Why doesn't IE offer full CSS support?
This question has been plaguing webdevelopers for years now. IE 6 has the dubious honor of being this era's Netscape 4 browser: buggy, incomplete CSS 2 implementation, but still having too much market share to ignore. So why is MS not upgrading their browser, which last saw a significant change in around 2001 or thereabouts? Interesting question, here's one possible answer, one of the first I've come across that actually makes sense:
:: Quote :: "It also seems that CSS support may be more important for client side work, and full or complete CSS support makes a thin client more attractive. This would seem to be counter to Microsoft's push for 'rich' clients. So you might not expect them to rush to fix any issues in this area," Cherry added.
:: Michael Cherry, senior analyst at Directions on Microsoft [From microsoft-watch.com]. You can read the full article here Now that's an interesting angle, while many out there may think that the days of the fat, obese in many cases, client will never end, there are a lot of others out there who would like nothing better to see desktops move to either a thin or slim client configuration. And Windows is anything but thin. The latest talk is more and more about running small OS'es like Beatrix Linux off of compact flash or embedded memory chips. In this configuration, a network admin's dream, most of the software would run on central servers, and be accessed by, you guessed it, your browser. Google is also working in this area apparently. Like Gmail, it will run off of Google's servers, making the operating system you use to access your applications and data irrelevant. I don't see this happening any time soon as a mass movement, but there are lots of very good reasons to move towards this model, especially in large organizations, where all the data is stored on central file servers already. MS can see the writing on the wall here, Windows gets more and more complex, when maybe what's needed is simplicity in the long run. Back to top |
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