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Microsoft Will Forcibly Stop Loading Some URLs in Internet Explorer To Move Users To Edge (zdnet.com) 114

Posted by msmash from the how-about-that dept.
Big changes are coming to Internet Explorer. Starting next month, users trying to access certain websites will see IE refuse to load the URL and automatically open the site in Edge instead. From a report: This forced IE-to-Edge behavior is part of Microsoft's Internet Explorer deprecation plans. Microsoft has been gradually rolling out the feature for testing purposes for some Windows users since the release of Edge 84 this summer. However, with the release of Edge 87, scheduled for next month, Microsoft plans to enable the forced IE-to-Edge action for all IE users.
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Microsoft Will Forcibly Stop Loading Some URLs in Internet Explorer To Move Users To Edge More

Microsoft Will Forcibly Stop Loading Some URLs in Internet Explorer To Move Users To Edge

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  • Fun times coming (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 26, 2020 @09:48AM (#60650074)

    Personally i always like it when i click a link in chrome or firefox only to have explorer pop up. For example a 'mailto:' link with unconfigured mailer when you click 'contact' on a website. Looking forward to enhance this experience by being redirected to edge.

    • MS have deliberately made Teams not continue to work in IE.

      MSEdge

    • MS have deliberately made Teams not continue to work in IE.

      site url="teams.microsoft.com" open-in allow-redirect="true" MSEdge /open-in /site

    • No matter how I try to be rid of Edge on my windows desktop, it somehow comes back. Today edge did not come back, but the login screen has started displaying a message reminding me that I should be using 'the browser recormended by Microsoft.' They are putting advertising for Edge on the bloody login screen!

  • Mixed feelings (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anon E. Muss ( 808473 ) on Monday October 26, 2020 @09:49AM (#60650086)

    Any use of "Microsoft" and "force" in the same sentence always sets off alarm bells in my head. Having said that, anything that helps kill IE is a Good Thing.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Any use of "Microsoft" and "force" in the same sentence always sets off alarm bells in my head. Having said that, anything that helps kill IE is a Good Thing.

      Sysadmins have been "forced" to support "Microsoft" users who refuse to properly maintain their highly-targeted OS for decades now. The feelings' rather mutual, as we wouldn't be having this conversation if IE would have died an appropriate death instead of lingering like an incurable cancer.

    • Re:Mixed feelings (Score:4, Insightful)

      by DarkOx ( 621550 ) on Monday October 26, 2020 @10:01AM (#60650142) Journal

      I don't see how its good thing. Letting Microsoft break software people already licensed is abusive. Its one thing if they make the page on the remote server use features that no longer work in IE. Its quite another when they push patches that actively break IE. Which is what this does. The browser job is to display the content as best it knows how.

      • The best thing that IE could do to display content is load any other browser. Therefore, this is IE doing exactly the right job.

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by The Rizz ( 1319 )

          Edge often crashes or locks up when I try to load certain pages. IE never does - it may not display them correctly, but at least it never freezes or crashes repeatedly.

          Between IE and Edge, I'll take IE.

          • Re:Mixed feelings (Score:4, Insightful)

            by SirSlud ( 67381 ) on Monday October 26, 2020 @11:44AM (#60650676) Homepage

            Between IE and Edge, I'll take IE.

            You're the worst. Forcing people to not use IE is akin to preventing people from smoking in a puddle of gasoline. I mean, sure technically it violates your freedom to do what you want to do, but there's simply no way to argue that it isn't for your own good. Edge is on Chromium now, so if Edge crashes for you (not that it ever does for me) do what you should've been doing in the first place and use one of the many alternatives and not use the worlds worst, oldest, stupidest browser. The only reason to use IE is to use it for things only IE does (wrong) and since Edge doesn't give you that, I can't possibly fathom any complaint beyond "there is a gun to my head, and they pull the trigger unless I use IE"

            URLs that work in IE won't forward to Edge anyhow, so it's a doubly moot complaint.

            • IE mode should be automatic for all sites on IPv4 intranet/private ranges running on legacy ciphers, where the output does not declare as HTML5. It should be simple and transparent. It should also run downloads through IE, not Edge like IE mode does now when tabbed. This way. old DMSes do not break the moment a user tries to check out a file.

              I'm disappointed Microsoft didn't continue to polish IE because it was scanned good on Windows 8.1 and just needed a bit of love to bring it up to speed. Instead, we

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by The Rizz ( 1319 )

              I mean, sure technically it violates your freedom to do what you want to do, but there's simply no way to argue that it isn't for your own good.

              Gee, or perhaps I can argue that since when I do occasionally use it it's the buggiest browser I've ever used, slow as hell, and crashes or freezes more often than anything else? I think that's a pretty damn good argument for using IE over Edge, but what do I know - I'm just someone who actually has to deal with the damn thing.

              Edge is on Chromium now, so if Edge crashes for you (not that it ever does for me) do what you should've been doing in the first place and use one of the many alternatives and not use the worlds worst, oldest, stupidest browser.

              A) Well, I'm happy that it doesn't crash for you. Must be nice.

              B) I use a combination of Chrome and Firefox for my everyday browsing. If I'm loading up IE or Edge there's a reason.

        • Except my work's site for time management and vacation days only works in IE and will not open in Edge. If this change happens then I guess we will just have to buy a big new expensive service to replace the one we already had. Or we should just stop using MS and all the problems go away. Libre Office is way better and does not break your docs like MS does.

          • Equating IE with MS Office really seems inappropriate. Office hasnâ(TM)t had a binary break in a decade to the best of my knowledge. IE on the other hand has been a moving target and a security nightmare since day 1. Honestly, your company should be grateful someone is forcing that stuff off your work computers. It is long passed the time to abandon it.

            • Can you not read English. If forced off the computer, we can't do our jobs. And Office breaks the doc, not the binary!

              • I suspect you will find a way to do your job. IE is a threat to your entire network security. I realize I'm not part of your company and I cannot see your threat analysis, so my opinion is a general one, and you might be a sufficiently special case. But for most businesses, it is passed time to migrate away from IE for any business operating in a modern threat environment. Same as having to give up Win95, WinXP, etc.

                • Sure, I agree that IE is bad and ue should change. But who, and when is the tool going to be fixed. I lso work with the Hikvision cameras at times. They only work with Active X. I just wish people stopped making tools that still sequire IE before it is being taken away from us. It's not like we didn't have any idea that we should change.

      • Re:Mixed feelings (Score:5, Informative)

        by Merk42 ( 1906718 ) on Monday October 26, 2020 @10:19AM (#60650216)
        It only opens in Edge if the site that is being attempted to open in IE is on a list of known URLs that do not work in IE [microsoft.com].

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by The Rizz ( 1319 )

          How about it giving an announcement with a clickable link instead of auto-loading another piece of software we may not want to use?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Merk42 ( 1906718 )
            Well it's currently in testing, so maybe someone will make that suggestion?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Rob Y. ( 110975 )

            Well, they're already force-loading Edge onto everybody's system. That's pretty bad to begin with, but IE shouldn't redirect specifically to Edge - it should redirect to your default browser. Still, if you're browsing in IE, you probably don't have Chrome or Firefox set up as your default browserm so...

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by The Rizz ( 1319 )

              Chrome is my default browser, but I sometimes I fall back to IE on occasion if there's a reason on a particular site, or a program automatically opens up IE. So yeah, some people do have Chrome or Firefox as their defaults, but still sometimes use IE.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by bobpaw ( 5725134 )
          This should have been part of the original post, in my opinion.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by marcle ( 1575627 )

          It only opens in Edge if the site that is being attempted to open in IE is on a list of known URLs that do not work in IE [microsoft.com].

          When MS thinks a site doesn't "work" in IE, what does that mean? Doesn't track the user? Doesn't serve up intrusive ad scripts? Doesn't load auto-playing videos or pop-up windows?

          Maybe not "working" is a feature and not a bug.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Merk42 ( 1906718 )
            Yes of course, "not working" is all those things, so evil M$ will make people open it in...
            *check notes*
            A browser with extension capabilities that allows it to do all the aforementioned functionality of blocking tracking etc.

            Yeah totally makes sense.

      • No one paid MS for that license to use IE. MS has no responsibility to keep supporting it. They gave you the browser for free. Choose to use it or not.

        • No one paid MS for that license to use IE. MS has no responsibility to keep supporting it. They gave you the browser for free. Choose to use it or not.

          Yeah, it's not like it was ever bundled with any operating systems that people had to pay for.

  • Ironic! (Score:5, Funny)

    by uffe_nordholm ( 1187961 ) on Monday October 26, 2020 @09:53AM (#60650100)
    Somehow, I find this ironic and funny: years ago, in the dawn of the internet era, MS was doing whatever they could to force you to use IE. And now they are starting to force you to _not_ use IE...

    • Re:Ironic! (Score:5, Informative)

      by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Monday October 26, 2020 @10:18AM (#60650214)

      It is worse, a lot of workers are trained not to open other browsers. They have been hit in the head from management and IT (who built a lot of IE only tools) to click the IE icon. Now to tell them, what they have been doing for decades is now considered bad, it going to be a tough habit to break.

      • How do people like that even have a job ? If they are that stupid how could they possibly understand enuff to do something else and be trusted ?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by thomn8r ( 635504 )

      Somehow, I find this ironic and funny: years ago, in the dawn of the internet era, MS was doing whatever they could to force you to use IE. And now they are starting to force you to _not_ use IE...

      If you think about it, they're simply forcing you from IE to IE2.0

    • Microsoft tried to force users to stop using IE for decades.

      But somehow people just kept using it.

      • Worse, IT departments and others would keep writing applications or web pages that could only work in IE. Not through a lack of worrying about portability, but by using Microsoft only technologies. I remember having to log in remotely to a windows Citrix server just to fill in a time sheet. It was so slow and cumbersome that most of us just filled in a month or two at a time. There were so many small and insidious ways that corporations would get locked into Microsoft solutions with no easy way to extri

        • There are still some on-premises SharePoint things that don't work with Edge Chromium.

          The Enterprise version of Edge Chromium has a menu item to re-display a page with the IE engine in the Edge window. The enterprise where I work disabled that choice; instead, they maintain a file of URLs that open in IE mode and we have to ask for additional entries. Their reasoning is that they don't want to have to have every user complain and be told how to use the page with the IE menu choice.

        • I am sure all of that is intentional on Microsoft's part - just enough compatibility issues to prevent people trying to incorporate rival products into a Microsoft environment.

    • It's actually a bit of a pain. Because Microsoft succeeded at convincing people that IE was ubiquitous and the way of the future, some hardware vendors made their web interfaces dependent on IE's non-standard and unique rendering features. There are a few old routers, VoIP adapters, and pieces of medical equipment where I *need* to use IE to configure them (and in one case any version of IE newer than 6 won't work). Their configuration pages won't render in any other browser.

      This is one of the huge disco

  • ... on any PC in the world, the persons responsible at Microsoft should get an electric shock.

  • Edge suggests nothing about the internet. Though, by changing the name, Microsoft admits that they were too lax about security.

    • Do the names Safari, Chrome or Firefox, suggest you that they are about the Internet?

      • Given that the Web is kind of a jungle, I think the name Safari is appropriate. Chrome sounds like something plumbers, mechanics or car fans would care about. Firefox sounds like something for furries [google.com].

      • The name Firefox came about as a result of trademark disputes. It was originally called Phoenix, until Phoenix Technologies threatened legal action, so it was renamed Firebird. Then the community behind the Firebird database made a fuss - they didn't threaten legal action, but they sent a lot of sternly worded letters strongly requesting a new name. So it ended up as Firefox.

    • The combination of Windows and network always puts me on edge.

  • awesome (Score:5, Funny)

    by lusid1 ( 759898 ) on Monday October 26, 2020 @10:04AM (#60650160)

    Sometimes I need a little reminder that I forgot to switch to chrome.

  • This behavior is why Chrome is king.... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Puls4r ( 724907 ) on Monday October 26, 2020 @10:05AM (#60650164)
    This behavior is why Chrome is king. And this same behavior by Chrome is why people are looking at alternatives. And this same behavior by Firefox is why people have dropped it in droves with the most recent realease.

    For example, with the new firefox release if use the 'close all' function in Android itself, Firefox DOES NOT CLOSE. It saves the tab states and data. So if I have a very good reason to expect the browser to close when I tell it to, say for instance I use it for banking, or purchasing online with 'buy it now' enabled, or *gasp* for viewing porn, I have to go through multiple extra steps to close it out.

    This sort of stupid FORCED behavior is why people hate many developers. Tone-deaf "we know better than you" bullshit. Here's another great one. I'm watching a video on youtube in firefox. I try to close firefox using the android 'close all'. Does it work? Nope, the video continues to play in the background. Just sound. No video. So you have to reopen firefox, and close each tab before trying to exit the browser itself.

    I realize I turned this into a rant about firefox, but that's the browser I used to use the most. We could also talk about how you can't set the google voice command on an android phone to open anything other than the fake-chrome 'app' that isn't really chrome.

    So to every developer out there that thinks they're smarter than their users - fuck you. To every developer that doesn't do a trial run of their newest, latest, and greatest feature and LISTEN to the community, fuck you. Of course, companies like mozilla are quickly finding out what happens when you don't listen to your customer base and don't have the built-in monopoly that MS does.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Merk42 ( 1906718 )

      To every developer that doesn't do a trial run of their newest, latest, and greatest feature and LISTEN to the community, fuck you. Of course, companies like mozilla are quickly finding out what happens when you don't listen to your customer base and don't have the built-in monopoly that MS does.

      TFA:
      Microsoft has been gradually rolling out the feature for testing purposes for some Windows users since the release of Edge 84 this summer.

    • > So to every developer out there that thinks they're smarter than their users

      You haven't met many users, have you?
      The other day I had to explain to a *computer science* major that a database isn't a web site, he needs to connect to the database with a database client, not with his "internet" browser).

      Here we're talking about *Windows users*.
      The entire point of Windows is that the user can see things can click in them, without first understanding anything.

      There are, of course systems made for people who

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Kokuyo ( 549451 )

        Well, gee, thanks, that wasn't elitist at all.

        Let me return the favor: Whoever finds ANY current OS up to snuff has had his brain removed through his anus in my opinion.

      • Here we're talking about *Windows users*.
        The entire point of Windows is that the user can see things can click in them, without first understanding anything.

        There are, of course systems made for people who know something about computers. Those systems typically have a name ending with "* Linux".

        Requiring a deep understanding of everything to use something is a bad design for any tool, it doesn't matter who the expected user is.

        A fighter pilot requires an exceptional amount of training and knowledge to operate a fighter jet, they still need to be able to quickly press a button and reliably get the desired outcome without understanding exactly what's going on in the avionics systems.

        • McDonald's has a kiosk with pictures of hamburgers and of fries, so someone can order a meal without knowing anything, without ever having seen the system before.

          They also have a web API, which you can use integrate McDonald's ordering into your app. To use the API you need to know WTF you're doing.

          Neither of these tools is pointless, the API has its purpose. Treating professionals like they are idiots is mistake. You get in the way when you force trained people, who know what they're doing, to use Fisher-

          • McDonald's has a kiosk with pictures of hamburgers and of fries, so someone can order a meal without knowing anything, without ever having seen the system before.

            They also have a web API, which you can use integrate McDonald's ordering into your app. To use the API you need to know WTF you're doing.

            Neither of these tools is pointless, the API has its purpose. Treating professionals like they are idiots is mistake. You get in the way when you force trained people, who know what they're doing, to use Fisher-Price style tools.

            Great example, you need to have an understanding of web APIs in order to integrate with my ordering system, that I chose to implement as a SOAP service with Kerberos based WS-Security. This is the best use of everyone's time because we can pat ourselves on the back when we figure it out then look down on idiots that use REST with bearer tokens to order burgers. Peasants.

            Usability should be a primary concern even when your users are experienced. It's not about insulting anyone's intelligence, it's about res

            • It's not about "looking down" in "peasants".
              It's simply a fact that the security team in charge of a web browser does in fact know their job better than the average user does. They DO know better than the user, in the vast majority of cases.

              Where the user is in the 1% who know that topic better, I can use other tools, rather than idiot-proofed tools.

              Somebody trying to order a burger doesn't WANT to have to learn SOAP fist, 99.999% of the time. They just want a damn burger. Giving them what they want isn'

      • Oh please. The issue you describe is one of education. If a comp sci major doesn't understand what a DB is then the program they are in isn't worth shit.

        GUI's aren't unique to windows. Microsoft didn't invent the concept nor were they they first to implement it. That was Xerox and they did so in Unix. So much for your misplaced sense of superiority. Engelbart showed off a desktop GUI with a mouse back in 1968 for the IEEE in one of the most famous keynotes ever given.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by gTsiros ( 205624 )

        anecdotal, but this is the best i can do...

        this guy was either EE or CS, sadly, i do not remember which.

        He had, in 2007, *two* masters degrees, of which at least the one, in distributed computing

        he would not accept that a CPU may use more than 10 W. I tried to figure out if this was some kind of misunderstanding or miscommunication, but i spent the better part of 5 minutes discussing it. Nope. CPUs pull at absolute most about 5 W, never, ever above 10 W

        at the moment my father was very saddened because i s

        • Might have been a reasonable assumption back in the mid 80s, at least in the area of desktop processors (which were only just then breaking 20MHz and having multiple 100,000s of transistors, TDP generally < 3W). Maybe they educated themselves from an unfortunately outdated source... at that time, a current-day CPU's specifications would probably have seemed absurd (multiple billions of transistors, often > 100 watts, current flowing through the die nearing or even exceeding 100 amps). At any rate, I'm

        • Perhaps he was having a brain fugue and was confusing it with volts.

      • The person you replied to was talking about an Android mobile browser - so was already using Linux, as do most of the world Smartphone users

        • It's not typically called Android Linux, is it? :)

          But seriously, Android is designed for "everyone", it's designed to serve the users who still keep clicking on the Nigerian prince email.

      • > So to every developer out there that thinks they're smarter than their users

        You haven't met many users, have you?

        And you haven't met many code monkeys^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hdevelopers.

        • True that. My best face palms have been developers and "Director of IT" or similar. Dumb is not in short supply, plenty to go around.

      • The other day I had to explain to a *computer science* major that a database isn't a web site, he needs to connect to the database with a database client, not with his "internet" browser).

        Some databases' interfaces are through HTTP. So he could use those through his browser.

    • This behavior is why Chrome is king. And this same behavior by Chrome is why people are looking at alternatives.

      This is from an alternate universe where Chrome doesn't force unwanted change on users I guess? I fled to Firefox a few years ago because of it.

    • This behavior is why Chrome is king.

      No it's not. Chrome is king for the reason that this very behavior is trying to get around: Shit not working. If I open up a site in IE and it doesn't work, my instinctive gut reaction would be to try it in Chrome. If on the other hand the computer just automatically loaded the site in Edge instead my instinctive reaction would be to just use the site.

      That's how users work. The only sites that MS are doing this for are sites known to not work in IE.

    • Phones are like that with music. Close the app, it doesn't show up any more as a window to switch to, but keeps playing. I have to restart the app, pause, then close. Is it really closed or is it running but paused?

      I understand efficiencies from a dev point of view, and keeping things suspended vs. truly closed, but I want it closed.

      I'd also turn off the re-open whatever was open when you closed it. Almost everything I do in incog mode for just thjs reason.

    • Here's another great one. I'm watching a video on youtube in firefox. I try to close firefox using the android 'close all'. Does it work? Nope, the video continues to play in the background. Just sound. No video. So you have to reopen firefox, and close each tab before trying to exit the browser itself.

      It seems you don't understand how Android works. Close all in the overview does just that in the overview... It closes everything that you have in the overview. It doesn't actually close any application at

  • Microsoft should just admit to the world, that their design on IE, was faulty and their consulting advice to direct businesses to use IE, was just based on trying to monopolize the internet.

    Way back when IE started to support Active-X Controls, I knew this a really bad thing. This was software that could only run on Windows OS, from Microsoft own browser, while ran faster than Java Applets (which sucked also), they also didn't have any of the security options built in. They did make it pop up warnings th

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Merk42 ( 1906718 )
      No but see this is teh evil M$! If they do that, well it's bad because they are removing software, but if they don't do it well that's also bad because they are keeping a bloated piece of software as part of their OS.

      • It is a no win problem.

        However people are going to do things the old way, unless they are forced to change. IE is so maliciously designed that being gentle in its transition just wont work.

    • Pointy-haired IT managers built a little empire of IE-only intranet sites, and have spent years training users to only click the blue e.
      The "e" is for enterprise. Only IE is the enterprise browser, that can do enterprise things, like use our accounting suite from 2003.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by Puls4r ( 724907 )
        Nope. The issue is that many legacy and enterprise (and even NEW) apps only work in IE. In fact - many don't even work in Edge! This isn't someone limited to one company either. Our brand new hundred million+ dollar inventory / maintenance system? IE recommended. Our relatively new hundred million + dollar payment and attendence system? Same thing.

        Now people might say "derp, then why did you except them" and the answer is simple: they were pretty much the best that was out there that did what our

    • Why do they want to keep using iE??

      As a matter of course, I'd say that very few people do.

      I, however, need IE to keep working the way it's supposed to.

      My go-to examples are some somewhat-older-hardware. HP JetDirect cards, older Dell and Cisco switches, and iDRAC 6 cards all tend to only work on IE. To be fair, at least some of these dependencies involve ancient versions of Java (an abomination of nearly equal proportions), but nobody at any of these companies are reinventing the wheel in HTML5 for these war horses.

      I'd be perfectly happy if

      • Sounds like a job for Windows XP in a VM with limited network access.

      • Not IE per se, just that when millions are on the line if the DBC or payroll or ordering system screws up, best to beat the hell out of it in testing, and that means the most default of browsers, IE.

        More browsers = 2x or 3x the testing. Good luck getting MS or Google to sign for liability if their product effs up.

  • I'm sure both of them will be really pissed.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Tailhook ( 98486 )

      Don't know. Don't care. Shit users using a shit browser from a shit company. Seems like they deserve each other.

    • So when I use certain Google apps that require a separate web interface and the only things that opens is IE.
      Is that Microsoft's problem - or a Google fuck up?

      This last happened to me when I tried to video conference with members of my family in 2016. Maybe Google has grown up, but they do constantly warn me to use Chrome every, fucking time I use Google Maps or something else.

  • It will be painful but worth it. There are millions of unemployed waiting to rewrite your legacy apps. Also get rid of the remaining XP boxes out there.

  • More and more I think we need laws that say that a software company is not allowed to force you to stop using an older version of software, nor are they allowed to change behavior of a system such that you must upgrade to a newer version to maintain functionality of something that was previously functional.

    I don't think I worded the latter well - it is for situations like Apple forcing you to upgrade your computer OS because you updated your phone OS.

  • As the majority of cars sold in this country now come with oodles of software designed to prevent you from driving your car as you see fit, don't be surprised when the manufacturers start locking you out of things you've already bought. Think I'm kidding? Witness how Tesla can turn options on or off at will or forces changes to the car's software whenever it feels like it.

    If you think this is great, allowing MSFT to force you to use something you don't want, you can't complain when car manufacturers, or an

  • I'm a reasarcher (blah, blah blah). For those of us who feel : 'this is good, ok, fine, etc." Can I give take quick poll, (not flamebait, I'm working on a paper,) If we replace "IE" with a physical device like a "record player" or "fishing pole' and like now, the maker, issued an update that made the player/pole then tell you or force you to use the new thing, would that affect how you feel about the change? Thanks! Zaph.

  • Some companies, like truscont.com, will probably scramble to make sure Microsoft exempts them. Their entire product line seems to be dependent on the continued existence of IE, because they exploit certain vulnerabilities as part of their copy protection scheme.

    Without a working copy of Windows and IE, software and data "protected" by their product is useless. Be sure to let your IT security people know, so they can lower your security level enough to allow it to run!

  • Death by a 1024 cuts.

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