10 May 2012

The Mozilla Blog: “Windows on ARM Users Need Browser Choice Too”

It’s reported that Windows RT (the name Microsoft has given to Windows running on the ARM processor) will have two environments, a Windows Classic environment and a Metro environment for apps. However, Windows on ARM prohibits any browser except for Internet Explorer from running in the privileged “Windows Classic” environment. In practice, this means that only Internet Explorer will be able to perform many of the advanced computing functions vital to modern browsers in terms of speed, stability, and security to which users have grown accustomed. Given that IE can run in Windows on ARM, there is no technical reason to conclude other browsers can’t do the same.Harvey Anderson

I guess I missed the post where Mozilla complained about the very same practice from Apple with iOS. Or where they announced they will be supporting Internet Explorer on their Boot2Gecko platform. Or where Google announced the same level of support on ChromeOS.

The fact of the matter is this isn’t about having choices. User will always have a choice, to buy an WinRT tablet or not – or to buy an iPad, as they will probably continue to do. It’s about Mozilla’s place in the browser landscape and the fact that they are being slowly, but surely, squeezed out, on the desktop as on mobile – where they weren’t that relevant to start with.

1 comment:

  1. Windows are great but the products are platform dependent of windows and paid also. On the other side Android are open source and maximum products are free to use.

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