
The new Microsoft Edge is out of preview - MikusR
https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2020/01/15/new-year-new-browser-the-new-microsoft-edge-is-out-of-preview-and-now-available-for-download/
======
sime2009
Regarding the topic of browser mono-cultures, I was web developer in the post
browser war era in the early 2000s where we had a dominant IE6 and a stagnant
browser landscape.

It was bad.

Real bad.

But I'm actually fairly positive about MS getting into the chromium landscape
and back into the game. Let's face it MS had lost all of its influence in the
browser world before dropping IE and making this move. It is a Google/Chrome
dominated world at the moment. But by adopting Chromium, MS can "catch up" on
a technical level and also wield significant power inside the Chromium project
itself. They have money and they have an experienced browser engine
engineering team. They will be able to provide some balance to Google in this
ecosystem. If push came to shove, forking chromium wouldn't be an idle threat
from MS. They will have some power.

On a technical level it looks like a move towards a mono-culture, but
politically it looks like a chance at more balance and diversity to me.

~~~
Wowfunhappy
I just wish they'd moved to Gecko instead of Chromium.

It's not like Gecko is an inherently inferior engine by any stretch, and it
would significantly bolster their marketshare so that developers actually have
to test against it.

~~~
RcouF1uZ4gsC
One huge advantage the Chromium has over Gecko is Google's Security Team (ie
Project Zero).

For most users, the web browser is one of the biggest attack surfaces and
having arguably the best security team behind the browser engine is a good
thing.

~~~
sjwright
Google have certainly done a great job of maximizing the PR benefit from their
security researchers. And it’s a great thing they’re doing. But regardless of
how well individual companies market their respective security teams, Firefox
has a comparable reputation for their browser engine.

Yes some of that might be thanks to PZ, but that’s beside the point, isn’t it?

Choosing Mozilla’s platform would have been better for code diversity, which
has its own distinct security benefits.

~~~
rtpg
I can understand value in multiple browsers for experimenting with new things
(see Rust integration into Mozilla's engine), but what are the security
benefits?

Like if you have 3 different crypto imlpementations, you have times more teams
that have to get a thing right. It seems way easier to try and get it right
just once.

Perhaps there's a holistic idea of "if one browser has an issue, at least it
doesn't affect 100% of them" but given what CVEs look like in reality (often
variations of the same attack across multiple programs) it seems like the
cost/benefit would not be in our favor

~~~
kortilla
Multiple implementations is a great way to highlight issues in the spec vs
reality (assumptions, unspecified behavior, etc). If you only have one
implementation, the implementation becomes the spec and you end up with people
targeting compatibility for that rather than a specification.

This happened with Cisco routers back in the day, Juniper had to add a flag to
make a routing protocol compatible with Cisco because Cisco implemented it
wrong but had so much dominance that Juniper had no choice if they wanted to
get in the game.

------
dessant
I have published some of my extensions for the new Edge browser on their store
[1], the submission experience was straightforward and pleasant, and the
extensions were published in a couple of days after manual review. Updates
were also reviewed and published in a timely manner.

More importantly, during extension submissions and reviews I did not feel
abused as a developer, something which I cannot say about the Chrome Web Store
[2][3].

So I am happy that Microsoft has not only renewed their effort in this space,
but they're also offering a decent alternative for developers who would rather
not deal with Google.

[1] [https://microsoftedge.microsoft.com/addons/category/Edge-
Ext...](https://microsoftedge.microsoft.com/addons/category/Edge-Extensions)

[2] [https://github.com/dessant/search-by-
image/issues/63](https://github.com/dessant/search-by-image/issues/63)

[3] [https://github.com/dessant/youtube-
autoplay/issues/3](https://github.com/dessant/youtube-autoplay/issues/3)

~~~
swebs
Phrasing it as a dichotomy like that is pretty dishonest, especially how
Firefox is twice as popular than Edge [1] and is free open source software
that doesn't spy on you.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Su...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Summary_tables)

~~~
int_19h
The dichotomy comes up because the new Edge supports Chrome extensions. So
it's literally the same code being submitted to both stores, which makes it
more of an apples-to-apples comparison.

~~~
bla3
Firefox and Safari are source compatible with chrome extensions too. Everyone
copied Chrome's extension api.

~~~
halfjoking
Ryan Gosling thinks differently:

[https://superanimo.s3.amazonaws.com/porting-firefox-
extensio...](https://superanimo.s3.amazonaws.com/porting-firefox-
extensions-2-LOJmZ-2248.mp4)

------
robbrown451
This is very good news.

In my opinion, this does more to keep Google in check than had they gone with
Firefox's engine, or stuck with their own. (I know not everyone agrees)

People use Chrome because they consider it a better overall experience than
other alternatives, and I happen to agree. (again, I get that not everyone
here agrees with that) For whatever reason, Google has the resources and
talent to make a browser that is preferred to the alternatives, by most
regular users.

Chromium based Edge allows users to get the best of Chrome without the worst
of Google. Google knows that if they get too aggressive with decisions that
are biased toward Google's bottom line (such as how they handle ad blocking
and various privacy features), Microsoft can easily push back by changing
these decisions in Edge. This is a very good thing.

True, there is also pressure on Google from Firefox (people can abandon Chrome
for Firefox if Google is too aggressive), and there is also Brave (and others)
if you want the benefits of Chrome/Chromium without the worst stuff. But
moving to Firefox is simply too big a move for most users and many don't like
the downsides [1]. And Brave has their own revenue model to protect, and they
don't have the deep pockets Microsoft has to resist the temptation to make
decisions that benefit their bottom line in the short term.

[1] In my case, I do a lot with MIDI in the browser, i.e. connecting a digital
piano and using it within web sites that support it. Firefox doesn't support
this yet, after years and years of talking about it.
[https://github.com/mozilla/standards-
positions/issues/58](https://github.com/mozilla/standards-positions/issues/58)
There are a ton of other things, but that one is a deal breaker for me. Works
beautifully in the new Edge.

~~~
mariushn
Exactly. I hope MS will also take Android and release an MS version of it.
Privacy oriented, no Google apps (that can't be removed either).

This would put more pressure on Google than privacy fines from EU. Competition
works best. I'm not an MS fan (using Linux at home, with vscode), but I'll
happily switch.

I wondered why MS didn't do this or partnered with Ubuntu instead of closing
their Windows Phone business, fully giving up the mobile market.

~~~
robbrown451
"Competition works best."

Right... I mean, a certain very strategic kind of competition. Co-opetition?
Direct competition would be simply offering a competing fully in-house browser
or competing fully in-house mobile OS. This is kind of sneaky in that it lets
Google do a lot of the heavy lifting, while still being able to yank the
things (or add the things) that Microsoft wants.

With regard to Edge adopting Chromium, I have to wonder whether Google sees
this as a victory, or if they feel like Microsoft pulled one over on them.

------
altitudinous
On MacOS it requires admin privilege to install.

I am done with that after all the crap that previous software with admin
rights installed. I cleaned it up and swore I would not install anything that
required admin rights again - for my own security and peace of mind. What does
it need admin rights for?

~~~
crazygringo
Seriously, that bugs the hell out of me too.

Why do I need to give Adobe admin rights to install Photoshop? Why do I need
to give Microsoft the same to install Word? And now for a web browser?

If I'm installing something low-level like a window manager or a keyboard
shortcut tool, _I get it_. But for a normal mainstream flagship consumer
application, what on earth do they need admin privileges for?!

I hate the fact I have to hand over the keys to my computer just to run basic
industry standard software and I have no choice _because it 's industry
standard_ and I have requirements to use it.

~~~
tsimionescu
Well, there is an extremely simple reason: because these tools are installed
for all users, not just your own. Doing it any other way would be wasteful on
an actual multi-user machine. But some tools do support it - both Chrome and
Firefox can be installed without admin privileges. There is also the fact that
Office and many other products rely on demons starting at boot time, which can
only be installed with admin rights. The same applies to all popular Linux
distributions (even more than on Windows, since you can provide a nice
current-user only installer on Windows, but any common program package on
Linux requires admin rights before you can even access it).

On the other hand, for most people this admin vs regular user separation is
almost meaningless and provides little extra security. Sure, if I install
malware as admin it will be harder to get rid of it, but except for that, it
can hurt me just as much, since all of the files I really care about
(documents, photos, game saves etc) are already accessible with my user, and
any program running as my user can already connect to the internet and send
information about what my user is doing (not to mention bother me with ads).
Some of the really damaging ransomware that recently made the rounds didn't
even require admin privileges, it simply encrypted data in some common user-
owned folders, if I'm not mistaken (it probably did need some privilege
escalation to spread, though, which is a big problem on office networks).

~~~
zapzupnz
> because these tools are installed for all users

So all they should require is to be dragged into the /Applications folder (or
/System/Applications in Catalina). That's it.

That's how a macOS app should be installed. That should be the end of the
process unless it needs to install kernel extensions (and even then, from
Catalina onwards, such extensions should become userland extensions).

~~~
tsimionescu
But how could a regular user be allowed to install something for other users?
That would be a breach of security.

~~~
xp84
The missing piece here:

Applications also don't need to be (and third party apps on most single-user
systems arguably _shouldn 't_ be) in /Applications. Users can put apps
wherever the heck they like (I keep mine in ~/Applications which even gets the
same icon automatically if you create it).

Apple could really streamline this because all apps that can be drag-drop
installed really belong in one's own home directory, where they'll be
seamlessly migrated when you move to a new computer, or brought with you if
you have a roaming profile. As it is right now, I just keep both Applications
folders in my Finder Sidebar and remember that the bottom one is "mine."

In an ideal scenario, users could still drag apps to the "one" Applications
folder and if they are not an Admin the app itself would actually be stored in
a default-invisible ~/Applications. Then when you opened "/Applications" the
system would show you the superset of both locations.

This is of course nearly exactly how the Windows Start Menu works except that
it always had "installers" do the work of putting those program shortcuts in
the respective directories, and only well-behaved apps ever asked which place
you wanted apps installed.

------
kerpele
If someone told the young Linux freak me back in the early 2000s that one day
Internet Explorer’s rendering engine is based on the KDE rendering engine I
would’ve probably died laughing and frozen in horror at the same time.

Yeah, I realize there’s probably nothing left if the old KHTML but it still
does give me a chuckle.

~~~
loudmax
But one wouldn't have been surprised to find out that the Microsoft's KHTML
based browser doesn't run on any open source operating system.

~~~
arusahni
IIRC it exists for Android.

~~~
vermilingua
Android is open source in the same way that Chrome is. That is to say, not.

~~~
arusahni
I'd contend that it is closer to Chromium as the Googley bits are in Play
Services and OEM builds.

------
hybrids
I get why Microsoft did what they did.

I just still wish they would have at least OSS'd EdgeHTML instead of just
shoving it in a closet somewhere.

~~~
techsupporter
I wish they had thrown in with helping Firefox instead of handing even more
web influence over to Google. A percentage of what Microsoft spent on EdgeHTML
contributed to the Firefox project—ideally as employee time—would go a long
way, along with the counterbalance of putting the Firefox engine and code base
front and center of more Windows users.

~~~
dubcanada
Sadly Chromium is WAYYYY easier to development on than Firefox. Had Mozilla
spent effort making the base of it as a framework in the same way Chromium is,
they may have considered it.

There is a reason why Electron, QT etc use Chromium.

~~~
_bxg1
I was just thinking, "Why isn't there an Electron for Firefox?"

~~~
kodablah
They worked on it a bit [0] but it has been abandoned along with all the other
embedding efforts over time. As someone who embeds Chromium (via CEF) only
because it's easy, I would really appreciate (and have been shouting into the
wind about) focus on the embeddability of Gecko.

0 - [https://github.com/mozilla/positron](https://github.com/mozilla/positron)

~~~
the8472
Long before positron (and electron) there was XULrunner.

------
c-smile
What happened with font rendering?

Fonts are rendered with thinner lines in new Edge (on the left):
[http://terrainformatica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/IE-
fo...](http://terrainformatica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/IE-fonts.png)

Such rendering does not match rest of Windows...

New Edge is definitely less readable, and Google Chrome exhibits the same
problem.

~~~
mehrdadn
Left side is actually sharp, with subpixel smoothing. Right side is awful
(just like many parts of post-Vista Windows) with apparent grayscale AA.

This is something they actually got right; it's one thing that was terrible
about IE and the old Edge, and that I'd bet was subconsciously turning many
people off (in my case, consciously making me want to tear my eyes out). If
you can't see the difference, open dev console on the screenshot and run:

    
    
      document.body.style.zoom = 1 / window.devicePixelRatio
    

If this doesn't work in the new Edge, try in Chrome (not sure if Edge supports
this zoom mechanism). You should definitely be able to see the difference in
sharpness.

Edit: Maybe also worth mentioning, Firefox's bold font rendering is one thing
keeping me away from it. Lack of the above zoom mechanism is another. Not sure
if I'm alone in these.

~~~
dr_zoidberg
All in all, I'd say the one on the left is more pleasant to read and easier on
the eyes, despite being "thinner". The jagged edges on the right feel on my
eyes like the sound of relentless blackboard scratching.

~~~
mehrdadn
That's a really nice way to put it, I could never find a decent way to
describe it until now!

------
scanr
It will make me happy to be able to stop supporting ie11 at some point in the
future.

Sadly, it doesn’t appear that ie11 will have an end of life date as it’ll be
supported as long as Windows 10 is and Windows 10 appears evergreen.

Hopefully Microsoft will make edge the default browser at some point.

~~~
irrational
2025 is the official end of life year. You can find a page on MS's website
with all the end of life dates.

~~~
noahster11
[https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/17454/lifecycle-
faq...](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/17454/lifecycle-faq-internet-
explorer)

~~~
TurningCanadian
So scanr is right, right?

------
dstaley
I'm really curious why they released to stable with so many basic features
missing. For example, your bookmarks won't sync between devices (although that
was recently re-enabled in the preview channels). It sounds like they're not
pushing out automatic updates right now anyway, so I'm not sure what this
announcement amounts to. Why not wait until the 20H1 Windows 10 feature update
(which sounds like the update that will include the stable version of Edge) is
released to mark the first stable version? Just seems like a weird release
schedule.

~~~
WorldMaker
The blog posts mention that releasing it _today_ is a shot across the bow for
Enterprise. Given Enterprises like their year+ efforts to "test" software
before ever deploying it, they want Enterprise to start that process _today_ ,
ahead of 20H1 when all consumers presumably will be pushed to it.

It's also a very subtle signal for several reasons to release it the day after
Extended Support for Windows 7 _ended_. On the one hand, it supports Windows
7, so there is a possible mixed message there, which is why it is subtle. On
the other hand, some of these Enterprises should realize that the last time
the browser team at Microsoft did a release like this after/ahead of a Windows
EOL they _highly_ revised their browser security support policy. (Back with
IE11 adding support for a couple older versions of Windows and Microsoft
immediately dropping support for IE <11, despite earlier "bundled with Windows
support timeframe" promises.) It can be seen as a very subtle "IE is dead,
move on from it, already, you dinosaur customers".

~~~
ataylor32
> ahead of 20H1 when all consumers presumably will be pushed to it

I'm not sure it will be part of 20H1.
[https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2020/01/15/upgrading-
new...](https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2020/01/15/upgrading-new-
microsoft-edge-79-chromium/) says:

> If you’d prefer not to install Microsoft Edge manually, you can wait for it
> to be installed in a future update to Windows 10, following our measured
> roll-out approach over the next several months. We will start to migrate
> Windows 10 customers to the new Microsoft Edge in the coming weeks, starting
> with a subset of Windows Insiders in the Release Preview ring.

I'm guessing 20H1 will be released sooner than several months.

~~~
WorldMaker
That says they are starting _now_ , so they are starting with 19H2 (in Release
Preview to start, which is still 19H2 by the way, then into the wilds).
"Several months" here could mean they want everything done by 20H1 (somewhere
between March and May, given the usual pattern). I don't know if that also
means that they are planning to move to packing New Edge in the RTW images for
20H1; so far 20H1 on Insiders still seems to have Edge Classic. But the clear
thing is that these are clearly parallel rollouts right now.

------
deaps
So as somewhat of an outsider to the 'web game' as far as most people here (at
HN) are concerned, but a relatively aware patron of web browsing software,
I'll add my thoughts on the 'web browser' game...

I feel like most people's browser of choice is chosen for reasons specific to
their needs. For example: I _think_ that Firefox gives me a bit of additional
privacy. I _think_ that Safari gives me that additional privacy as well. Some
people may feel like Chrome just works. Some people just use what came with
their OS.

When I do front end work, I tend to always test it in Chrome first. Their
devtools make that part of my job (quickly finding issues with the frontend) a
lot easier. Once it works in Chrome, I'm sure that the code is working, and
any problems I encounter will just require browser-specific tweaks.

Anyway, long story short...I think that Microsoft really needs to pick
something that Edge is best at if they want people to have a reason to use it
(PS loading a highly browser-optimized page some number of milliseconds faster
than the competition just doesn't do it for me, personally). Their niche has
always just kind of been "well it's what comes with the OS" \- and that's a
fine way to get a userbase for sure. I'm not faulting them - but if that's
their intended userbase, then I feel like they're putting a lot of effort into
this whole browser game.

I guess at the end of the day, I don't _trust_ IE or Edge or Chrome for my
every day use. Whether that's poorly placed mistrust or not, I'm uncertain.
But in either event, that's how I feel.

~~~
lotsofpulp
> I think that Safari gives me that additional privacy as well.

Safari provides a material improvement in battery life.

~~~
om2
And memory use. And speed (at least by most public benchmarks).

------
rdiddly
Linked at [https://microsoftedgewelcome.microsoft.com/en-
us/privacy](https://microsoftedgewelcome.microsoft.com/en-us/privacy):

 _" We will honor your choices about browsing data and collect only what is
needed to make your experiences better."_

~~~
pacala
Meaningless. There are people claiming with a straight face that targeted ads
make user experience better. Wholesale collection and aggregation of personal
user data will continue unabated.

~~~
tomerico
Curious, why would targeted ads make the user experience worse? (putting
privacy aside)

~~~
not_kurt_godel
Targeted ads degrade user experiences for me because it's a reminder that
someone or something that I don't know, knows about me.

It's as if a stranger came up to you on the street, knew what brand of toilet
paper you used at home, and asked if you wanted to buy more because you're
almost out. Naturally you would wonder how this stranger knows these facts
about you - do they snoop in your trash? Do they observe you in the bathroom
through the window? Do they come in your home while you're away? We would
consider such a world where this was normal to be Kafka-esque and dystopic.
Anyone who gives an iota of care about personal privacy and dignity could (and
arguably should) find implementation of the digital equivalent equally
repulsive.

~~~
robbrown451
You say "someone or something," and to me, that's a pretty big difference.

I don't care if things know about me. If there is an actual human being who is
directly looking at me, associating it with my face, etc, that is a lot more
bothersome than some machine that is doing that.

I understand that many people here don't make that distinction. I do care
about privacy in some ways, but when you I "arguably should" find machines
invading my privacy to repulsive, I guess I have to thank you for putting the
word "arguably" in there, because I would argue that. It just doesn't bother
me, and I am happier for not having one more thing to be bothered by.

~~~
not_kurt_godel
I agree that there's a difference, but it's not necessarily one that the
primal part of my brain cares about, regardless of what I know at a
conscious/intellectual level. Furthermore, data that a machine knows is just
one step away from becoming data that a human knows given sufficient curiosity
or happenstance; a step into which you usually have no insight into whether or
if it will occur.

~~~
robbrown451
Yeah, I hear ya, I guess my primal brain is different than yours.

For instance, sometimes I feel a bit embarrassed by what I purchase at a
store. (even if it's just that I'm buying a lot of junky, easy-to-prepare food
at the grocery store) I've never once felt that way checking out at Amazon.
Not even a teensy tiny bit. And that would remain true even if I suspected (or
knew) that some human at Amazon was looking closely at the orders.

~~~
not_kurt_godel
Buying something at a store isn't a good analogy. Uninterested members of the
public being able to casually observe you buy something at the store is a
perfectly normal part of society. A better analogy for today's internet is if
you walked to the store holding a big sign with your credit card bill, texts
to your friends, and a list of places you went today printed on it, and the
street on the way was packed with people who were there for the sole purpose
of taking pictures of that sign and selling them to whoever will buy. Targeted
advertising would be the people who bought those pictures knocking on your
door.

~~~
robbrown451
Seems like a pretty extreme analogy, but ok. Having someone knock on my door
is kind of a pain, since I have to get up and answer it. I'm not sure it is
comparable to seeing ads on web sites that I am on by choice.

I guess I have enough concerns in my life that actually have measurable
impacts on me that such things seem pretty trivial.

------
llampx
If you use the PDF or e-book functionality in Edge, you may want to hold off
on upgrading. The PDF scrolling is not as smooth as on the older version.

~~~
spookyuser
I am so sad about the fact that Edge can no longer read epubs and seems to
have (so far) sub par pdf reading. It's been my go to pdf reader for a while
now and I love the way it scrolls. It is so smooth - just like preview on a
mac. I haven't found anything else that comes close to edge for the smoothness
of its pdf reading on windows, so I will definitely be holding out on this
update for as long as I can. I don't really need two chromium based browsers
on my PC anyway.

~~~
endothrowho333
Have you found any good ePub reader?

Zathura and Calibre are insanely bloated. FBreader is just _no._ Emacs works,
but has similar functionality to FBreader.

~~~
spookyuser
Yeah it's amazing how incredible Calibre is at organising books but terrible
it is at displaying them.

As a matter of fact though, I think I have found a very good epub reader which
I don't see mentioned very much called Cover.

It is ridiculously smooth at displaying epubs, maybe even more so than edge. I
was reading an epub with tons of images and I could swipe left and right
between pages multiple times without waiting a second for reflow, almost felt
like swiping a pdf. Whereas on all those other apps the book was blurred and
did not scale how I would expect it to, to fill the screen. On cover
everything is displayed how I think it should be displayed without changing
anything. So yeah, cover A+

[https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/cover-comic-
reader/9wzdncr...](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/cover-comic-
reader/9wzdncrfj9w7)

~~~
rym_
Agreed at Calibre! Ihave the same qualms with EPUBReader in FF, it does not
get close to what edge was capable of. I'll take a look at cover at home as I
sadly cannot install it at work.

------
AsyncAwait
I don't get why Microsoft gets a pass here vs Google, given its insane
mal/ad/spy/ware crap default settings in Windows 10, including sending MS all
kinds of telemetry, logging into Windows via an online login etc.

Firefox over this crap all day.

------
retonom
It's nice to see MS pushing for tracking protection as well. Firefox now takes
the lead on privacy issues. Google will try to hold it off as not to hurt
their own business. People will eventually migrate away from Chrome because of
this and the tracking/ad business will go down. Now is a good time to do some
thinking if you're in the online tracking and/or ad business.

~~~
nattaylor
Chrome announced it will drop support for third party cookies within 2 years.
[https://blog.chromium.org/2020/01/building-more-private-
web-...](https://blog.chromium.org/2020/01/building-more-private-web-path-
towards.html)

------
axilmar
One of the reasons there are so many incompatibilities between browsers in
every era is that the web is not built out of a small set of primitives:
everyone that wants to provide a web interface must implement the whole set of
WWW standards (html, scripting, css, etc), which is very difficult and error
prone.

If there was only a handful of primitives to implement, and everything else
was built on it, then it would be much easier to stay compatible.

This is the kind of situation that has led to IE6 dominating the web, then
motivating Google to create a browser, take the market and then Microsoft
finally dropping their web engine and taking up Chromium.

------
skierguy
Aaaaand the EULA and menu buttons are in Italian when I download from the en-
us version of the site. I knew there would be 90 languages, but I didn't know
I'd need to learn _all_ of them to use Edge!

~~~
SketchySeaBeast
It was french for me. German for a coworker. The language settings are all
screwed up.

------
izacus
Previous Edge was significantly more power efficient than Chrome - did they
tell anything about how much battery does this new version use?

------
ripdog
So... What's the value proposition over, say, Firefox?

~~~
KoftaBob
You get Chrome's large ecosystem of browser extensions, with much less Google
tracking. That's how I see it at least.

~~~
swebs
But then you add Microsoft tracking which is even worse. Why not just use
Chromium and have no tracking?

~~~
wayneftw
Why is Microsoft tracking "even worse" than Google tracking?

I'm pretty sure Google has infected more of the Internet than Microsoft.

~~~
d1zzy
> Why is Microsoft tracking "even worse" than Google tracking?

Without specifics is hard to know what the message you replied to meant but
one thing where I find MS tracking worse than anything Google can do on the
Internet right now is that MS tracks and reports my local OS use (what
applications I install/run, how long I run them, what files I have) while an
Internet tracker can only get access to what the browser allows which
generally limits sharing the type of information I listed.

EDIT: And pretty much all browsers have an Incognito mode or you can use
TorBrowser which goes beyond that but I cannot similarly defend myself against
my own local OS privacy invasion.

~~~
wayneftw
I use a Linux desktop and I’m looking forward to using MS Edge there when it
is released so I guess I don’t have that concern.

I’m already using it on my Mac.

------
agumonkey
Their logo is really neat, soft and peace inducing. Everything but today's web
:)

~~~
c-smile
Yeah, and it is close to my Sciter logo:
[https://sciter.com/](https://sciter.com/) :)

Seems like I am not alone in using Yin and Yang metaphor here.

------
thiagomgd
At home, it's already my main browser. Love the work they are doing on it and
it's a nice alternative to Chrome (everytime I try Firefox, I go back to
Chrome, so...)

------
Jamwinner
Of all the times I wish MS had written their own browser, this would be the
first not in jest. The web is not open if only 2 orgs can hope to stay
functional displaying it.

~~~
selectodude
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EdgeHTML](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EdgeHTML)

They already did that years ago.

------
greatjack613
As much as I despise chromium controlling the browser market, having microsoft
in the game should improve the situation, so kudos to them.

~~~
arbitrage
Monocultures never improve anything.

~~~
d1zzy
I disagree with such a vast general statement.

Yes there are problems to everyone using the same software but there are
advantages too. One drawback is that potential security issues would affect
"everyone" but on the other hand the same fix works for "everyone".

If the common software is open source it serves as de facto standard/reference
implementation so you don't have compatibility issues. Standardization
processes try to address this without reference software but IMO that is a lot
more effort (in terms of engineering hours) to get it right so you can have a
fully featured standard that is clear, has no bugs and has multiple perfectly
standard compliant independent implementations.

After all software is just a tool to serve a purpose and our decisions in this
area should be driven by pragmatic reasons alone. If we can serve the same
purpose with much less effort by having everyone build on top of/use the same
common base why not.

Similarly I'd rather see everyone just use Linux instead of all the different
popular OSes we have.

------
rejectfinite
Installed it on my home PC and work PC.

I like it. Customised the front page with some useful links and turned off the
news. Real serene image, non-distracting new page.

I like the interface overall and it has ublock origin, basically the one
extension that is a must.

This will be big for corporations too. Users wont need to have Google Chrome
deployed anymore to use certain web apps.

Ill use it as a secondary browser to Firefox when I need a Chromium based
browser, as this is already installed in Windows 10 soon.

Best browser for Netflix too. I am using the "Add website to app" function for
it already, or just browse to it.

Old Edge was also really good for video performance and battery performance in
general, hope this has that too.

~~~
toper-centage
Unlock origin will soon be se verily nerfed though, which is a pity.

------
petilon
I love that I can now use Edge when using Google services such as Gmail and
Chrome when accessing Microsoft sites such as Office 365. That way neither
company can log me into the browser itself when I log into their sites. This
should reduce abuses by both companies.

Google has an option that says "By turning this off, you can sign in to Google
sites like Gmail without signing in to Chrome." But it doesn't work, which is
a blatant abuse by Google. Adios, Chrome! I will now be using Edge when
logging into Gmail.

------
baby
Does it allow for tabs on the side like tree style tabs on firefox?

------
reddotX
Linux not sported yet...

------
Tom_Martin
For those already using Edge for its greatly superior DRM, the new browser may
result in a big nosedive in performance for streaming video! Providers will be
happy to supply cheaper Widevine-encrypted content instead of Playready but
this will cause a big increase in CPU cycles when watching encrypted videos.
Fortunately users may opt out of using Widevine by disabling the Widevine DRM
flag at edge://flags/#edge-widevine-drm.

------
FpUser
For some reason it had decided that I am Italian. Took me a while to decipher
and bring it back to English

~~~
dunham
It gave me the page in english, but the license agreement in Russian.

~~~
downerending
So you're saying that if the license was in English you would have read it?

~~~
dunham
To be honest, I paid more attention to the Russian version than I would
English. I kinda know how to pronounce it, and it's fun to see if I can figure
out any of the words.

------
cmroanirgo
Was just about to have a look at the latest download for this for MacOS, and
found out it downloads a .pkg rather than a .dmg (which is how standalone apps
typically install).

So, looking into the .pkg file I notice that it's also bundled
Office16_all_autoupdate.pkg, which has a 'Microsoft AutoUpdate.app'. Inside
the contents of that app is another app called 'Microsoft AU Daemon.app' which
contains various M$ Root Certs and a string 'Microsoft Update Assistant
launched'...

It's stunts like this which make me not trust Microsoft very much. I want
nothing to do with Office, nor a one-stop-shop port of Windows Update. God
knows what telemetry MS will try to upload with these products, but I'm not
buying it.

------
okareaman
I've been using it all afternoon and I must say it is very snappy, crisp and
pleasant to use. Microsoft has cleverly copied Chrome and made it better. A
bit of the ol' Embrace and Extend of the past? I've tried Firefox but it never
feels right and I switch back to Chrome. I'm not switching back this time.
They even restored a feature that Chrome inexplicably took out -- the option
in history to restore all your open tabs that went away when you accidentally
closed the browser.

Edit: I even like Bing better. What miracle is this that the top links aren't
advertisements?

------
jdlyga
I switched over to Firefox about 6 months ago, and I'm surprised by how much I
love it. It's great to be able to have separate home and work accounts while
still being logged into the same gmail account. Plus, there's certain
interface decisions like putting Undo Close Tab in more places that makes it a
nicer experience. The only issue I run into with Firefox is my company's
intranet site makes me login once per day where with Chrome it doesn't.

------
mactunes
Does anyone know what the UI of Edge is written in? Since it runs on Mac as
well, have they ported some of the .Net UI frameworks to Mac or is it native
all the way?

~~~
dstaley
Edge (and Chromium) both use a custom C++ UI framework. Chrome wrote the
framework to be cross-platform, so Edge was able to take advantage of that to
deliver the macOS version. AFAIK there's no WinUI XAML components being used.

------
amyjess
Everything I've heard is that touch support is completely destroyed in this
one.

This completely destroys my main use case for my Surface. I need a tablet with
a web browser that's designed to be used in portrait mode without the Type
Cover attached.

Can anyone here recommend a UWP web browser I can switch to when the real Edge
goes away for good? Or if none exists, can someone recommend a cheap 12"\+
tablet that runs a mobile OS?

~~~
microtheo
Ironically it has brought a breath of fresh air to my surface in tablet mode.
I use it everyday with touchscreen only and find it very satisfying.

------
dmd
The logo seems confusingly similar to Firefox's.

~~~
bagacrap
Definitely more similar to the explorer 'e', but I do see the resemblance to
IceWeasel.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
I don't think it evoques a flat letter 'e' at all, it is highly reminiscent of
a blue Firefox logo though (so IceWeasel probably, if I remembered that logo),
IMO.

------
mlang23
I wish Microsoft wouldn't alpha-test their browser-experiment on real-world-
users. Since Edge is out, I find it totally useless. It has also been a total
fail on the accessibility front. To release something that is inaccessible
from the start is no longer acceptable in 2020 methinks, especially from a big
player like MS. The word that comes to mind is embarrasment.

------
srhngpr
Is this also susceptible to the same issues that resulted in developer of
uBlock Origin to no longer create new versions for Chrome?

------
Scarbutt
Does the android version lets you install ublock?

------
doctor_eval
So if I remember correctly this is another step in the history of KHTML ->
WebKit -> Safari -> Chrome -> Edge.

I’m sure much has changed internally but still, who would have imagined that
_KDE and Apple_ would be the ones to produce the dominant core browser
architecture for the whole world?

------
rym_
Not completely related but does anyone know of an epub reader with the quality
that Edge had? The EPUBReader extension in FF works but the rendering and UX
is a lot worse. Calibre on the other hand is a great management system but
with a horrendous reader.

------
Rapzid
Tested it out a few weeks ago and discovered Netflix was limiting the
streaming bitrate on it. Turns out Chrome and Edge can play at 1080p now, but
the bitrate is reduced(much) over what I see in Safari and the Netflix app on
Windows.

~~~
rejectfinite
[https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/edge/features](https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/edge/features)

Says it is 4k in Netflix now

* 4K Ultra HD exclusivity is limited to PCs running Windows 10. 4K works in both Microsoft Edge and Netflix app. Only 7th Gen Intel® Core™ processor or higher devices can decrypt PlayReady 4K DRM. Netflix Ultra HD plan required.

~~~
Rapzid
Interesting, I did report the issue. Worth looking at again but I don't have a
4k display and it may still be reduced nitrate. The quality difference was
very noticeable on something like Lost In Space.

------
theebrownieee
Anyone know how Ad blocking works for Edge on iOS? I’m getting better results
than Safari and while I see AdBlock Plus in edge settings, there’s nothing to
unable under Content Blockers under iOS settings.

------
kirstenbirgit
Tried to download it for macOS. It displayed a license agreement/download page
in Polish (I assume.) My browser language is English, and I'm in Denmark.
Maybe some other day.

------
CriticalCathed
I love Edge. It's very quick and feels super stable. However that new icon is
terrible. It looks like laundry detergent branding and it only vaguely
resembles an e.

------
niuzeta
I know this isn't contributing to the discussion, but Vimium extension is
honestly my only reason to keep using Chromium-based browser. I should give
this a try.

------
miohtama
Are there interviews why they based it on Chromium, not Gecko? From business
point of a view taking a direct competitor's effort is somewhat blurry.

~~~
exacube
Presumably because Chromium and related technologies (e.g. V8) have far more
investment by the community than Gecko and SpiderMonkey. MS already uses
Chromium/v8 in some of their products like VS Code.

------
zsoltsandor
Now, if only they released it for Android (before Surface Duo hits the
market), and Linux (since they have teased us). Well, I'll wait.

------
vkaku
Installed it. I use Firefox, but now I don't need Chromium/Chrome/Brave for
any websites that do detect Blink.

------
crescentfresh
Installed itself entirely in German. What?

------
Sirikon
The video they prepared for the launch is basically what happens when you
downloaded Chrome like a year ago.

------
mouzogu
I haven't looked into it but I hope that the use of the Chromium engine means
web standards and feature support on par with Chrome and Firefox. They mention
less fragmentation for web developers so I hope that that is what they are
alluding to.

I will "probably" never use this browser but I just hope that it doesn't open
a new set of issues to deal with. I don't think it should

------
chensformers
I see it supports Mac. Does it mean we can now test webpages without a Windows
PC?

------
Pigo
I'm glad to see this, and I hope it's a strong competitor. Stronger
competition pushes everyone and we end up with better results as users.

That said, browser debates often come off like the Nintendo versus Sega
arguments I remember as a kid. It's funny how people become married to one.

~~~
jamesgeck0
We have effectively lost a competitor. Microsoft is now contributing to Chrome
development.

The best long-term outcome for the web would arguably to have been for
Microsoft to put more resources into their in-house EdgeHTML browser instead
of throwing it out and reskinning Chrome.

~~~
robbrown451
It's beyond reskinning. They can change anything they want to.

Let's say Google says they don't like some privacy feature because it hurts
their bottom line in terms of ad revenue. So they decide not to have that in
Chrome.

Sure, people could switch to in-house Edge or Firefox. But they don't want to
switch, because for whatever reason, Google is better able to make a browser
that people like. Attested to by the tiny market share Edge has (and fairly
small share Firefox has, notwithstanding its popularity within the HN
community).

Switching to Chromium based Edge is a much easier move for users, assuming
Microsoft decides to second-guess Google's decision, which they can do easily
and have strong incentives to do -- keeping in mind that the number one
complaint people have about Chrome is that they don't trust Google.

------
oaiey
Is it just me or is edge with blink faster than chrome with blink

------
SanchoPanda
Why save pages as mhtml by default (Android)?

------
chensformers
Does it finally support Blink element?

------
ChicagoDave
I use Edge on my iPhone and Firefox on my laptop. Trying to reduce my Google
footprint as much as possible.

~~~
kxrm
Just for clarity, iPhone browsers all use Safari, so Edge on iPhone will just
be an Edge skinned Safari.

~~~
ChicagoDave
Using WebKit as a foundation is not the same as using Safari.

------
makach
I love it!

------
sys_64738
Microsoft makes the coolest software these days. Who knew.

~~~
mda
Except it is 80% Google's work.

------
Krasnol
Great. Now give me a safe and reasonable way to uninstall it.

------
0xdead
I'm not entertaining any new browsers that aren't written in Rust.

------
ongezoutenboter
What about the new fluent design language? Where is the fucking transparency
in the tab bar MS.

~~~
Devagamster
Not sure why you're angry about this...

~~~
dblohm7
Lots of people get angry about this kind of stuff. "I'd switch to Firefox if
it supported Fluent" is something I have read multiple times in discussions
about browsers.

