Chicago (IL) – Microsoft’s focus on a proprietary browser engine worked well when the Internet Explorer (IE) dominated the direction of the online world. But long update cycles and a somewhat neglected core technology is now backfiring as the company sees itself trailing other browser engines such Apple's WebKit, Mozilla's Gecko, and Opera's Presto, all of which follow web standards more closely than IE. According to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer (Not my favorite American Executive. See post from June 3), the company may consider moving IE to the open-source WebKit browser engine. Such a move may have a tremendous impact on web development trends and help IE get back on track.
Microsoft’s top executive made the off-beat comment in Sydney, where he spoke at the Power to Developers event. According to a Techworld article, when confronted by a student who questioned that Microsoft could maintain proprietary browser engine when there are open source engines that can respond to changes in web standards faster, the executive said: "That's cheeky, but a good question, but cheeky." Although he defended IE's proprietary add-ons, Ballmer said IE "may need to have a rendering service" in the future.
The executive then hinted at a possible switch to an open-source alternative browser engine called WebKit. "Open source is interesting," he said. "Apple has embraced WebKit and we may look at that, but we will continue to build extensions for IE8." Ballmer's acknowledgement of the fact that web standards do matter is good news for all people using the Internet in one way or the other.
Why do web standards matter?
Just consider the fact that web developers (Like me, your Top of the Curve Editor!) these days spend a lot of time and money to write extra code that makes web pages look right in IE.
Originally from...http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/40099/140/
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