Yes, nothing else I want, too. I know my posts might polarize in some way. But actually at recent days when I browse through the web I have to read news that make me think about M$'es monopoly and ways they enforce it. Concerning google's Android I have a great variety of browsers I can choose. I don't have the impression the third party browsers are in a way restricted, though. Many prefer browsers such as dolphin over the original AOSP browser...and Samsung for instance has its own stock browser as well, which I prefer. So there is competition...
Well, imagine if the freedom with mobile sotware was the same as with PCs, how much more malware would be out in the web, I think that evil developers is one of the justifications of a closed ecosystem. Now, I completely agree that innovation is what should be driving the development, but unfortunately the companies now just care about high-profit short-term investments. Imagine if Henry Ford or Thomas Alba Edison were living in our time, they would have never get the sponsors to fund their projects. It's a really sad reality of the tech world.
@100, Those words are very dear to my heart, and I think you hit it right on the head. I may come off as biased, but then again, bias is inescapable. For if you try to be unbiased, then that is your bias (choosing to be unbiased versus being biased). Anyhow, I am very openly against any company that stifles our innovation, our creativity, our freedom, and ultimately what it means to be human. If I owned an Apple iPod or iPad, which I do not, I would jail break the sucker. My focus on M$ is simply because their behavior over the last decades has deserved it. I can think of no other company that has acted as predatory and controlling and on such a large scale. M$ is king of that type of behavior and I am simply crowning them as they have rightfully merited such.
Mr. Ford, a good keyword. Let me compare car industry to high tech OSes. Firstly a main issue is that a car is an object one can touch, an OS consists of data. But: How many different models of cars we can choose? We have different engines: Diesel, gas, gasoline, two stroke, four stroke, four-cylinder, six...., electric, hydrogen, fuel cells.... Engine technology is high tech AND old tech. Every developer can develop new engines, there is no monopoly (one company that is allowed to make diesel engines alone). Engines are 'open' source, cars are open source The only successful model for innovation can be open source. Sure the car industry has own interests (money) and a lobby also in politics. Also cars are controlled. They have to pass local technical controls, there are requirements for our safety. Do we need monopoly /closed source to gain safety? NO! We need one who is responsible that requirements regarding safety are realized. And that sure can be google who can remove a app from their google play store, or Apple, or M$. But we don't need a closed 'system' to exclude malware. The AOSP is the future, open source. Without open source there never will be real innovation. AndroidOpenSourceProject. Google is responsible and has the right to control, but code is open source. Device manufacturers are allowed to fit the AOSP code for their needs, so we have HTC's Android, Samsung's Android...(there are the different cars that have got the same kind of engine). We have the app developer and programmer, we have an entire market. And we have the Android community which consists of private persons. The ROM cooker who customize, style the OS, they implement handy features. Compared to cars there are the private tinkerer who give their cars a new look, tuning, more power....and all the industry around, the market. Have a look at Android devices, and get how much variety we have here already. Is Android unsafer than windows? Open source is the future. Its engine is the Linux kernel. I'd appreciate to have even more. M$es and Apples models are purely made to gain most profit. They restrict to exclude competitors. They are based on lies to fool the consumers. They sell restriction as coolness. And the best thing: It works. (because of stupidity). This is my biased opinion, hope not to be in a rude way. We have now a complete new chance with the ARM CPUs and a big market of mobiles, tablets and portables. It all can change to the better, it seems Android makes its way. Yes, I knew that. (You know me and my kind of humor, sometimes a bit of spitefulness, especially regarding M$ and Apple).
Seriously who gives a sh!t if they won't be supporting Google or Firefox? If they have perfected their IE and work just as good as Chrome or Firefox no one will give a rat ass about it.
That is what I thought about all these discussions. My personal experience with W8 is, that IE10 works best on my tablet. It is faster than FF and Chrome and behaves much smoother than those mentioned. The only problem which I see is the lack of addons like FF provides. I hate advertisemt at all and with an adblock addon, I can customise my FF. If this were the same with IE10 or whatever version, I could get along with it like I do with FF. Performence like gesture handling is the best I can state with W8CP on my tablet PC. Paul PS: I found such addon now for IE as well and this makes me feel even more comfortable with IE now ...
Do you expect a honest answer to your question? It are obviously people like you. People who don't get that the option to have a choice means freedom. Freedom of choice. Behind every product there is the idea and vision of the creator. To have a place for all of them is innovation and progress. To exclude some of them is restriction and slows down innovation for nothing but own profit. Technology needs to get forwards, but not the interests of a monopolist. So if there would be a car that comes with only one particular interior, specified by the monopolist. You would say yes, I don't need to have the choice to take another one? Even though there are many many other interiors available? Why should you? The original covers already your needs....and so it's ok that the monopolist excludes all others.
Yen, I agree with you 100% but as a standard user: What choice do I have if the monopolist still makes the rules? Any new version that works fine on my computer is most wellcome and I really like varieties of any kind. However power of a single big company like M$ or the one with fruit has to be broken one day and probably it will come that way. Until then, we need to take what we get and rely on guys like you are to get us out of that jungle one day. All the best Paul
I feel Google, Mozilla, and Opera have a double-standard between Microsoft and Apple. In Apple's iOS ecosystem, the browser is even MORE locked down and restricted than the browser on Windows RT. Yet, I don't see the same kind of outrage, the same call for the DOJ and EU, etc. Can I install Firefox, Chrome, or Opera Mobile on iOS devices? Hell no! Apple specifically forbid all third-party HTML/JS engines. Even if you build a shell for the built-in WebKit engine, you still can not use the JIT with JS. Can I install Firefox on Chromebook without resorting to hacks? No! One more thing: You can not change default browser from Safari to another shell browser. Microsoft allows the default browser to be changed. Where's the complain in Apple? At least on Windows RT, any third-party browser can code up their own HTML/JS engines using the WinRT API. The exception is that JIT is not supported. This is far more lenient than Apple where it's just banned.
Seriously maybe there is a reason for them to lock down on an ARM version of Windows 8. So where are the complains on regular Windows 8 for desktop or for tablets? They are still free to have Firefox and Chrome install on them and in Metro. You're not even going to use Windows 8 so I don't see why you are even complaining.
Only potential owner of w8 have the right to complain about, ah, OK. Btw: To offer criticism and to complain are two very different animals. I share the concerns of Mozilla and Google, that's all. (Will they all use w8, lol?). Mozilla is highly respected to me. The Firefox era made it possible to break out of M$es browser monopoly. Without it we probably still would have just one browser. A browser which even would be worse than it is today. When M$ recognized that IE loses quickly market share they were forced to improve it. Without that competition M$ would have done nothing. Mozilla is a paragon that the better product can make its way and that competition is good for innovation. IE still doesn't fully support HTML5 and CSS3
Well said Yen. Mozilla forced M$ to attempt to make a better browser. Competition breeds choice, and choice breeds better quality.
So only M$ code will be able to load in the Windows Classic enviroment, and all apis are undocumented. Will all Windows Classic enviroment apis be contained in dlls with full name in a export table, or will they export by ordinal only?.
If iPad and Android tablets get the ability to change the default browser to Firefox/Chrome versions it would be fine, otherwise I completely agree with MS. It would be so wrong if Microsoft has to allow third party browsers and Apple does not. Windows on ARM isn't even a full Windows 8 version, lacking lots of older API structures and ability to run x86 classic apps (I doubt even the Metro browsers tapping into these APIs would work as well as their x86/64bit counterparts. Smart and righteous choice, Microsoft.
On Android you can use these browsers (of which I know): Chrome, Dolphin Browser mini and HD, Opera Mobile Web Browser, Skyfire Web Browser, Mozilla Firefox Web Browser, Miren Browser, xScope Browser, Boat Browser, Maxthon Browser for Android, NetFront Life Browser... But I have to admit to uninstall the 'stock' default browser you need root access. Anyway you can set any of those browsers to be the default browser, uninstalled or not.
The reason you can't run x86 software on ARM is because the processor instructions are different and it's impossible to execute x86 binaries; it's not something MS has a choice of supporting, the executables have to be recompiled for the different processor architecture by the developer. If you remember Apple's switch from PowerPC to x86, it was the same thing. It's just not possible to run the existing PowerPC binaries on x86, you need a recompiled "Universal Binary" of the executable. Of course it would be possible to compile "classic" executables for ARM if MS gave developers the possibilities (i.e. the SDK targeting ARM and the compiler). It's not something the OS "can't do". It very well can, and they're preventing third-party developers from using it for no other reason than to lock users into using "Metro-style apps", i.e. the Windows Store. I think the question of what browser you can use is irrelevant here. It's a symptom, but it's not the cause of the problem.