In article <4721209.2GCQ8eRXLb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Roy Schestowitz wrote:
> Look at Internet Explorer. Why the heck should Firefox developers support
> some Microsoft 'HTML'? Because Microsoft intentionally generates _junk_ in
> FrontPage and Office, outputting this as so-called 'HTML'? Not to mention
> ActiveX. Microsoft _hates_ standards. They are not good for its investors
Firefox should support it for the same reason IE supported a bunch of
Netscape junk--it is what is out there. The way much of the HTML standard
developed was by companies like Netscape and Microsoft proposing things, and
implementing those things in their browsers. After the standards bodies see
that these things work in practice and are useful, they are added to the
standard.
This leads to some damn fine stuff, such as AJAX. AJAX's lineage is quite
direct from various Microsoft extensions (IFRAME in IE3, Micrsoft Remote
Scripting, XMLHttpRequest in IE5). Only now, *AFTER* this stuff has proven
itself to be worthwhile, is the W3C standardizing it (first working draft for
XMLHttpRequest published April 2006).
This is how many (most?) areas of standardization work in computing.
Languages, for example. C++ standardization was an iterative process, with
vendors implementing *and* *shipping* their takes on what the standard
should be. Standards that are developed by committees rather than by
experience with implementations tend to be junk. Look at the ISO network
model vs. the model TCP/IP uses, for example.
...
> My gripe was with the former paragraph, but I will only add that Microsoft
> has an history of patenting technology and method that it nicked from
> others. Have a look:
>
> http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/04/02/25/1346201.shtml
>
> Microsoft Seeks Patent On Virtual Desktop Pager
I wasn't able to understand the patent application on first reading. Could
you explain just what it is they've nicked from others there? (I assume you
aren't just looking at the title and judging from that...)
--
--Tim Smith
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