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[Tomas (imported)]

Which of course, Riverwind, is why there are international standards agreed to by the vast majority of manufacturers.

Admittedly MSIE is the 'easy way out' for many IT departments, even if it does not follow the established standards. If it comes with the computer why change - just stick with it and learn it foibles - make workarounds.

There are standards in most technologies - that is why AC plugs fit into outlets and bullets fit into guns. It is only when one company becomes so powerful, and their products so overwhelmingly in use, that they begin to feel they can afford to ignore the established standards and set their own.

If a company can do that, and not provide the details of their proprietary 'tricks' to others, they can make the other products seem to be inferior and poorly designed simply by having all their products set up with the same quirk. If one "owns" 95 percent of any market, one can freeze out the competition by simply changing the rules on everyone else.

Luckily, some IT departments look more deeply into a product and it's performance than "it came in the box."

The last two companies I worked for were like that. One was large (67,000 employees) the other small (6 employees) but both took it upon themselves to standardize on products that followed international standards rather than whatever fell out of the box. Neither standardized on MSIE.

Yes, more people use MSIE than use any other browser. More people drive Chevys than drive Cadilacs, Fords than drive Lincolns, just about anything than drive Rolls Royce or Mercedes. Just because more people use a product does not automatically make it better.

Some people always look for the easiest answer, others want a right answer, some just want to be different. None of them are inherently wrong.

One can argue logically on most any side of any issue, be it body modifications, operating systems, cars, or browsers. Thing is, one seldom leaves with anything more than they walked in with unless they open their minds and look at the reasons for the differing opinions.

Some of my opinions come from personal dealings with WHG III and a strong dislike for his amorality and his company's business practices. Looking beyond those issues, though, I also find that just because his products came with a lot of the boxes out there does not automatically make them the best, but only the most obvious choice. Some things really are better than those that are most used.

We all need to learn that and live with it. We also all need to understand that the good guys don't always win.

Take care,

Tom

[Robby (imported)]

Which of course, Riverwind, is why there are international standards agreed to by the vast majority of manufacturers.

...We all need to learn that and live with it. We also all need to understand that the good guys don't always win.

Take care,

TomTom,

You have many good points to ponder. I fully agree with you on WHG III, his company is the most offensive of all. Fair play? That is a thing of the past when it comes to MS.

Now, lets get down to the real nuts and bolts of this discussion. What operating system and browser is most pervasive in the public perview (lets keep this to the U.S. market)? MS and IE. Who brought the WWW to the masses? Not MS. What browser brought ease and comfort to the masses? Not IE. What company undermined the masses with IE? MS... yes MS.

With that being said, we looked at the percentage of users on MS and IE. As Talula said previously, less than 1% (something like .2%), are using browsers other than MS IE {Correction: using browser levels less than Netcape/IE 4.0}. This is no easy way out as you keep putting forth. This was a logical choice.

If you want to discuss business, lets talk about the need many companies face when it comes to their software libraries. No one wants to support a myriad of disparate products doing the same things. Standards are put in place and people's feet are held to the fire. The software library doesn't represent the best and greatest choices. It represents a choice in keeping costs down (which could be debated), a standard catalog of applications that work together and reduction in technical support issues brought about by technologies that do not work well together.

Internet/Intranet, LAN based, and stand alone applications work best with standardized communication interfaces. Sure, MS is not the leader in this sector of the market and they never will be true innovators. That is not their goal in life. Their goal is market share and profits. Most PC based machines in the U.S. are MS based. We can't argue that fact and we certainly can't change that fact here at the E.A. We strive to implement technologies for the masses.

Are we bound to implement the best? NO, we are not. Do we want to implement the best? Not really. We want to implement a solution for the masses.

Tom, this is not an argument. This is reality in the making. Apple Computer, which has more resources than you command, could not beat MS at this marketing game. At this time, nobody has enough resources to beat MS. I do not support MS but I want to surf with ease and MS is the player...

Take care Tom...

[Tomas (imported)]

I understand that, Robby, and in my earlier post you may recall my saying that the only thing that bothered me in this thread was the "Fu*k 'em if they don't use MSIE on MS Windows" attitude in just one post.

I'm not arguing for any other path than the one chosen, I'm not saying there are any errors in the decisions made for the EA, I'm not even saying that there are any problems with the way any of the pages work.

The comment you quote from was a direct response to Riverwind's, and not a reflection on the EA or it's choices. It was simply a side discussion on how software is chosen in business (and elsewhere) - which I suppose is far enough off track (though responsive) to cause confusion.

One thing I (and many others) do, is to cause our browsers to identify as MSIE even though they really aren't.

Why is that? Because for some unfathomable reason if a browser does not ID as MSIE many pages either feed some specialized (crippled?) source to the browser or refuse to accept the request. If the browser ID's as MSIE, however, and is given the same page source as the MSIE browser, it performs at least as well as MSIE.

In other words we 'spoof' our browser's client ID to get around ridiculous strictures unfairly placed on non-MSIE browsers for no logical reason.

Not all of the "MSIE's" in a page's stats are really MSIE - not that it makes any difference for the purposes of the EA's choices.

For those getting excited about having an ox gored, I apologize, and will again wander off to find a bridge under which to hide, and wait for travellers. I should have ignored the one post that riled me.

My apologies to bystanders.

Take care,

Tom

P.S. I don't browser spoof to the EA servers - they see this browser as Camino, not MSIE. There is no penalty on EA for not using MSIE that I have observed.

Neither MSIE, nor any other browser, can currently use tabbed browsing from the main page. This is not a huge failing, only a comment from someone else who also tabs - which started this whole discussion. The fact that one person appeared to take this as an attack and respond awkwardly had little if anything to do with objective reality.

Ah! Here's my bridge.

T

[Robby (imported)]

Tom,

I happen to agree with all you say. I use Opera and do the same thing, spoof as MSIE. I know this is ridiculous and my Apple Notebook doesn't offer any options to resolve the issue of tabbing.

There was no issue as to an attack, only discussion. Please don't be hurt by this dialog, your thoughts are greatly appreciated.

The message board is here for all to express their opinions. We may not like what we read and therefore have the option to respond in kind.

Take care buddy,

[An Onymus (imported)]

Of course, the internet, and also a lot of business and other applications software, have become so pervasive, both in the economy and in society in general, that the whole works is somewhat in the nature of a public utility. To allow one rather quirky company to dominate the whole area of computer software, seems to be rather foolish social policy.

Of course, some innovations like Linux are pointing the way to something better--albeit, I don't consider Linux much of an improvement on Windows.

[Tomas (imported)]

Just as a VERY quick aside: I note that the time between my last two visits to the EA main page was over three months.

Obviously I do not use the main page of the Eunuch Archive: My bookmarks are much deeper into the site architecture.

I don't know if that affects the stats used, as I don't know what stats were looked at.

My only reason to visit the main page was to find out what folks were talking about in this thread, and my only reason for even commenting was the additional marginalization of some EA visitors evidenced by the opinions expressed in one post.

Carry on,

Tom

[talula]

Perhaps some clarification is in order.

When I said that .2% of the Archive users would be affected I was referring to those that continue to work browser levels less than Netcape/IE 4.0.

Yes we have users still using Netscape 2 and it is time for them to upgrade.

I suppose someone could be mis-representing thier browser type/version as Netscape 2, but why would they want to?

The Archive is not set up to display pages based on user type, and why would we want to?

tal

p.s. Despite rumors to the contrary, the Archive I.T. department does think outside of "The Box", writes in several different programming languages, uses several different operating systems, and knows it's impolite to pick your nose in front of a job interviewer.

[Tomas (imported)]

Talula, just as a quick point of reference, since the 0.2% was a reference to obsolete browsers, could you tell us roughly how the EA's 'MSIE vs not-MSIE' numbers stack up?

I'd be curious to see if your numbers are somehow astonishingly different from what I see at my sites (83:17).

Thanks,

Tom

[talula]

Sure Thomas,

Last month's stats go as follows:

IE 87.7%

Netscape 7.1%

Opera 1.3%

Safari 1%

Webtv .2%

Konqueror .1%

A pile of PDA browsers, Lynx, etc.

[radar (imported)]

In other words we 'spoof' our browser's client ID to get around ridiculous strictures unfairly placed on non-MSIE browsers for no logical reason.

Hi Tomas, and thanks for the support. I really wasn't trying to be difficult about the change, and you pointed that out quite nicely, and explained it much better than I ever could.

But please tell me: How do I spoof the client ID? Is that done as a registry tweak?