

Ask HN: What would it take for IE not to be hated? - andrewcross

After watching the new Microsoft troll ad for IE 10 on TechCrunch (which is actually pretty good), I started thinking about what it would take for IE not to be hated by the tech community.<p>For those that have done web dev, you'll know the pain it causes. CSS properties aren't supported, the debugger is terrible, etc.<p>Would solving those issues be enough for you not to hate IE? If not, what would be required?
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duiker101
I think it's very hard, if not impossible. It is deep in people's mind, and
that is more a problem than the browser's actual features/problems. I think
that IE has done a lot of steps forward and is now a decent browser.
Unfortunately there are many people that are considered "those good with PCs
because they spend a lot of time playing games", that believe that IE sucks
because everybody thinks so, and it's not going to be easy to change their
mind, it's like "fan boys" but with hate.

I think this is because IE has been bad for many releases before being decent.
Android has been near the same fate. Everyone thought that Android has a
crappy user interface and a lot of people still think it even if now Android
completely changed. Lucky it changed quickly, and so more people are giving it
credit. But with IE, it's another story. In conclusion, possible, but it will
take a lot of time and a lot of effort. I wonder if it's worth it. Microsoft
should come up with some crazy revolutionary "killer feature", other way there
will be no reason to switch back.

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runjake
Direct link to video for others who don't read TechCrunch:

<http://youtu.be/lD9FAOPBiDk>

I don't hate IE, but for me to consider start using it, it would need to run
on all major platforms and be open ala Chrome and Firefox. Otherwise, I don't
see the point.

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dholowiski
That's actually a pretty clever video.

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sergiotapia
For me it has nothing to do with being open source or aligned with the "free"
philosophy. I don't like IE because it makes my job harder without any real
reason.

Why can't it update automatically and save millions of dollars? Developers
cost money and companies have to pay tons of unnecessary hours making a web
page work on broken IE renderings.

I would not hate IE, and maybe even use it, if it could update itself without
needing it's crap Windows Update thingy.

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eduardordm
I feel a bit disrespected by that ad.

See, I'm a IE 'hater' not because 'IE sucks' but because in my current project
I have 746 lines of CSS hacks to bring IE 7/8 to 2012 because MS is incapable
of rolling out a functional, continuous update system.

The update system was not fixed.

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27182818284
I think Microsoft and IE haters alike often overlook one HUGE reason people
won't switch to IE 10: There is no reason to switch back to IE because it
doesn't offer any reason to. Even your question points out that there is no
obvious reason why users should be switching. If it did, it would have started
with something like "Now that IE has X will you switch?"

Chrome, Firefox, and Opera have proven innovative not just in the realm of
CSS, JS, and HTML5 standards, but also in things like extensions, community,
update cycles, etc. IE is constantly catching up, so even when it does become
the "fastest browser" it is only that for a month. Then a new version of
Chrome or Firefox comes out that is faster _and_ has new features X,Y, and Z.

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jfaucett
I think it would take IE not working for something a lot of people want to do.
The problem with IE is that it works for end users. devs build websites that
work on IE so most everyday people never even notice or care that IE is such a
pain. I remember when facebook dropped IE6 support. That was a nice day,
pretty soon IE6 support was more or less dead (at least in user-land,
corporant behemoths are another story...). Basically, big players would just
have to quit IE support entirely and force ms to do what opera does and build
a decent browser.

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dholowiski
As others have said, I don't think it's possible. I think Microsoft could gain
some trust by bundling Chrome and Firefox with Windows, and possibly even
abandoning IE, but I think that's fairly unlikely.

[edit] their best bet is to make the browser 'go away' so you can't even tell
when you're in IE. I think they're actually taking steps towards this with the
'metro' version of the browser in Windows 8.

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marshray
It would need to have a default start page that does not insult my
intelligence, rather than one like this: <http://twitpic.com/9y42i1>

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maze
By using Webkit

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rglover
If they'd admit that Trident wasn't a great engine and swapped it with
something else (Webkit), maybe.

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codgercoder
time travel?

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pasbesoin
Perhaps for those of an older generation (if not more generally), it's not
primarily that IE is IE -- it's that Microsoft is Microsoft.

We're always wondering when the rug is (once again) going to be pulled out
from under us.

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leecGoimik7
die?

