Microsoft: Give ie another chance

Microsoft: Give ie another chance

Microsoft IE team developers and project managers called on users to give IE browsers another chance in an interview with the social networking website Reddit on Thursday. They claimed that the follow-up products of IE8 are very much worth looking forward, they also confirmed that although they will release some small-scale regular feature upgrades, they will certainly release IE12.

They also said they even considered changing the name of the IE browser so that the product could not be renamed.

According to Net Applications, a market research company, Internet Explorer's current user shares are still as high as 58%, almost three times that of Google Chrome, which ranks second, with a share of 20%.

However, compared with the previous one, the user share of IE browser has dropped a lot. In May January 2005, its user share was as high as 89%. At that time, Firefox was ranked second, with only 6% of the latter.

In December 2011, the user shares of IE browsers dropped to the lowest point in history, with only 52%. The reason why the user shares of IE browsers have been decreasing for a long time, the main reason was Microsoft's decision to stop developing the product over the past 10 years. At that time, Microsoft believed that the product had won the browser war.

Now, IE developers hope Windows users can give IE another chance.

"Many times, users make a decision not to use IE Based on the situation ten years ago," said Jonathan Sampson, an developer, at that time, the IE is very different from the current IE. We know that our task is to change the user's perception of IE and win the support of users. Some users will download another browser after opening IE, and they will be the objects we will strive for in the future ."

Microsoft developers and project managers also talked about Microsoft's expected user views. When asked whether Microsoft has considered discarding the name "IE", Samson gave a positive response.

He said: "The company has always had such suggestions. I remember many people have actively discussed this issue. The employees put forward a lot of ideas and suggestions to help us eliminate users' negative views on IE, which cannot reflect our current products ."

Samson implies that changing the browser name is not impossible. He said: "I remember a few weeks ago when someone was discussing the matter. Who knows what will happen in the future ?"

Microsoft recently made a decision to stop providing security upgrade support for earlier IE versions from January 2016. This was approved by critics. Critics also raised some questions about this policy, because it overturned Microsoft's previous commitments.

Someone suggested: "how determined are you to force enterprise users to upgrade to IE11? Our company's employees don't even catch a cold on IE9, let alone the following products ."

Colleen Williams, another developer of the IE team, replied: "We are serious ." She also said that the IE team was very happy to make the decision.

Someone suggested: "What are users' attitudes when Microsoft releases browser support policies ?" Williams replied: "The company made a sensation inside the company when it modified this policy ."

Analysts said last week that although this may be the case, the test results have been insufficient to persuade enterprise users to accept the new policy.

Directions on Microsoft's westmiller Wes Miller said a week ago about changes in IE support policies: "This will irritate enterprise users who want to continue using traditional applications ."

They also talked about how Microsoft has accelerated the release of new IE versions. Microsoft announced the decision last week to upgrade Windows through smaller and more frequent feature upgrades. This also applies to IE, which has been upgraded several times recently, mainly by integrating Developer Tools.

"Since IE11, we have been using the monthly Tuesday upgrade to upgrade IE, not just to enhance its security and reliability. Last week, we started to launch new and enhanced F12 Developer Tools, WebGL instance extensions and other enhancements, as well as support for WebDriver infrastructure ."

In fact, Microsoft wants to follow the practices of Google and Firefox to regularly and frequently upgrade browsers. IE developers pointed out that the release speed of the new version has been accelerated.

Williams said: "We have accelerated the release of the new version of IE, from 2 to 18 months to 12 months. Although we are getting better, we still have more work to do ." She also said that Microsoft and IE are aiming to achieve a release pace similar to Chrome and Firefox. The former will release a new version every 6 to 8 weeks, the release cycle of the latter version is 6 weeks.

When asked about his expectations for the IE upgrade, the developer Greg Whitworth replied: "I really hope we can release the new version of IE at a faster pace. This helps us solve many problems and add new functions in a more timely manner. We can certainly achieve this goal, but now we have to continue to work hard ."

In addition, Microsoft apparently does not intend to change the product version number frequently. Like Google and Mozilla, Microsoft does not intend to change the version number once a month. In other words, Microsoft will certainly release IE12.

Someone suggested: "Will Microsoft release IE12? Will some functional changes be included in the small-scale upgrade of IE11? Will IE11 be the last version of this browser ?"

Charlie Morris Charles Morris replied: "IE11 won't be its last version ."

IE12 may be released at the same time as the next version of Windows with the product code "Threshold". Microsoft may name the next version of Windows as "Windows 9 ". Most insiders speculate that Windows 9 and IE12 may be released in the spring of 2015, while Gartner predicts the second quarter.

Although it is still unclear, the digital naming method of IE is still very important. When Microsoft announced a change to its support policy in August 7, it claimed that "only the latest version of IE browser will receive technical support and security upgrades ."

For example, if IE11 was replaced by IE12 in May, the former will be removed from support for Windows 8 or Windows 8.1.

However, Microsoft is reluctant to disclose how long it will support IE11 after the next version of IE is released. According to Microsoft's statement, as long as IE12 is released, IE11 will become retired.

Although yesterday's interview did not mention the future support time, the IE team hinted that it was only a matter of time before and after to stop providing support services for IE11.

"Our goal is to allow users to use the latest version of browsers," said Matt Rakow ."