The Edge of an Era -- Internet Explorer is OFFICIALLY DYING

[Nimoy007]

 

Microsoft has announced the EOL (End-Of-Life) dates for the old "Legacy" version of Edge (pre-Chromium-based Edge) and dates for compatibility reductions for Internet Explorer.

 

Quote

Now, Microsoft has confirmed it will end support for the old version of Edge—meaning it will not receive any more security updates—on March 9 2021. . . . At the same time, Microsoft has also confirmed that many of its web-based services widely used by enterprises will stop supporting Internet Explorer 11 from August 17 2021. (Forbes)

 

The Internet's favorite browser patsy, Internet Explorer, or more creatively, "Internet Exploder," has finally received its death blow as Microsoft recently spelled out its time of death in a post on their blog. Along with IE's demise, Microsoft has also dug the grave for the relatively short-lived "Legacy Edge" browser. Microsoft detractors need not celebrate too quickly, though, because as was previously announced, Microsoft plans to continue to support and develop the current Chromium-based version of Edge. Technically, the announcement regarding Internet Explorer only concerns its integration with Microsoft 365 (formerly known as Office 365) and Teams, but users can be sure that the continued strip-down of IE's feature set will only hasten its ultimate and complete demise. Legacy Edge's date is, however, a hard EOL date.

 

Why does it matter that these older applications are fading? To the average consumer, many of their sites and much of their Internet content have long stopped being optimized (or even usable) on IE, and considering Google Chrome's majority browser market share, it may seem unlikely to affect the majority of netizens. The answer lies more in the corporate and commercial sector. With the price tags usually associated with software licenses and hardware deployments on a business scale, it can be hard for many corporations to justify keeping technology on the bleeding edge when much of it runs basic and seldom-used programs. Another key factor on the CEO's mind is compatibility. If switching software for one use-case breaks a whole system's infrastructure, there has to be a good reason to do it or it won't be done. After all, time is money, and corporations can't afford to take large portions of their network down over a minor software feature change. With Internet Explorer at the heart of many older web-based applications, it is a wake-up call to any businesses still using it as a major tool.

 

Legacy support for applications is important to foster a software company's image. Microsoft already, as a general rule, supported versions of Windows for five years with feature updates and ten years for security updates with extended support lasting even longer. At some point, though, it's time to throw in the towel, even for a giant like Microsoft, due to rising difficulty in compatibility with modern applications and new cyber attack vectors bringing legacy software to its knees. Still, it's important to remember some of the most iconic aspects of tech came from software's early days (Techquickie: Why Do We Use Ctrl-Alt-Delete?).

 

For those that still rely on IE and versions of Legacy Edge, the window to move on in a graceful manner is almost shut. For them, the transition may not be an easy one. Any time there is a major change in the world of technology and computing, some will be confused and disadvantaged by it, and it will be received negatively in some sectors of the market (Techquickie: Why CPU Sockets CHANGE So Much), but the slow march of progress will carry on nonetheless. Internet Explorer's twenty-five year lifespan coming to a close certainly marks the end of an era for older Windows/Microsoft software, but considering Firefox began to overtake IE in 2015, the browser may die "not with a bang, but with a whimper" (T.S. Eliot's Hollow Men).

 

For more about the death of the browser titan, check out Techquickie: The Browser That Took Over The World...and then DIED.

 

Author's Note: In regards to companies jumping ship: Best Buy has been making changes in its employee-facing systems to leave Internet Explorer behind for Chrome over the course of this year. Though not everything is fully ported over, it's a clear sign of progress as more and more content is made available through Chrome. As another side note, as well as divulging the reason for this post, I restarted my computer earlier today, only to have my screen filled with what seemed to be a borderless fullscreen Edge window. I now also have an Edge icon pinned to my taskbar and an icon on my desktop with absolutely no warning. Microsoft!! Have you learned nothing from your past browser shenaigans?!?!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sources

Spoiler

Main Image source: http://i2.cdn.turner.com/money/dam/assets/141230104204-ie-must-die-1024x576.png

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateoflahertyuk/2020/08/18/microsoft-here-are-the-end-dates-for-legacy-edge-and-internet-explorer/#5772da3c20de

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-365-blog/microsoft-365-apps-say-farewell-to-internet-explorer-11-and/ba-p/1591666

https://www.statista.com/statistics/544400/market-share-of-internet-browsers-desktop/

https://www.zdnet.com/article/bypass-discovered-to-allow-windows-7-extended-security-updates-on-all-systems/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XyDoXB0wQ0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIBtZfKfaMk

https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share/all/worldwide/2015\

https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/poetry/hollow-men/poem-text

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Sy5ify-R0w

 

Edited August 22, 2020 by Nimoy007
Sources section not appearing correctly underneath images, corrected spelling mistake, updated title for clarification purposes, updated article summary and title under advisement from forum members Vitamanic and Athan

[Guest]

IE's been edging far too long.

It's bout time it released all those page loads.

[Andreas Lilja]

Best browser I ever used to download Chrome.

[TetraSky]

Now businesses won't have any excuse to not upgrade their aging (craptastic) softwares that rely entirely on Internet Explorer and somehow doesn't work with other browsers.

[TempestCatto]

[bcredeur97]

I've been using the new edge on and off. Some bugs here and there, but overall it's actually pretty good. I think MS made a smart move switching to the chromium engine.

Old edge and IE were garbage tho. 

[Helpful Tech Witch]

But...... how will I use my surface rt?

[Ravendarat]

2 hours ago, TetraSky said:

Now businesses won't have any excuse to not upgrade their aging (craptastic) softwares that rely entirely on Internet Explorer and somehow doesn't work with other browsers.

This^^^^^ I have several web based programs I have to use through work that only work in IE, now they will have to get off their lazy asses and actually write a new version

[captain_to_fire]

5 minutes ago, TheTechWizardThatNeedsHelp said:

But...... how will I use my surface rt?

Surface Pro 

[Roswell]

Uh... I think you’re confused. Nothing in that release says they’re discontinuing support/updates for IE. 

[Kisai]

7 hours ago, Den-Fi said:

IE's been edging far too long.

It's bout time it released all those page loads.

MSIE should have been terminated with the end of Windows XP.  But as recently as 2016 there are still bots impersonating MSIE6.0 that form the basis of ad networks.

 

[Athan Immortal]

1 hour ago, Vitamanic said:

Uh... I think you’re confused. Nothing in that release says they’re discontinuing support/updates for IE. 

 

"After March 9, 2021, the Microsoft Edge Legacy desktop app will not receive new security updates."

 

Very interesting distinction you've pointed out there actually, Vitamanic. They only mention the Windows 10 legacy edge, not IE, and a note at the bottom reads:

 

"Internet Explorer 11 is a component of the Windows operating system and follows the Lifecycle Policy for the product on which it is installed."

[Monkey Dust]

8 hours ago, TetraSky said:

Now businesses won't have any excuse to not upgrade their aging (craptastic) softwares that rely entirely on Internet Explorer and somehow doesn't work with other browsers.

It looks like they will introduce IE11 compatible tabs in Edge to get around that problem, and probably drive Edge market share at least in offices.

 

Replacing software in a corporate environment is not a quick process. Two years from deciding an upgrade is in order, to full roll out is about as quick as it gets. Replacing it by August next year isn't going to happen unless they are already well into the testing phase.

[TetraSky]

5 minutes ago, Monkey Dust said:

It looks like they will introduce IE11 compatible tabs in Edge to get around that problem, and probably drive Edge market share at least in offices.

 

Replacing software in a corporate environment is not a quick process. Two years from deciding an upgrade is in order, to full roll out is about as quick as it gets. Replacing it by August next year isn't going to happen unless they are already well into the testing phase.

Lets be honest here. Businesses had years to prepare for the death of IE. It has essentially been put on death row ever since Edge was announced. But more often than not, management gives zero shit about IT since they don't understand any of it anyway.

[Athan Immortal]

2 minutes ago, TetraSky said:

Lets be honest here. Businesses had years to prepare for the death of IE. It has essentially been put on death row ever since Edge was announced. But more often than not, management gives zero shit about IT since they don't understand any of it anyway.

Yep. Same reason they'll get 1 length of CAT cable installed, but not think to run a second or third line while the electrician is there anyway for redundancy or expansion in future.

[Monkey Dust]

30 minutes ago, TetraSky said:

Lets be honest here. Businesses had years to prepare for the death of IE. It has essentially been put on death row ever since Edge was announced. But more often than not, management gives zero shit about IT since they don't understand any of it anyway.

Business software is really expensive, it's often customized for the business adding considerable expense. 10s, 100s or 1000s of people may need to be trained. And it can still go horribly wrong.

 

Even it goes well it's still a huge investment for a small return, it makes financial sense to stretch the life of your companies software as far as possible.   

[Dabombinable]

Ah the days of fighting others for the 1 desktop in the library that had Chrome installed. I really, really hated using IE8 in school. More so when the school forced their Celeron D and Pentium D with 1GB RAM to run Win7+Norton - it got even more useless.

[Nimoy007]

4 hours ago, Vitamanic said:

Uh... I think you’re confused. Nothing in that release says they’re discontinuing support/updates for IE. 

I see you didn't read my post. If you had, you would have seen the passage in the first paragraph beginning with, "Technically..."

Stripping IE support from 365 apps is a very good reason to believe that the aging browser is very quickly becoming useless.

[wall03]

11 hours ago, Andreas Lilja said:

Best browser I ever used to download Chrome.

never actually used Internet Explorer.

 

I used Edge to download the new Edge to download Firefox, and Edge (ft new edition) is nice to hae around

[Doobeedoo]

 

About time. 

[Commodus]

3 hours ago, Monkey Dust said:

Business software is really expensive, it's often customized for the business adding considerable expense. 10s, 100s or 1000s of people may need to be trained. And it can still go horribly wrong.

 

Even it goes well it's still a huge investment for a small return, it makes financial sense to stretch the life of your companies software as far as possible.   

That's arguably been one of Microsoft's biggest liabilities, and why companies like Apple and Google can be so nimble in comparison.

 

Part of why the PC market was struggling pre-pandemic (and still is, to a degree) is that Microsoft's former "legacy support above all else" mantra was coming back to haunt it. Companies have been loathe to buy Windows 10 PCs because they still want to run Windows 7, because it has a Windows XP mode that can run their Windows NT apps, because... you get the idea. Microsoft was so eager to build backward compatibility into Windows that it didn't stop to realize that it was setting unrealistic support expectations. Every time it wants to ditch a legacy framework it risks alienating tens of millions (if not hundreds of millions) of customers who've been trained to think all their software will run forever.

 

Apple and Google, meanwhile, don't have that baggage. They can sometimes be ruthless, but they also don't end up maintaining decrepit frameworks... or, for that matter, having to rush out security patches for a 16-year-old OS when ransomware wreaks havoc across the planet.

[Monkey Dust]

7 minutes ago, Commodus said:

That's arguably been one of Microsoft's biggest liabilities, and why companies like Apple and Google can be so nimble in comparison.

 

Part of why the PC market was struggling pre-pandemic (and still is, to a degree) is that Microsoft's former "legacy support above all else" mantra was coming back to haunt it. Companies have been loathe to buy Windows 10 PCs because they still want to run Windows 7, because it has a Windows XP mode that can run their Windows NT apps, because... you get the idea. Microsoft was so eager to build backward compatibility into Windows that it didn't stop to realize that it was setting unrealistic support expectations. Every time it wants to ditch a legacy framework it risks alienating tens of millions (if not hundreds of millions) of customers who've been trained to think all their software will run forever.

 

Apple and Google, meanwhile, don't have that baggage. They can sometimes be ruthless, but they also don't end up maintaining decrepit frameworks... or, for that matter, having to rush out security patches for a 16-year-old OS when ransomware wreaks havoc across the planet.

It's the difference between catering to corporate and consumer markets. If Windows machines had to go in the bin after 4 years like phones because no more security updates, many business users would seek an alternative.

 

As an example would you rely on an Android or iOS app to operate an expensive piece of machinery, or would you rather go with a Windows program safe in the knowledge it could still be made to work in 15 years? 

 

 

[RejZoR]

Currently Windows systems literally have 3! versions of Microsoft's browser. Internet Explorer, Legacy Edge and new Edge. Ridiculous.

 

Also I wonder if they'll finally migrate OS components and dependencies on IE components (like Explorer) and move them over to Chromium. I wonder if this will force NVIDIA to finally migrate their dumb, ugly and outdated NVIDIA Control Panel into something more modern and faster. Coz their stuff still runs on same IE from circa 2004-2006...

[Anarchyz11]

Tell that to my office.  We'll be using IE until I retire. 

[CTR640]

Oh no...I'll miss the ActiveX elements message