On Thu, 17 Aug 2006 05:23:24 +0100, Roy Schestowitz wrote:
> __/ [ Oliver Wong ] on Wednesday 16 August 2006 19:10 \__
>
>> <nessuno@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
>> news:1155745520.068780.23650@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>>
>>> Erik cited this same guy's blog a few days ago to support the notion
>>> that Microsoft is dedicated to standards compliance and is doing the
>>> reasonable thing (I think that's why he cited it). The way this story
>>> has developed, it shows exactly the opposite, and is very revealing
>>> about sentiments out there in the developer world.
>>
>> I don't know about Microsoft, but the guy himself seems to be dedicated
>> to standards compliance:
>>
>> http://blogs.msdn.com/cwilso/archive/2006/08/15/701894.aspx
>> <quote>
>> This post is about me. Please do not post comments about Microsoft's
>> behavior in response to this post.
>> [...]
>> There's a lot of anger aimed at Microsoft, in particular around IE. A lot
>> of it comes out in comments, here and in the IEBlog. A lot of the
>> frustration behind it is certainly justified, though being frustrated at me
>> personally is not. I try very hard never to take it personally, and usually
>> succeed. I occasionally let blatant inaccuracies piss me off, and then I
>> can get pretty pissy in tone in reply. (The inaccuracies are frequently
>> the result of anti-Microsoft sentiment to begin with, compounded with the
>> last five years of web browser non-feature-development.) Too many people
>> read that as "typical Microsoft arrogance", which frankly pisses me off all
>> the more, because I've personally railed against Microsoft arrogance for
>> longer than most of you have been involved in the web. (Yes, really. I
>> started working on IE in 1995. I know many of you were working on the web
>> prior to that, but I doubt the majority were.)
>> [...]
>> Few of you believe it - occasionally, someone who knows me really well
>> does - but I actually believe in open standards. Real open standards. The
>> ones built by a group of people with an interest in making the world
>> better, not just in their own private vested interests. I've championed
>> that in one way or another since I joined Microsoft, and I continue to do
>> so today. It's been a hard road, but not one I can imagine myself not
>> choosing to walk down. It's been gratifying to me over the past couple of
>> years to see my championing pay off in the change of direction in
>> Microsoft. It's been frustrating, though, to be continually identified as
>> the personal screw-up responsible for IE not supporting more standards
>> today, when it's actually because of my personal influence that CSS is
>> IMPLEMENTED in IE. </quote>
>
> Judging by that later post of his, his bosses antagonise any desire to
> embrace standards. And with phrases like "unethical shitheads", he is most
> likely to ditch Microsoft soon. A shame, really. There are many buses filled
> with developers who leave Redmond, but few buses actually come in.
>
> Ultimately, Microsoft is forced to employ people in less developing
> countries. And the quality of the software (e.g. Windows Vista) shows... a
> lot of Microsoft project (including Vista) are being offshorn as Bill Gates
> whines about CS education in the States. It's nothing but crocodile's tears.
> None of the good American developers is willing to work for an evil
> monopolist, so in his defences, Gates says that no good developers are out
> there. They are definitely out there. They just don't want to work for him.
> They make it their life's mission to have Gates' house of fraud eliminated.
Actually, judging by the responses and support from people in the web
community that actually know what's going on, Microsoft is making serious
headway and doing the right things. They've got a lot of support from the
Web Standards Project, and various other big names.
>From the blog comments, the author of the "compliance chart" you posted,
david hammond, says this:
" am the author of the cited standards support resource, I personally
prefer using Firefox on Linux, I'm a huge supporter of strict standards
compliance, I think Internet Explorer's present state (IE7 included) is
perhaps the biggest obstacle in the advancement of the Web, and yet I
completely agree with Chris Wilson's post here.
Internet Explorer is grossly behind the times because Microsoft dropped the
ball several years back. But when IE7 development began, they picked the
ball back up and are now running as fast as the developers of any of the
other browsers. Yes, they'll continue to be grossly behind for quite some
time as they struggle to catch up (which, if they stay at their current
pace, could take a decade or longer), but there is no point in pretending
like they aren't trying right now. No matter how much money you have, you
can't catch up on several years of development on a project like this
overnight, and other browsers aren't going to slow down to let Internet
Explorer catch up. So don't confuse not catching up with present laziness."
Some people refuse to accept the fact that IE development was stopped for
several years, and that this can't be made up for overnight. The comments
like "Why can't you just support standards" are naive and stupid. They say
this like standards support should be a simple thing, and clearly
Microsoft's lack of support means they're deliberately not doing so. That,
of course, ignores the fact that no browser is fully standards compliant,
which just proves how difficult it is.
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