Firefox Adoption

I was intrigued by this article from PC Pro in the UK about the trailblazing pace of Firefox 3.0 adoption. It turns out that just after 10 days, the number of visitors using Firefox 3.0 is outnumbering those using Firefox 2.0. Wow! Talk about success!

Just for the fun of it, I looked at my (completely unscientific and scewed) site stats. It turns out that the number are very similar for me. Before June 17^th, it turns out that Firefox 2.0 was already in the lead, followed by Firefox 3.0.

Here are the stats over a 32 day period:

Before June 17^th:

Firefox 3 52.87%
Firefox 2 45.98%
Firefox 1 1.15%

On June 17^th and after:

Firefox 3 62.00%
Firefox 2 38.00%

For the sake of comparison, here's how Firefox fared between the other browsers.

Before June 17^th:

Firefox            85.29%
Internet Explorer  11.76%
Mozilla             1.96%
Safari              0.98%

On June 17^th and after:

Firefox            86.21%
Internet Explorer   8.62%
Opera             5.17%

So, what conclusions should we draw behind these stats?

Well, to begin with, I don't think my site counts as a solid benchmark of Firefox for two reasons. I think it's fair to say that a lot of my visitors are like-minded and a lot of my regulars are friends and family. Most of them will be using Firefox.

The only surprise is that Firefox 3 was already ahead of Firefox 2 on my site 16 days before the release. This is most likely due to me encouraging my friends to try the latest beta.

I'm happy to see that Firefox is going to strong on my site — and not all of those visits are from people I know.

Beyond that, I'll let you draw your own conclusion.

Have a great day!

How Microsoft Won and is Loosing

Steve Ballmer had it right. Developer developer developer!

The prime reason why Windows won over OS/2, the MacIntosh and even MS-DOS was thanks to the mighty influx of application that crept up for the OS. And the only way that those applications existed was thanks to developers.

Thought the Windows API are not the most graceful API I've encountered, they were reasonably well documented. I learned the Win16 and Win32 APIs mostly by reading the MSDN help files.

Using the simple tactic of ensuring that developers would favour the Windows platform early on, Microsoft achieved dominance in the operating system market.



But what is happening today? Balmer has been singing a different tune for the past few year. Since the rocketing rise of Microsoft's stocks capped in 2000, the behemoth is now struggling to pierce new markets while retaining their heavy monopoly.

It's interesting to see Microsoft running like a chicken with it's head cut off. Vista is a disaster, they are still loosing money in their search and gaming division and .NET is barely making a dent in the Java marketplace. Let's not even mention their iPod killer: the Zune.

If it wasn't for the near monopoly on Windows and Office, Microsoft would be hemoraging money faster than the speed of sound. BANG! Bankrupcy before they know it.

I think the reason is pretty clear. Microsoft is now spitting in the face of the very people that brought them to where they are: the developers.

Balmer himself said that he would like open source innovations to happen on Windows. However, he seems (or chooses) to be clueless about the free software philosophy.



Balmer can push all he wants, but he should realize that developers are usually intelligent folks. Many open source developers are quite brilliant. I do believe that most developers can smell bullcaca when it is spewed out of someone's mouth.

Genuine honesty free of marketspeak is not something you often hear from Microsoft!



It's certainly not by forcing proprietary software or standards down the FOSS developer's throat that Microsoft is going to win any friends. Neither is it going to give developers the desire or even the posibility to innovate.

Personally, I like computers to work for me and not the other way around. That's one of the many reasons I don't use Windows &mdash I cannot stand an OS that thinks it can tell me how I should work.

ODF is the Winner: Microsoft

I'm kinda worried when Microsoft themselves declare that ODF is the clear winner in the OOXML-ODF war.

However, I think I can agree with Microsoft. The whole ISO/OOXML saga gave ODF a huge boost both in terms of popularity and credibility. This means that more people and organizations are aware of ODF than ever before.

I've long learns not to take anything Microsoft says at face value, so I'm a bit concerned about the statement. Maybe the statement is genuine, but I can't help but think that Microsoft has something up their sleeve. Until they display they ace, I'll keep my eyes and ears open.

Microsoft and Québec

"Vive le Québec Libre!"

I'm both honoured and weary of Microsoft's reach in Quebec.

The honour comes from the fact that Microsoft is calling their next version of Windows Embedded 'Quebec.' It's nice to see Canada recognized again.

However, using Canadian landscapes to win me over. Things like recognizing the GPL and supporting standards (instead of redeveloping them) would make me look at Microsoft again.

I'm also weary of Microsoft and their deal with the government of Quebec. Microsoft recently objected public access to the deals, since it would "likely risk to cause serious prejudice to our client and would procure the competition an appreciable advantage and would substantially undermine the competitivity of our client."

What I find interesting is that both IBM and Novell had no quorum against exposing the deal. So, what does Microsoft have to hide? What kind of prejudice would it place on the government of Quebec? If Microsoft feels that if would procure a appreciable advantage to their competition, does that mean that Microsoft has priced their products well above that of their competitors? What else was in the deal?

I'll keep my eyes on http://blogs.savoirfairelinux.net/cyrilleberaud/ and see which way this story goes. I'm sure it worth it!

"Vive le Québec Enchainé!"

The MS-OOXML Standard

Venezuela appealed OOXML as well, following the lead of South Africa, Brazil and India. Norway has also filed a letter of protest.

Though the news is interesting, what I find even more interesting is that it seems that even discussion of OOXML usually leads to Microsoft and/or Office.

The reason why I find this interesting is that no other companies are ever mentioned as direct benefiters beyond Microsoft. If the standard is truly a standard, why is only one company's name attached to it.

It's true that Microsoft created the standard, but why is Corel or Apple — supposed backer of the standard — never mentioned? Why are so many headlines along the line of 'Microsoft looses OOXML war?'

I don't know about you, but that tells me that there is only one company that stood to win from OOXML, and that's Microsoft. Let's face the fact: Microsoft did not create OOXML out of the goodness of their heart, or with inter-compatibility in their mind. OOXML was simply another tool in their lock-in arsenal.

Though ODF, MS-OOXML's so-called competitor was created originally with OpenOffice in mind, it has grown and evolved thanks to their own standardization process. Companies like IBM, Novell, Sun Microsystem and Google all participate to the development of ODF.

In the case of OOXML, who gets to participates in its future development?

Here's a hint

This is one of the many reasons I cannot support any Microsoft-controlled technologies or standards. No matter how 'open' they claim to be, Microsoft develops in secrecy, and announces specific features as they are getting close to completion. This ensures that any competing project continuously have to play catch-up with Microsoft. The standards controlled by Microsoft are pegs in the sand, and it's Microsoft that chooses where to put those pegs.

Who wants to play a game against an opponent who is also the referee?

Good News All Abound

Yay!

OOXML has been formally appealed by South Africa, Brazil and India. Microsoft has announced that they will support ODF 1.1 in Office 2007. However, they will not even support OOXML until the next version of Office.

To keep up with the good news, Internet Explorer 8 will finally be standards compliant. As a web developer, this is such a relief! No more double standards for web pages.

Furthermore, thanks to the success of the Eee PC, Linux is becoming more and more ubiquitous. Desktop Linux is, in my (no so) humble opinion at a level that is above that of Windows and the Mac. Not only do you have choice, but if you compare the ease of use of Gnome or KDE, I think that Linux is a powerful contender. The only obstacle that remains is education. Windows users need to unlearn things like C:\ drives or the pain of running setup programs.

Finally, even Novell is reporting success in the Linux front. I took the plunge and installed Novell's openSUSE, and thus far I'm greatly enjoying it. As much as I like Ubuntu, I would hate for a single Linux distribution to become the 'defacto standard,' just like I would hate to see Gnome or KDE displace one or the other. Choice and competition are good.

I'm so excited to see real competition gearing up in the world of informatics. I'm afraid that the Microsoft monopoly has set us back a number of years from where we could be in terms of technology. For example, it if hadn't been for Internet Explorer slowing the adoption of standard HTML, then CSS, where would the web be now?

Oh well. That's water under the bridge. Now that we are freeing ourself from the Microsoft stranglehold, who know what real innovation we are going to see in the world of computing.