Date: Thu, 1 Nov 2001 13:52:01 +0000 From: Nik Clayton <nik@freebsd.org> To: Paul Robinson <paul@akita.co.uk> Cc: Craig Harding <crh@outpost.co.nz>, chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Supporting MS IE (was Re: NatWest? no thanks) Message-ID: <20011101135201.N99754@clan.nothing-going-on.org> In-Reply-To: <20011101112107.F43740@jake.akitanet.co.uk>; from paul@akita.co.uk on Thu, Nov 01, 2001 at 11:21:07AM %2B0000 References: <15328.13403.591620.246277@hyde.lpds.sublink.org> <20011031210224.A710-100000@howie.ncptiddische.net> <20011101095903.B43740@jake.akitanet.co.uk> <3BE126AF.F555A4E0@outpost.co.nz> <20011101112107.F43740@jake.akitanet.co.uk>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
--qi3SIpffvxS/TM8d Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On Thu, Nov 01, 2001 at 11:21:07AM +0000, Paul Robinson wrote: > Now, instead of moaning about how IE doesn't do this, or doesn't follow t= his > standard, perhaps, just perhaps, we should put some development effort in= to > Mozilla and other browsers to make them IE compatible. At this point, it = is > the OSS development community's job to make user's switch by giving them a > similar browser experience to IE but without any of the nasty stuff (like= it > crashing, Passport stuff, etc.). We're a long way from there, but to say = we > shouldn't start out is ridiculous. Doesn't work. Because now you've just handed effective control of the standard to Microsoft. Go re-read the Halloween memos, and the bit about embracing and extending commodity protocols and standards in order to lock out competition. I note that one online bank in the UK (Egg) is now planning on switching to using MS Passport for authentication. > Also, you seem to imply that we should all support all browsers. That's r= ot, > and you know it is. How about this then - you can use your on-line bank w= ith > any browser you want, but you have to pay, say, an extra $50 setup to fund > the development? If you're genuinely happy to do that, tell your bank. One of your earlier examples gives the lie to this. Smile (the bank I use) switched from a slow, browser dependent, crash prone Java applet to a CGI implementation. They've retained (as far as I can see) all the functionality, and have transformed their online banking experience (for want of a better phrase) from something that used to be very frustrating to something that is much more convenient and (possibly psychologically) much faster. As an aside, it also lets me do clever things. Because their interface is (effectively) an application where the URLs form command strings, I can write simple[1] Perl scripts that can go to the site, and pull down my current balance for me. Which is actually quite handy. I couldn't do that before. N [1] Well, moderately complex --=20 FreeBSD: The Power to Serve http://www.freebsd.org/ FreeBSD Documentation Project http://www.freebsd.org/docproj/ --- 15B8 3FFC DDB4 34B0 AA5F 94B7 93A8 0764 2C37 E375 --- --qi3SIpffvxS/TM8d Content-Type: application/pgp-signature Content-Disposition: inline -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.0.6 (FreeBSD) Comment: For info see http://www.gnupg.org iEYEARECAAYFAjvhU4EACgkQk6gHZCw343Xq6ACbBIUQcOEjmEc94qFHKtI0LUoi l3oAmgO+EiJ4aXAZXf763g0jOSFM7Vzd =OpcO -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --qi3SIpffvxS/TM8d-- To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20011101135201.N99754>