 'bookmarks.html' file that was extraordinarily portable. (i.e., my bookmarks file is more than 10 years old - I've moved it from computer to computer, from one version to another. I have URLS for gopher sites, but that's another discussion). Seems that FF is now keeping bookmarks in a mysql database now. You can apparently export a bookmarks.html file from within the bookmarks manager, but it doesn't truely use the bookmarks.html file anymore.
I noticed this not all that terribly long ago because I use my bookmarks file as my homepage. It really speeds up the initial load of FF and makes it so you can quickly jump to a given page. What I noticed was that a new bookmark I'd added wasn't on the list when I restarted FF. At first I thought I'd done something weird, but a little digging showed that the 3.x versions of FF no longer use the bookmarks.html file.
ARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!
O.K. I don't care who you are but that's funny! :-)
Business web applications (both internal to the business and exposed on the external web) do a LOT of javascript, particularly when doing Ajax.
Excellent definition of troll dayglored. I've been following the discussion, and enjoying it. I must say that y'all aren't playing this 'internet discussion' thing quite right. For example, I've yet to see the word "nazi" in posts from either of you. Someone's slipping around here.
I'm a unix/linux guy, but I still drop in the apple and windows threads because some of the windows supporters are every bit as annoying as the mac heads and unix nerds.
While i use Firefox as my main browser (OpenSUSE 11.1), i've found that Opera (now version 9.6) is much faster. Of course, i have A LOT of extensions on Firefox, and that tends to slow it down.
As for that "Paste and go" feature, it might be beneficial to contact some extension developers and see what can be accomplished. i've done so with some theme developers. They do listen to suggestions.
And IE8 would have prevented that from happening...HOW?
Seeing as how you would have had to download the file, your problem was probably the ID10T interface on the keyboard/mouse.
That one has bit me on the @$$ a couple of times.
I used to haul my bookmarks.html file around too, until I discovered the Foxmarks add-on. If you don’t mind your bookmarks being out there on somebody else’s computer, it’s really handy. I have a couple of different accounts, one for work, and one for home.
| IE 7 | 38% |
| Firefox 3 | 35.4% |
| IE 6 | 14% |
| Safari 3.2 | 6.4% |
| Firefox 2 | 2.6% |
| Chrome 1 | 1% |
| IE 8 | 0.6% |
| iPhone | 0.4% |
| Safari 4 | 0.4% |
I don't know that any IE would have prevented it. My point was that using a fully up to date Firefox and up to date purchased version of AVG, I still got a really nasty virus.
Seeing as how you would have had to download the file, your problem was probably the ID10T interface on the keyboard/mouse.
In both cases where I got a Vundo infection, I wasn't downloading anything. I just opened a page, things slowed to a crawl and only after the damage had been inflicted did AVG start complaining.
I have heard that Vundo uses a Java exploit in which case, an embedded applet may have done the dirty deed.
Since then, I installed Registry Mechanic and have it constantly monitoring my registry. I don't know how well that additional defense works as I have not stepped on the Vundo landmine again.
Not slipping, it's intentional. ;-)
We're trying to avoid invoking Godwin's Law, and the surest way to do that is to let the discussion degenerate into reductio ad Hitlerum.
Oh, poop, I guess I haven't tried moving it recently enough. That sucks bigtime. BIGTIME. "ARRRGGGHHH" indeed.
Yeah, but what's the fun in that?
> Yeah, but what's the fun in that?
Well, I enjoy the conversation, repartee, good argument. Once you trigger Godwin's, you lose.
Unless, of course, the other person really -is- a nazi, in which case the argument was sorta pointless from the git-go...
LOl. Agreed.
What did previous versions of IE score? But of course in the end it doesn’t matter, IE is the standard, if you’re making a web app that’s going to be in the Windows market you code to IE and might not even test on other browsers. Sure it would be nice if IE followed the standards so you could code to them and have your app probably work on many other browsers, but that’s not good for MS. Own the market and let everybody else be “buggy”, that’s the MS way.
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