Windows 8 forces other browsers out of Metro playground

Windows 8 is considerably more complicated because you have two versions of IE, one for the Legacy Desktop and one for the Metro Start screen.

ZOMG?! TWO options?! That is the most complicated thing imaginable! How will I ever choose which one will take me to the firefox download screen?
 
ZOMG?! TWO options?! That is the most complicated thing imaginable! How will I ever choose which one will take me to the firefox download screen?

From the article.

Windows 8 is considerably more complicated because you have two versions of IE, one for the Legacy Desktop and one for the Metro Start screen. In Windows 8, if you choose IE as your default browser, you need to pick which version of IE is the default browser: Metro or Legacy. In a flourish of Windows-style user interface muddling, the place where you choose your default browser is not the same place where you choose which of the two IEs reigns as default.

Here's how Microsoft stacked the deck. As long as either version of IE is the default Web browser, there's an IE tile on the Metro Start screen. But if you make some other browser the default, the tile disappears. There isn't any way on heaven or earth to run Metro IE, unless IE is chosen as the default browser.

Don't believe it? See for yourself. Download Firefox or Chrome -- the latest versions of both work just fine on the Windows 8 Consumer Preview Legacy Desktop -- and choose either as the default browser. (To truly change the default, you have to work through Control Panel's Set Default Programs applet.) The minute you make either Firefox or Chrome the default browser, the IE tile on the Metro Start screen changes so that it no longer points to Metro IE, but instead points to the Legacy Desktop IE. Since neither Firefox nor Chrome have Metro-style apps ready yet, that means you can't browse on the Metro side of the fence. Period.
 
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Windows Server 8 rocks. Windows 8 workstation sucks hairy balls, and has no place in an enterprise environment. I will not be deploying Windows 8 at my workplace.
 
am I missing something regarding why market share of browsers even matters? It's not like there are advertisements, I don't pay for the software, etc
 
am I missing something regarding why market share of browsers even matters? It's not like there are advertisements, I don't pay for the software, etc

Yeh, you are missing something. Do you need to be reminded what happens when MS is allowed a browser monopoly?
 
Seriously not a big deal. Just write your browser with Metro support, they even let you do that legally.
 
I'm really starting to think windows users are the most self loathing os users. I think they are still shell shocked from liking 7, so now they are going full throttle at hating 8. lolll.

OSX - consistently good for a decade.
 
I'm really starting to think windows users are the most self loathing os users. I think they are still shell shocked from liking 7, so now they are going full throttle at hating 8. lolll.

OSX - consistently good for a decade.

I believe that Mac users are silly people who like to jump on "popular" things. Windows usage isn't that different, it isn't "easier"... I use both at my house, depending on which room I am in. I just don't see enough of a difference to claim superiority. I also don't like the way that Apple treats every user like they are going to steal everything.
 
I'm really starting to think windows users are the most self loathing os users. I think they are still shell shocked from liking 7, so now they are going full throttle at hating 8. lolll.

OSX - consistently good for a decade.

OSX rolls out updates pretty quickly and consistently. Microsoft likes to sit around in its lair and wait until they've developed this "perfect" version of their OS, and by the time they're finished it's been years and years, then they dump it on users who are horrified because it's so goddamn different. That's where the user testing occurs and they figure out all the things that didn't work. Windows 7, for instance, is basically a highly polished version of Vista. Windows 8 is clearly something entirely different.
 
It looks like there will Metro support on Firefox 14.

On April 2 Mozilla announced prototype testing with the Windows 8 "Metro". Mozilla hopes to bring Windows 8 support in Firefox 14. Firefox on Metro, like all other Metro apps, will be full screen, focused on touch interactions, and connected to the rest of the Metro environment. Firefox will have to support three "snap" states—full screen, ~1/6th screen and ~5/6th screen depending on how the user "docks" two full screen apps. Version 14 has a planned release date of July 7, 2012 - this means Firefox 14 "Metro" will very likely be ready for when Windows 8 goes on sale.[SUP][104][/SUP]
 
I'm really starting to think windows users are the most self loathing os users. I think they are still shell shocked from liking 7, so now they are going full throttle at hating 8. lolll.

OSX - consistently good for a decade.

Every other release is hated. People loved 95, but hated 98; loved 2000, hated ME; loved XP, hated Vista; loved 7...and so on.

I actually liked Vista for the most part, but was always too ashamed to admit it. 0_o

I'm not violently opposed to W8 for home use. But I don't think it'll fit in an enterprise environment at all.
 
ME was beyond standard complaints of "bad." I had ME, it was buggy as shit. Really really really bad. I went back to 2000 as soon as I could.
 
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