Comments on: Microsoft's Gazelle browser takes a radical path

In an exclusive interview, CNET News' Ina Fried talks with Helen Wang, the researcher behind Microsoft's Gazelle effort, which aims to make the browser more like an operating system.

[summer_star]

Firefox is WAY better. I'm tired of Microsoft's trial and error, web browsers...IE 1...2...3...4...5..6..7...8... If they can't get it right the first time, GIVE IT UP!!! Firefox is safe, checks your spelling and lets you know what it is doing, without taking over your computer, and/or freezing up your system. Let's face it, IE stinks!!!

[monkeyfun14]

"without taking over your computer, and/or freezing up your system"

That's debatable.

[Pishkado]

Thank you for the rant. Maybe Microsoft should stop doing all research into new computing approaches, fire everyone who might have a new idea, burn Bill Gates in effigy and hang Steve Ballmer at sunrise? Would that make you happy?

[twitter_1963]

I've tried Firefox over the years and it's pretty lame. Might explain why 95% of enterprise users use it, feel safe with it and IT support it. At least, if you going to bash Microsoft, have some respect that these 95% of business users are REAL!

[goodspeed8701]

Summer star.... Please be a computer literate first before posting rant.

[jaguar717]

So regarding this "first time" requirement, and your rant about version numbers:

Which version of Firefox are you using? Because I'm pretty sure mine is 3.5.

[celticbrewer]

What a stupid comment. Firefox, as evolutions of other browsers, has actually been around as long, or longer, than Internet Explorer. They've had just as much trial and error as MS. Perhaps Firefox should just "give it up".

Secondly, I use Firefox myself (and IE at work). Firefox does indeed lock up my system from time to time. It is also less secure than MSIE.

As long as companies keep improving their products, there will always be new versions. And if they decide to stop improving, then society will become stagnant. Perhaps you need to evaluate your perception of existence if you don't thiink things should evolve.

[cougar888]

I have to agree that Firefox is way better. That isn't saying much, because just about every browser is way better. From my experience in enterprise, 95% of enterprises support IE as the official browser, but 99% of enterprise employees use anything but IE. The reason why it is supported is because of all the legacy code that was written for it. Once those tools become obsolete, I forsee a major shift in the enterprise market.

My personal favorite is chrome. I used to be a Firefox fan, until there started to be updates every day. Now it takes just as long to start Firefox as it does to boot Windows. Once it is up, it runs great. I can't wait until chrome gets better extensions.

[thelemurking]

Yes celtic, firefox is way less secure than IE... oh wait, Microsoft is warning everyone of yet another activex whole which lets someone take complete control of your PC from the browser... oh joy! how wonderful it is to have a browser tied directly into the operating system!

Firefox is quick to offer updates, Microsoft tends to wait a month if it doesn't fall in their patch Tuesday cycle.

But you got to love the way IE7 and 8 rip off features of Firefox... tabs, extensions and privacy anyone?

[monkeyfun14]

Yes celtic, firefox is way less secure than IE... oh wait, Microsoft is warning everyone of yet another activex whole which lets someone take complete control of your PC from the browser... oh joy! how wonderful it is to have a browser tied directly into the operating system!

Firefox is quick to offer updates, Microsoft tends to wait a month if it doesn't fall in their patch Tuesday cycle.

But you got to love the way IE7 and 8 rip off features of Firefox... tabs, extensions and privacy anyone?


That Active X exploit doesn't affect IE 8
IE has been using an extension system for years.
Privacy IE had this feature before FF *** are you talking about.
Tabs oh come on just because one browser uses it all the others should be doomed to have to open a million windows and Opera had this before FF did.
Lets start yelling at Honda for including doors on there cars because Ford had them first.

[BingItOn]

I use FF/Opera/Safari only because my company wants me to make sure page renders and works fine acrtoss all browser. But for my actual browsing I heavily rely on IE.

[Mr. Dee]

Any screenshots of it? Sounds like something for either Windows 10 or Windows 11.

[innov8ion]

Wouldn't you rather see the proposed architecture -- the nuts and bolts? A screen shot won't tell you anything.

[mrguard]

Here's the MS article that Ina missed::

http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/news/features/gazelle-062909.aspx

[lennie22]

some people buy cars because of how it looks, and others buy cars becauser of how it drives, Innov8ion, I think you and I buy cars the same way

[brjones]

Yeah make it more like Konqueror ;) I keep using Linux. Free and open source rules.

[berfarah]

A great concept. Just please change rendering engines from Trident (I believe it's called), and move on to webkit - or perhaps a newer, more revolutionary one. Come on Microsoft, you can do better than this - after all, you are on your way to release of the best Windows OS in MS history.

[compbry15]

No, please not a "newer, more revolutionary one." Webkit is already regularly updated with the latest standards in HTML, CSS, and JS. Adding yet another rendering engine to the mix would be a complete waste. If IE knew what was good for them they would upgrade IE to Webkit, and use that same rendering engine for this new Gazelle too.

[ckurowic]

Haha, the best Windows OS in history is NOT saying much.....

[gggg sssss]

webkit? you must be kidding.

[palavering]

I submit that I.E. 8 is as good as any other browser on the market. Those who choose to denigrate one browser to elevate another are using caprice instead of reason as their hallmark.

[Lerianis3]

Well, IE8 is STILL very insecure compared to Firefox 3.5 or Opera.... that's a bottom line assessment coming from a Microsoft fanboy. Yet, those things I can overlook because as long as you are not surfing the 'seamy underbelly of the internet'..... you are pretty safe even with IE8.

[ckurowic]

And what are you doing then?

[codynews]

"are using caprice instead of reason as their hallmark."

Seriously? Who talks like that...? Do you talk to people in real life in that way?

[kelmon]

"I submit that I.E. 8 is as good as any other browser on the market."

Fair enough. I submit that IE8 is better than prior versions of IE7 but not as good as any of the other major browsers. Sorry but I only use it when a web application actually needs it. It's slower, clunkier and still doesn't support Ctrl+L as a shortcut to the URL bar (I know it sounds minor but it drives me nuts).

[kelmon]

"I submit that I.E. 8 is as good as any other browser on the market."

Fair enough. I submit that IE8 is better than prior versions of IE7 but not as good as any of the other major browsers. Sorry but I only use it when a web application actually needs it. It's slower, clunkier and still doesn't support Ctrl+L as a shortcut to the URL bar (I know it sounds minor but it drives me nuts).

[traxx09]

kelmon, what browser did you use to double post? I'm pretty sure it wasn't IE8.

[cougar888]

@kelmon

You can get to the URL with ALT + D
This works for all browsers except Safari which uses CMD + L only.

I understand the frustration. I've learned the ALT + D route instead of CTRL + L and I hate it when I use Safari because it doesn't comply with my muscle memory.

[monkeyfun14]

"Well, IE8 is STILL very insecure compared to Firefox 3.5 or Opera"

Eh actually in the default sandboxed mode in Vista and Windows 7 its the most secure browser.

[wolivere]

And firefox does not support Ctrl F for find.. drives me nutz when i am searching through big sites. Yes each and every one does something different, and sometimes when someone gets use to one way it becomes a pain.

[SactoGuy018]

While I like the improvements in IE 8, the rendering speed still lags, especially compared to the wonderful Firefox 3.5, probably the best overall web browser for most users (sure, Google Chrome is even faster, but the woeful lack of third-party support hampers that browser).

[Gonzie]

"the browser needs to act more like Windows does"
*coughs* erm no thanks

"making sure that different Web applications are protected from one another"
when did windows ever do that? with normal applications no less

[Vegaman_Dan]

@Gonzie:

"when did windows ever do that? with normal applications no less "

Vista and Win7 both protect applications from interfering with each other for increased stability.

[FF2009]

Gazelle? I think MS is scratching their heads and dont know what to do with IE. Here is a though for MS..let it die and concentrate on Windoz security, make sure you patch those holes before Trojans and Viruses find their way in.

How about that MS? it's not much to ask. Let Open Source worry about Browsers because they to a better job than you! [CNET editors' note: Prohibited content deleted.]

[codynews]

MS should make an "IE Lite" , basically a chrome rip off.

[wolivere]

If open source did so well, why are they still on the bottom? Its not like there is not enough advertising out there? Why? Why is open source and free just not working?

[hippie_dream]

"Why is open source and free just not working?"

Define not working. Seem to me that FF is doing just fine, Chrome is growing like crazy and each and every year IE loses market share. These things don't happen over night and any improvements in the browser market over the past few years are directly due to competition. Regardless, of which browser you use, it is impossible to argue that we would better off with JUST IE and none of the alternatives.

[wolivere]

FF been around how many years for how much? Chrome is growing like crazy? Last chart I saw was flat, similar to Linux distro's. For all the *Great* they just have not grown to the killer stage that people have expected. As some others have pointed out Mozilla has been around longer then IE, how long does it take? For all that fanfare, it seams I will be long dead before they catch up, if they ever do.

The reason Internet Explorer's market share has stayed so high is beacuse of non-technical people who are afraid to try something new or just don't know how to download stuff at all. Thus, unless Microsoft relents and puts open source browsers as Default browsers on Windows (which will never happen), Internet Explorer will always have a pretty high market share due to Computer novices.

[ckurowic]

MS is in a mad scramble to get away from all the names that have given them a DESERVED bad reputation over the years. First Vista is now 7 (same sh...), now Internet Explorer is going to be....Gazelle.

[monkeyfun14]

How is 7 same as Vista exactly? Why don't you use it before making baseless comments.

[Vegaman_Dan]

@ckurowic:

"First Vista is now 7 (same sh...), "

Please explain that comment in full detail how Vista is the same as Win7 and I do believe you'll find yourself alone on an island of misunderstandings.

Really now, try something new and original instead of letting others think for you?

[lennie22]

don't feed the troll

[jake3373]

Another comment from a person who is commenting on Windows 7 before he even tried it.

I am running Windows 7 on a pretty low-spec computer (one that could never run vista), and it works very well.

[twitter_1963]

I don't know how old the author is but this is what the Browser was supposed to be when the Windows OS and the Browser were supposedly one of the same with the launch of 98/XP. IE and the O/S are pretty much one and the same already and it didn't work well. Browsers suck as a technology.

Given just how many plugins, and programming hooks, work-arounds, scripts are needed in ALL the browsers to make them work, all we have succeeded in doing is turning them into Fat Client, Client Server apps. Why don't we just stick with ZERO INSTALL, FAT CLIENT APPS in the browser or outside - who cares anymore. They are much more productive then Web Apps which are very flaky with all these plug-ins, forget things and often a backspace press in the wrong field and you lose all your data :)

I'd still taken Quicken FAT client than Quicken ON-LINE any day of the week. I can work ANYWHERE with it.

[wolivere]

Because they wanted the Browser/OS to be separate.. well the DOJ did at least.

[plbyrd]

AMEN!!!!

Silverlight and Flash should be the only platforms web developers use. HTML is a blight on humanity.

[kelmon]

"Wang isn't trying to suggest Windows is going away. Indeed, she says, Gazelle depends on Windows, acting merely as the middleman for Web pages seeking to access a computer's resources."

I believe this is the point where I lost interest. If the applications that my computer is going to be running are in the cloud then what do I need Windows for? I'm expecting the desktop computer to become more of a dumb terminal and I'm damned sure that I don't need a Windows license to manage the limited resources that the web applications will need. The last thing that we need (but I suspect Microsoft does) is another means of chaining the Internet to Windows.

[twitter_1963]

Your going to have to rewrite 30+ years of legacy code first. That's going to take some some risk taking CTO with deep budgets to even start on that road. If your lucky enough to be running the few commercial apps that run in the cloud (AKA, not med-large enterprise) then good luck. I think the O/S will be around for a little while yet. Oh, and that's there's financial services, and healthcare. Not likely to be storing much data in the cloud anytime soon!

[jkohut]

This COULD be an opportunity for Microsoft to break the ties of ActiveX and other proprietary technologies. They should embrace this browser and make it revolve around Java and HTML5 (and other open internet standards). They can then keep their proprietary OS, but have a browser that is inclusive of technology which will give them the ability to work on any website. It may be the thing that prevents them from becoming obsolete as more and more people move toward mobile comuting (Smartphones) where people are demanding open solutions. Big opportunity for Microsoft here, but they have to see that alienating other platforms is not the way to go.

[wolivere]

I hate JAVA, biggest crashing resource bleeding pile of crap ever brought out.

[lennie22]

java is ****, **** I tell you.......even though I use it to play some java based games with family and friends, its still ****.

[randy620]

@lennie22
I agree that Java is **** but Java does not equal JavaScript ... two different things

[jake3373]

Java sucks, always kills my computer. However, JavaScript is one of the best things invented. This site probably wouldn't even work without it.

[lorax1284]

Microsoft has spent over a decade INTEGRATING the browser into the OS to the point where they are getting fined for anti-competitive practises.... and a decade patching the security holes exposed by this tight integration. NOW they say that they shouldn't allow the browser to have such direct access to the operating system. Well, DUH. They should stick to the OS and let those with only arms-length access to the deep OS code be the vendor of choice for the Web browser. For me, Firefox is it, and I am deathly afraid of using IE for the very reason that it is so tightly integrated into the OS that it makes me very uneasy to use it.

[jake3373]

Agreed

[pctec100]

I've been hearing for more than a decade that the browser would replace the OS. In 1999 it was Netscape Navigator and Java that was going to kill the OS. Hasn't happened yet. I suspect writers will still be putting together similiar articles a decade from now.

[randy620]

Exactly pctec100,
I have been hearing of Microsoft's demise for 15 years. how foolish these open farce people are

[cvaldes1831]

Here we go again. The future of the Internet is not on desktop PCs. It's on handheld devices such as smartphones and the iPod touch. This is where the growth is; already much of the world is already runs their lives from their cellphones (look at Japan).

In the eighteen months of owning an iPod touch and especially in the year that the App Store has been around, I find myself using my home computer a lot less. It's a MacBook that has gone out the front door twice in the past year.

On top of that, these little devices use apps to access data on the Internet. I get e-mail, news, stocks, sports scores, weather, traffic, streaming audio/video, TV and movie schedules, maps, access to social networks, IM, share files, buy stuff (music, apps, etc.) and can book restaurant reservations without using the World Wide Web (i.e., not using a web browser).

Developers, journalists, technologists, and other pundits still cannot see the forest for the trees. Thinking of the web browser as an operating system is obsolete because already people are using Internet services and accessing data without firing up a browser. I'm doing it and I'm an old fogey.

And frankly, the Mozilla Foundation better get their butts in gear as well. They have no credible mobile browser and their entire business model is based on directing people to Google for search. While that's not quite a house of cards, it's a model with limited growth potential.

The future is in the palm of your hand, not sitting on your desktop back at home.

[Mungoflea89]

Agree.

[JDubbs115]

Well said.

[randy620]

agree and disagree. I see mobile devices growing rapidly but I don't see most giving up the desktop. They may use it less but there will still be one or two in the house.

[weegg]

Wang is so far off the mark as well as MS if they give this idea any credence. There are so many aspects of the desktop metaphor using a browser just doesn't address and will inherently limit user access to OS features they need. I equate this idea to work as well as Cloud, which I would never trust.

PCs will live for a long time and OSs will still be battling it out for the rest of my lifetime. The standard desktop metaphor will survive.

[cosuna]

Ina:

Microsoft needs more than a Proof-of-Concept to outrun Mozilla, or even Chrome.

Gecko is so far different from IE as it is from the original Netscape code base that it inherited when the project started. The main reason was that developers found that traditional browser conceptions were antiquate and introduced tons of useless code, for example VML, HTML+Text, etc.

IE 7 was Microsoft opportunity to create a fresh start from IE3/4/5/6 evolution, but got wasted when Microsoft saw this too complex a project to accomplish in a finite amount of time. Now IE8 has taken Windows 7 approach and just refactored and splitted so the development team can actually manage the release. But no new code seems to be introduced and rendering does become faster, but more due to compiler optimizations and code enhancements, than completely new and fresh code.

So IE8 is no match to Chrome's V8. It would have been better to scrap the Active Scripting Engine of IE6 in favor of a CLR compatible Dynamic Language runtime, than what they did, which is good for compatibility sake, but closes the path to improvement.

In many ways IE8 and Windows 7 reveal the challenges that Microsoft has for the next 10 years, that is keep legacy compatibility while introducing new functionality without "feature creep" and the creation of unmaintainable code.

Win7 team drop the towel of legacy support and introduced the creaky "XP Mode" which has now created a nightmarish scenario where TWO TEAMS are required to maintain Business Win7: "Vista team" and "XP Team".

Should IE thread than same path. Time will tell if the Win7 people were Win3.11 right or Workplace OS wrong. (People that know Workplace OS will understand this statement clearly)

[wolivere]

If chrome is so good, why does it Chew up resources like crazy? I can't count the number of times I used chome came to this very site, started posting, and watched my work pc just crawl as CPU hits 100%

[hypnotic]

@wolivere: Strange, thats never happened with mine. If my PC came to a crawl, then I wouldn't be experiencing Chrome as being balzingly fast, would I? Sounds like you have crappy hardware, or awesome hardware with Vista installed on it.

[jake3373]

"Sounds like you have crappy hardware, or awesome hardware with Vista installed on it."
lol, Windows 7 for me.

[jake3373]

Meaning that I use Windows 7 and it fixes this problem, not that Windows 7 is Vista SP3 (or whatever service pack they happen to be on by now)

I Love Windows 7!!!

[CDubber]

Hooray! Another attempt by Microsoft to subvert the Web and turn it into another proprietary Microsoft technology!

[Vegaman_Dan]

Exactly! And because Google makes Chrome, that means Google is trying to take over the net for exactly the same reason based upon your comment. Also, that indicates that they may have trouble since Apple has their own browser so perhaps it's Apple that is taking over the Web. Or was it Firefox? I have trouble keeping up with the conspiracies.

Sheesh. Talk about being gullible....

[lennie22]

I bet if oen of the other browser companies had came out with this you would of been all for it.

[CaptThom]

Precisely my reaction when I read this article. The last thing anyone needs is more proprietary MS approaches to an increasingly open-source world.

The Prime Directive of MS, as is Apple's or Google's or any other corporation, is to supply value to shareholders and turn a profit. If, as many suggest, the browser is the OS of the future, MS can't fulfill that directive if it loses the browser war. So, following a well-trodden path, it seeks to further appropriate the browsing experience by means of reinventing the wheel in its own image.

Or, maybe I'm just bitter because my g*****n Vista notebook crashed again this morning....

[inachu1]

Microsoft is trying to head off the past reports to make operating systems irrelevant.
It is a good question.

Why not have a small electronic box just for doing typing and another just for web surfing.
Having an all you can eat carte blanch OS is BLOAT WARE in the extreme.
Would be nice to buy a program embeded into a hardware device just for that purpose.

Kinda like how they are selling games on a joystick at the checkout lanes in tech stores.

[gfsdfge]

It seems that once again the majority of commenter?s on this site have totally missed the concept of the article and just went back to their petty bickering over browsers and what mega-corporation they believe actually cares about them. I think I'll stop reading the comments from now on. Tot he authors though, I'll continue to read the articles. I thought this one was informative and I will research Gazelle a bit more.

[jake3373]

I love reading comments after any browser or OS article (or many other articles that spur irreverent Mac vs. Windows or FF vs. IE vs. Chrome vs. Safari vs. Opera wars)

[ArsFragica]

no thanks. apple knows how to make the safest browsers, OS, and products. unlike ****** vista, RRoD 360.

[lennie22]

you're joking right? it was the first to get hacked in recent competition.....it went down in seconds.....friggin seconds. and for your information, I love my xbox. vista worked fine for me granted I had 3gb of ram which cost me roughly $40

[randy620]

ummmm, yeah the store accross the street from me that hasn't opened yet gets robbed a lot less than the one right next it that has been in business for years too. Lack of market share does not equal secure.Let Apple grab 30 -40 percent of the market and we will see the Mac bot networks explode like they already are with their slight growth (5 to 9 percent.)

See comment above from lennie22 ... they are the first to fall in any simulated attack. Vista and XP SP2 are two of the most secure. Props to Linux too as it is pretty tight.

[jemiller0]

I want to know if it's implemented using the .NET Framework. I've long thought that this is the way to go from a security perspective. Maybe then there would be less buffer overflow vulnerabilities. I really hope IE dies the miserable death that it deserves. In the new browser they can start by dropping all the non-standards compliant crap and implement the real standards correctly and completely. Microsoft needs to say no to COM and ActiveX and all the rest of the legacy crap they've been accumulating in the OS for the past 15 years or so. If Windows 7 still has the 80 useless processes running in the background slowing things down that Vista has, that's it, either sticking with XP indefinitely, or, I'm going to have to give serious consideration to switching to another platform. Vista really is a horrible OS. It's right up there with Windows Me and that says a lot when you are talking about horrible factor.

[lennie22]

I see you haven't used win7 yet. it will put a smile on your face. and vista worked fine for me, I had a couple blue screens due to me overclocking my hardware too far without good cooling.

[hypnotic]

I have a system with Vista on it, and I have had my laptop simply never wake up from Standby, having to perform a 'hard' shutdown too many times to count. The backup feature on it, when I tried to use it, was so incredibly ill-thought, I couldn't believe it....a backup of my documents includes all kinds of crap from AppData, Programs Files, and many other folders which had absolutely no use or connection to the pdfs and music files I had in Documents, bloating the backup to a size which defeated the purpose. Apart from that, I haven't had too many complaints, but the constant permanent sleep of my almost new laptop (no problems on the dual boot ubuntu..) is really frustrating.

Also, why do I need the adminstrator password to delete a SHORTCUT ICON that is on MY desktop (standard user). For gods sake, talk about ridiculous usability issues!!!

[jake3373]

Hey, guess what, I'm running Win7 and I only have 78 processes running right now (with about 5 programs open). And only about 10 are OS processes. (The rest are mostly my millions of Chrome tabs, as they each count as a separate process, and my email in the background, and my printer listener, and SmartDefrag, and other apps that I want to be running)

And Vista has 70 processes open now, with no programs running

[ca5ter]

I'm eating a can of beans

[rapier1]

I like beans. Only navy beans though. Anyone that eats pinto beans is insane and stupid.