
Microsoft’s New Browser Will Be Called Microsoft Edge - jdkanani
http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/29/microsofts-new-browser-will-be-called-microsoft-edge/#.ej0rsm:dO0p
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pcj
Looks like it supports both Chrome and FireFox extensions -
[http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/29/8515771/microsofts-edge-
br...](http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/29/8515771/microsofts-edge-browser-
supports-chrome-and-firefox-extensions)

~~~
breitling
Wow...this kind of levels the playing field. A big reason I stayed away from
IE was because of the extensions. If people's favourite extensions start
working on Edge, then I'm sure many will give it a serious go.

~~~
lostit2xx
Edge will have to prove itself as a browser first. IE is inferior to all the
others, currently. Edge, as "Spartan", has shown positive results in
Microsoft's "lab tests" but they showed same results in the past so viewing
such "reports" should be taken with a grain of salt.

Till then, stick with Firefox or Chrome.

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RKearney
I wonder if they went with Edge so they could keep the 'e' icon? I could only
imagine the confusion less computer-savy customers would have if they could no
longer find the 'e' icon to access the internet.

~~~
vinceguidry
My guess is that the icon is going to be something like a blue capital-e. Just
similar enough to the familiar logo that end-users will take to it
immediately, while different enough that tech staff will be able to tell the
difference.

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Stenerson
Here's a video from Microsoft -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iH1D31YHsgY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iH1D31YHsgY)

~~~
nhayden
They're really selling the ability to draw on pages. Who needs that?

~~~
genericone
From the looks of it, users who subscribe to the lifestyle of Tablets/Mobile +
Sharing Economy.

~~~
yaeger
So, once again, focus on mobile, ignore the desktop. Cause that worked so well
in the recent past for MS, didn't it? Guess some people just won't take a
hint.

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bobajeff
This looks like a excellent browser. It has a sleak interface and from all the
news I hear it may support some very powerful web technologies and will
finally be rapid release.

Still, it's a shame that it's still very much close source and Windows only.

"...rather than just open-sourcing EdgeHTML and letting anyone contribute,
they’re approving individual “major web entities” in a piecemeal fashion.
Microsoft is twisting itself into pretzels to get some of the benefits of
being open-source without actually going open-source." \- Chris Hoffman |
PCWorld

~~~
craigvn
I am guessing that by open sourcing the browser they may need to open source
parts of Windows which they are not in a position to do yet, so they have to
take a cautious approach.

~~~
bobajeff
There is no reason they would have to open source any other parts of windows
just because EdgeHTML depends on them. Thats what libraries are for.

I think they are simply against the idea of open sourcing it. At least that's
what it looks like.

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lewisl9029
I'm still waiting for a browser with good native vertical tabs support.
Something like this:
[http://i.imgur.com/PnpZwos.png](http://i.imgur.com/PnpZwos.png)

Tree Style Tab is the main reason why I use Firefox for all my day-to-day
browsing, but the UX could definitely use some polish, especially when it
comes to autohide behavior and handling touch input.

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talmand
Will we have to do this from now on?

    
    
        <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge">
        <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="Edge=edge">

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cleverjake
no, because there are no document modes, and therefore no x-ua-compat modes

~~~
talmand
Joke [johk]

1\. something said or done to provoke laughter or cause amusement, as a
witticism, a short and amusing anecdote

2\. (as verb) to speak or act in a playful or merry way

3\. (as verb) to say something in fun or teasing rather than in earnest; be
facetious

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EdSharkey
Hmm, I don't like this name, it's still trying to be something special.

I surmised from the chatter until now that Edge would be called "Internet",
"My Internet", or "Browse" or some other non-program entity thing. And quite
frankly, that made me shiver a bit for Firefox and (less so) for Chrome.

See, what if Microsoft plain-wrapped their browser, made it seamless and
ubiquitous? Perhaps this is what they were envisioning with the original
Active Desktop style integration? (And no, I'm not talking about Metro tiles,
blurgh.) A successful plain-wrapped browser is like an unstoppable ideology
for me, there's no name to put to the enemy. Internet Explorer could be
demonized - it had a marketdroid-crafted icon, it had a NAME.

I honestly can't conceive of what such a plain-wrapped browser experience
would look because I like having multiple browser windows and I like tabbed
browser windows. It does need to work something like an application, at least
for me. For that matter, we can't continue Fisher Price'ing up our user
experiences, apps like browsers need to be productivity focused and not cater
to the 3 year olds and other neophytes. That Metro Internet Explorer browser
experience in Windows 8 was a joke. Take up way WAY less screen real estate
with the browser chrome, cut it out with hip, annoying animations, show me my
information and be quick about it.

I feel the PRODUCT NAME needs to go - Edge needs to fade away and just be
there in the background as a vaguely recognizable, essential, but rather bland
and uninteresting part of the overall computing experience. If Edge did fade
into the background and become this trusty thing with its own signature user
experience and pleasant signature flourishes or painting style or whatever,
then it would more easily make the jump to new devices, autos, televisions,
billboards, etc. The exact same bland, trusty experience would be expected
everywhere.

I feel egos probably drove this naming decision. Oh well, already stumbling
out the gate; a visionary needs to wrest control. Hopefully not another
opportunity for meaningful change squandered.

~~~
Vraxx
Just as a note in response to the suggestion the browser not have a name to
make it harder to hate, most of the android default browsers for different
phones have no distinguishable names yet you can still refer to them as the
default browser if you wish to degrade them. People will have a name to call
it if they wish to refer to it.

~~~
EdSharkey
That Android Webkit thing is an odd internal politics story, though. The
Android team was separate from the rest of Google, and the Chrome team always
wanted to slip in and replace the Android Webkit browser.

But the Android team wouldn't have it because Chrome was too heavyweight for
many years and would have led to a subpar experience.

Android Webkit made a lot of sense up until a year or two ago because it was
so simple and fast. But now the mobile hardware and Chrome performance has
caught up. Chrome should be the one and only browser from Google that runs on
Android. The Android team should simply concede and upgrade Android Webkit by
gutting it and turning it into a Chrome launcher, damn the consequences.

Edge, presumably, would be a much different situation than Chrome vs. Android
Webkit. That would have Microsoft's full weight behind it and would be
integral to their core strategies. God willing, the Edge team won't be
competing with the zombie legacy IE maintenance team for resources and
mindshare within Microsoft.

The point of my original comment was that a great/competitive evergreen
browser from Microsoft without a name would be a scary foe, especially if it
ever claimed a majority share of the market.

~~~
lern_too_spel
AOSP hasn't had its own web browser for a very long time now. It uses
Chromium.

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primitivesuave
Internet Explorer is generally regarded as a reason we can't have nice things,
so this is a huge step in the right direction for Windows users.

~~~
frik
IE11 trident rendering engine was already renamed to "Edge", press F12 check
it out (then see in the bottom bar -> top right). The step from IE11 to IE12
aka Edge from the render engine is not as huge an outside might think (reading
only the PR) - it's still a great step forward so don't get me wrong. The GUI
window app has been completely scrapped in favor of a WinRuntime app "Edge"
instead of the old iexplore.exe that code can be traced back to at least
Internet Explorer 3 (and maybe even IE 1).

~~~
hirsin
Partially correct. EdgeHTML was in IE11, but wasn't a renamed MSHTML (check
your system32, you'll see both DLLs in Win10). It's a departure from MSHTML
that's been seriously changed, lots of cruft removed and a lot of interop
added.

Fun anecdote - last week someone at Steam wrote one of the sale pages using
entirely -webkit- prefixes. It showed up blank in Forefox, but rendered fine
in Spartan and Chrome.

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Offler
I don't find the fact a brand new browser already supports legacy 'webkit-'
prefixes a fun fact...

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hirsin
In truth, neither do I. But Edge/Spartan follows the developers, and sometimes
that involves being interoperable with poorly designed sites that have fallen
prey to browser-specific prefixes.

From a business sense, it works because if it works in Chrome and fails in
Spartan, it's our fault. From a user experience sense, it also works because
they deserve to have their sites work.

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winry
All I need to hear is when is when "Edge 2" going to be released. If it's two
years after this one then we'll have a "new" old problem.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Like IE11, Edge is evergreen.

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evbots
hopefully not the same pig with new lipstick

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jastanton
Yet another engine to support. They are creating their own called EdgeHTML

~~~
wlesieutre
It's replacing Trident for everyone except companies that use internal
software designed for IE6, and you can pretty well ignore those users.

Same number of engines to support as before.

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davidgerard
That's really not how browser support works ... if your customers are paying
money, you don't trust a damn thing and you verify stuff on all browsers with
any appreciable market share. jastanton is entirely correct.

~~~
wlesieutre
Sure, but IE's rendering engine is probably not going to change appreciably
from here on forward, it's just a legacy support thing.

If they'd called this IE 12, you'd be supporting IE 8-11 and IE 12. Instead,
you're supporting IE 8-11 and Edge. Big difference?

Less of a big deal than the Webkit/Blink split, if you ask me.

~~~
davidgerard
In my real-life experience, you're simply incorrect here. If all those
variants of IE are in use by paying customers (which is our situation), then
you do have to account for the fact that they have sufficient individual
quirks as to require individual testing.

If you don't have paying customers, or you can actually tell them what to
browse with, you might plausibly not care. Ours tend to have locked-down
desktops and very little personal choice in browser.

~~~
wlesieutre
Yes, you have to test in multiple versions of browsers. My point here is that
they are adding _one_ new browser.

If they were making a new IE 12 instead of making Edge, you'd be in exactly
the same boat of having to test one new browser from Microsoft.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I'll be surprised if the version of IE that they ship for
enterprise users is practically different from the current version in Windows
8.

