Just caught Dave MasseyMassy‘s (apologies for the misspelling, Dave) response to some comments of mine from a CNET/ZDNet story back in June. I got linked to the entry from another CNET story here.
The original comment I made was:
“Longhorn isn’t going to be delivered in the timeframe Microsoft originally expected, and users probably can’t wait that long for a stabilized browser. So as a stop-gap move, they are going to shore up IE,” O’Grady said.
His response located here was:
This is not the case at all. As Tony Chor the Group Program Manager for IE said on Channel 9 a couple of months ago there is a renewed effort on Internet Explorer. The immediate focus is on security improvements and you can clearly see great progress there in Windows XP SP2. There are currently no plans to release a new version of Internet Explorer prior to Longhorn when it will be delivered as part of the new OS. As the team completes Windows XP SP2 we are starting to think about what we will deliver as a great browser in Longhorn which is why the feedback now is so useful.
So I think I must be missing something here, as I don’t see where I went wrong. At no point in the quote am I talking about a standalone release of another browser; Microsoft’s been clear on that score, even if I think it’s a significant mistake. What I said was that rather than wait until the release of Longhorn, which is a few years away, they were going to improve – or “shore up” – IE. Which I think jives pretty well with what Dave said. And it’s pretty much what we saw in the security improvements and minor functional alterations (pop-up killing, etc.) issued in SP2. What did we get? A shored up version of IE.
Perhaps it was the word choice – “shore up” isn’t as clear as it could be, but a Google of [definitions:”shore up”] gives the following as related words: “bolster, hold, hold up, prop, prop up, propping up, shore, shoring, shoring up, support, sustain.” Replace is notably absent.
If I’m just being obtuse here, by all means let me know. I would have just posted this as a comment to Massey’s blog, but he has – not unreasonably, given its a few months old – closed comments on that particular post. So to Dave, sorry I missed the opportunity to respond at the time, but you’re on my blogroll now. Better late than never, right?
