Unbelievable.
Talk about shooting one’s self in the foot. For me, Windows 8 has gone from bad to worse.
So now, in the ARM version of W8, there will be no possibility of installing a third party browser, per the MS blog (1). So, for x86 systems, free access to all browsers. For tablets with ARM, “No soup for you!” and no “Come back one year.”
MS forgot it said quite the opposite in the past (2). Asa Dotzler won’t let MS forget the page they disappeared either (in the pdf below). Bless you, Mr. Dotzler!
So, third party devs who want to make software for Windows RT, and only create Metro apps for that and thus MS shoots itself in the foot which seems to be in its mouth. So Mozilla and Google climbed on board in expressing their concerns regarding the limitation of user choice and limiting innovation (no surprise there)… and this kind of limitation will prevent MS from the European market, and will probably cause even more litigation. So much for the “ethical company award” it always touts.
MS claims the reason for doing this is that those apps cannot be ported as is because of:
“commitment to longer battery life, predictable performance, and especially a reliable experience over time.
The conventions used by today’s Windows apps do not necessarily provide this, whether it is background processes, polling loops, timers, system hooks, startup programs, registry changes, kernel mode code, admin rights, unsigned drivers, add-ins, or a host of other common techniques. By avoiding these constructs, WOA can deliver on a new level of customer satisfaction: your WOA PC will continue to perform well over time as apps are isolated from the system and each other, and you will remain in control of what additional software is running on your behalf, all while letting the capabilities of diverse hardware shine through.” (4)
Thus, as M. Bormann points out at gHacks:
“This highlights that it is not only about blocking web browsers, but all classic software from running on ARM. What Mozilla and Google criticize is that these restrictions do not apply to Internet Explorer. Other software companies might criticize that it is also not applying to Office, or other first party software that Microsoft integrates into Windows RT. The question here is if the new APIs are as restrictive as Mozilla and Google make them sound to be like.” (5)
You know what? I’ve stopped caring about Windows 8. It’s a lost cause, and just getting worse.
If anyone could have killed the idea of the Windows Tablet, it was only MS.
Sources:
1. http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/asa/archives/2012/05/firefox-on-windows-o.html
2. http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2006/jul06/07-19PrinciplesPR.aspx
3. http://lockshot.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/windows-principles-document.pdf
4. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/02/09/building-windows-for-the-arm-processor-architecture.aspx
5. http://www.ghacks.net/2012/05/11/no-third-party-browsers-on-windows-rt/?_m=3n%2e0038%2e516%2ehj0ao01hy5%2eiyk