Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Businesses Internet Explorer The Internet

Getting Your Company to Migrate from IE? 199

Posted by Cliff from the stemming-the-exploit-flow dept.
RunningFerreT asks: "With all the recent warnings and recommendations on migrating from MSIE, I have come across a serious problem. The company for which I work doesn't want to, even after being informed of all the exploits and problems with Internet Explorer. Having the boss 'try out' Firefox isn't working: a single site looks bad, so IE must be better. Has anyone had success in convincing management types to switch from IE, to another more secure, standards compliant browser? If so, how did you get the job done?"
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Getting Your Company to Migrate from IE? More

Getting Your Company to Migrate from IE?

Comments Filter:

  • I must ask... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by HaloZero ( 610207 ) <protodeka@gma i l .com> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:13PM (#9625141) Homepage
    ...which site? And do other sites render worse in IE than they do in Firefox?
    As for migrating from IE, I've never had a problem encouring people. The built-in popup blocker is almost an instant 'OK! I'm converted!'. This may or may not be helpful: http://texturizer.net/firefox/faq.html [texturizer.net]

    Perhaps, distribute a company-wide email, linking to a download for Firefox (put it on a local server, first, link to that, save Moz the bandwidth. ;) and give the end users the option to switch. The upside? They get to waste an hour of company time moving into a new browser. :-p And less work for the ITS guys.
    • As for migrating from IE, I've never had a problem encouring people. The built-in popup blocker is almost an instant 'OK! I'm converted!'.

      The thing that always gets noticed when I show people (certain) browser alternatives is the tabbed browsing, though the popup blocker also gets noticed, of course.

      • suprisingly for me, everytime I show someone tabbed browsing they don't seem to be impressed. I'm guessing these people are so used to browsing the old way and they don't use open in new window ever, so its just such a foreign idea. Or am I showing them the wrong way. I show it by bringing up a page with several links, and set the settings to open in background and middle click. Then I middle click on several items in a list of links.
        • I've always "shown it" by using it and not making a big deal about it, but jumping back and forth between tabs, as needed for whatever it is I'm working on with someone...it's in those cases where I'm just using it as another tool that it gets noticed and commented on.

    • Re:I must ask... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Elwood P Dowd ( 16933 )
      MSDN doesn't look as good. Some of us just aren't going to switch.
      • I use MSDN constantly with Firefox. I don't care if it "looks good" or not; it gives me the same information.
        • I just checked out msdn.microsoft.com from Camino. The only problem was that it forced a tiny font, and a quick CMD-+ fixed that. I have a collection of browsers on my linux and Mac boxen, because part of my job is testing web pages for usability.

          We might note that Microsoft-related sites have a history of checking the client's ID string and sending garbled pages to non-IE browsers. There was a recent story here about the Opera folks getting a few million bucks from msn.com over this.

          When someone compl

    • Re:I must ask... (Score:3, Informative)

      by Fizzl ( 209397 )
      Heh, only thing rendering horribly for me in FireFox is /.

      I don't know what is the reason but sometimes it just renders the frontpages article list on top of the left menu.
      Ohwell, guess slashdot should put up a disclaimer:
      "Designed for Internet Explorer 6 or later" ;)

      PS. Damnit, I tried to get it to barf to put up a screenshot but now the damn stubborn thing refuses to render incorrectly :)

      • Re:I must ask... (Score:3, Informative)

        by endx7 ( 706884 )
        The /. rendering problem is a known bug, and the fix should appear in Firefox 1.0

        http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=217527 [mozilla.org]

        • Re:I must ask... (Score:2, Insightful)

          by cbr2702 ( 750255 )
          "Ook! Sorry, links to Bugzilla from Slashdot are disabled." - Bugzilla

          Imagine if MS did something like this? We'd all be screaming bloody murder!

        • Interesting. I wonder if anyone has found a fix for the /. problem that I and a few others have reported, in which firefox simply stops responding to clicks on links within /. pages?

          It does seem to be a rather bizarre bug, with no obvious correlation with the pages being viewed. But it's serious enough on my Mac (but not my linux box) that I simply use a different browser.

          Good thing there are a lot of browsers available.

    • Perhaps, distribute a company-wide email, linking to a download for Firefox...
      Better yet, send a company wide e-mail with a link to firefox titled "Cool Screensaver", that should get people who use IE in the first place to click it...
    • The one complaint I've gotten from people that I switched over is that ESPN motion doesn't work. Most of ESPN, of course, is fine, but the Motion thing (which is a kind of cool streaming video deal) requires Media Player and IE.

  • Web Standards (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Will2k_is_here ( 675262 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:13PM (#9625148)
    Remind your boss that the reason the sites look so terrible in non-IE browsers is because the sites do not conform to WWW standards [w3.org]. By insisting IE continue to be used indicates Microsoft should dictate what websites should look like, not the Internet inventors themselves. Surely he or she can agree that Microsoft should not be given that power. Thus, sticking to IE is not a solution, rather it contributes to the problem.
    • I suspect the problem is that the boss is an idiot, unfortunately, and that he will not grasp the subtlty of this argument.

    • Re:Web Standards (Score:3, Insightful)

      by kent_eh ( 543303 )
      Remind your boss that the reason the sites look so terrible in non-IE browsers is because the sites do not conform to WWW standards.

      And to that the boss says "but if IE can make it look right, why can't this firebox thingie manage to do the same?"

    • How Managers Work (Score:5, Insightful)

      by turgid ( 580780 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @05:23PM (#9626105) Journal
      Remind your boss that the reason the sites look so terrible in non-IE browsers is because the sites do not conform to WWW standards.

      PHBs don't think like that unfortunately. They think, "Microsoft is everywhere so it is the standard. Everything else is broken or not good enough." When one of their PHB friends talks about how cool moving over to Firefox was next time they are out playing golf instead of working, you'll get a memo telling you about this great new thing that he's found and insisting that you try it out and have it installed on his machine. Next thing you know, a committee will go away and do a cost/benefit analysis and within 12 to 18 months a document will be written recommending that it becomes corporate policy to only use Firefox. Three to four years later it will become policy, you'll get to install it, but it'll be a 2-year-old version full of bugs and security holes and lacking modern standards.

    • Re:Web Standards (Score:3, Insightful)

      by lateral ( 523650 )
      Surely he or she can agree that Microsoft should not be given that power. Thus, sticking to IE is not a solution, rather it contributes to the problem.

      Asking your boss to be part of a geek crusade is *not* going to swing it, not if they're any good at their job. You're not setting out how this change will provide any benefit to the company they and you are paid to represent. You're effectively saying if your boss switches and then an utterly huge body of millions of other users all do the same at around th

  • Firefox 1.0? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by DRue ( 152413 ) <drue.therub@org> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:14PM (#9625149) Homepage
    I've tried getting my mom to switch countless times, always with problems. My current plan is to wait for Firefox 1.0, and then make her switch again.

    At work, many people use IE - but nobody has to. I'm also plannign on moving everyone at the office to Firefox once it hits 1.0. It's hard to get the PHB's to agree to something that's not 1.0 :)

    • It's hard to get the PHB's to agree to something that's not 1.0

      Convince using death by a thousand cuts

      • "Fortunately all of our Linux servers were immune during the latest vulnerability. Did I mention we haven't had to reboot them in months? And that our licensing costs are zilch?"
      • "You can use my Knoppix disk to get work done while we go cleanup the damage. My Linux box at home never dies unless it's a hardware problem."
      • "Unless we try some alternatives, we're going to need your signature on this PO to

  • Label it as IE (Score:5, Informative)

    by David_Bloom ( 578245 ) <slashdot@3lesson.org> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:18PM (#9625211) Homepage
    I pretty much maintain all the computers in our high school's publications room.

    I just installed Firefox, then deleted the IE icons and then created new ones that had the IE icon and said "internet explorer" but whose link went to Firefox.

    No compliants, no spyware since.

    • By the way, if you aren't feeling quite as sneaky (I think I actually took this less-sneaky route myself), rename your new icon to "Internet", not "Internet Explorer". That way you're not just lying :).

      • Re:Label it as IE (Score:2, Interesting)

        by dn15 ( 735502 )
        > By the way, if you aren't feeling quite as sneaky (I think I actually
        > took this less-sneaky route myself), rename your new icon to "Internet", not
        > "Internet Explorer". That way you're not just lying :).

        Yeah, it's often just a matter of people not recognizing alternative browsers. I tried a similar approach at work, which is a small library setting. On our public computers I made a new shortcut to Firefox on the desktop, gave it a generic globe icon, and called it simply "Internet." Now I

  • ISV's (Score:3, Insightful)

    by adamshelley ( 441935 ) <adamshelley@shaw.ca> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:21PM (#9625251) Homepage Journal
    We need everyone in our industry to switch. All of the ISVs and vendor extranet type applications require IE. We cannot switch from IE until the functionality provided by these companies is compatible with mozilla or moved from the browser based application. It'd be nice to have them only load IE for the specific app but trust me: users are stubborn. An extra click or two would cause them too much pain and suffering.
    • I call "bs". Which application are you referring to?
      I assume that it's not java, but a windows dll style plugin (activex). In which case, IE and Windows /is/ the platform. IE/Solaris and IE/Mac wouldn't work. Not smart, tying to a single vender /that/ tightly. But those boxes should not be "internet" enabled.

      And, most of that crud should be gone. Even MS is pointing you at .net

      ratboy
      • Even if .NET is used for every new IT project, there will still be ten billion legacy apps that will never be ported.
      • There are hundreds of applications that are built just for IE, across many, many industries. Many geeks out there fail to realize that Internet Exploder and Microsoft Word aren't the only applications that are used by people who work. Every industry has specialized apps. Many vendors have jumped on the ability to use IE technology to interface to their products. It's not as simple as "Just use Firefox, luser!".
    • We have a similar problem with both third party CRM apps used internally (InterAction) and vendor/client sites.
      Our solution has been to do the sneaky icon switch somebody posted above and set things up so that everything defaults to FireFox but we also gave people separate appropriately labeled icons to those IE-specific sites with IE locked down so they can't go wandering off (or at least not as easily anyway).
      It's a little ugly but it works and we've sent various emails to the site maintainers wit
    • An extra click or two would cause them too much pain and suffering.

      But what about businesses where employees are paid? Surely if someone can't endure an extra mouse click even after getting paid to do it, fire their lazy asses!

  • IE - Safari problems (Score:3, Funny)

    by TibbonZero ( 571809 ) <.Tibbon. .at. .gmail.com.> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:21PM (#9625257) Homepage Journal
    I'm currently trying to get my boss to use Safari (recording studio with all G4's). He got stuck on using IE back in OS 9.x, and just isn't a 'computer person'. If his banking site doesn't work well in Safari, or something doesn't look exactly like IE, he doesn't like it.
    My simple idea so far is just to remove his permissions to IE

    • Re:IE - Safari problems (Score:4, Insightful)

      by spitzak ( 4019 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:42PM (#9625569) Homepage
      Huh? The Mac version of IE probably works with fewer sites than Safari. Macintosh IE has nothing to do with the Windows IE that all sites are "designed for".
      • Depends if you are talking about major sites or CSS/javascript-heavy nerd sites.

        Windows-using corporate types have heard of IE and have heard of Macs, so they tend to write Mac/IE testing into their requirements. However, they haven't heard of "Safari", so it's not as likely to be written into the specs.

        In fact, I bet that even most Mac users haven't heard of Safari, because it's only really availble on the latest OS X version, and half the installed base is still on OS 9 and below. If you want to reach t
    • I also work in a recording studio, we are on a MOTU/Mac platform. It is easier to just do then ask permission. What I told my boss, who is also a creature of habit:

      "IE is a piece of shit and has security problems. I'm installing another browser."

      "But...my bookmarks"

      "Your bookmarks will be there"

      "Uhm...Ok"

      No apologies, just do. If there is arguement, print out some Windows IE bug reports and pretend they affect the Mac. Highlight those phrases like 'critical', 'data corruption' and 'complete data loss'.
      • Yea, the problem is that some of the behaviors in IE, just like where the typing cursor is when he opens a new window, and a few other small things (fleet bank doesn't seem to like safari, and if i remember a comcast site didn't for activating our cable modem). He's kinda the type of guy that if one or two things in a product bother him, and there's a good alternative, he uses it. I'm not thinking that IE is a good alternative to anything, but he's stuck on it.

        You point about hourly loss doesn't actually
  • This is one thing that allways got to me. Why isnt there a theme that mimics IE's gui perfectly? My parents were resistant to switching to firefox but I pressed them and basicly said it was IE's once removed cousin before they adopted it.

  • IT folks should have the final say. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by forged ( 206127 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:22PM (#9625283) Homepage Journal
    Let the boss handle what bosses normally do and just take the decision based on IT recommendations alone... You know it makes sense.

    Just because a single site "looks bad" by the boss' taste is hardly an excuse for letting open your company's IT infrastructure to all sort of malware and viruses. Even if not for the technical aspect, the boss will understand how much money can saved by avoiding the problems in the first place, and should be convinced. Same as with backups, really: this comment [slashdot.org] from earlier today, is pretty insightful to that matter: how much is your data worth ? Justify the migration "costs" (free in your case, but some cosmetic issues the boss will have to do with) by figuring out what your data is worth to begin with.

    • Never had the boss say "I got it to work on my computer at home, you better damn well make it work here!" have you?
    • I agrre with the parent on this, but it's not that simple. This is a smaller company, and the boss is THE BOSS. Since he can't actually SEE the problems(exploits, viruses, malware, adware[I keep the computers very maintained]) he doesn't see any reason to switch. It's the sort of situation where we might almost HAVE to get infected with a keylogger and have his CC# stolen and used to get him to change his ways. Even though it's a minor graphical hicup, that is, at this point, enough to prevent us from c
      • I agree with you both. My approach was to tell the staff to use Mozilla temporarily while this latest IE security problem was resolved. We have a big thing happening on our website at the moment (second semester enrollment) which everyone understands is important, so I basically said that they had to use Mozilla for surfing anything other than our own website until there was either a patch released or enrolment closed, whatever came first. I think most have them have moved back to IE now.

        The next time th

  • Use a trusted brand name (Score:3, Insightful)

    by DesScorp ( 410532 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:24PM (#9625311) Journal
    Branding still means something. I'm installing Netscape Navigator 7.1 on our stations, because it's a recognizable brand name, and more readily acceptable than say, Mozilla, even though they're essentially the same product. I get IE out, and a Gecko based browser in, which is the most important thing.

    I understand the enthusiasm here for Firebird, but it's still essentially a beta product. Netscape/Mozilla has always rendered pages for me correctly, so I'M more comfortable with that option as well. Yes, the Feds warning against IE helps, but if you're an IT manager or sysadmin, it's still your rep on the line when something doesn't work right. The fact that Netscape appears to have gotten a reprieve (7.2 is coming out soon) helps matters. Businesses and government organizations like to play it safe. They don't want to hear beta or open source. They want to hear a trusted brand name. When that brand name uses open source, all the better for you the technology implementer.
    • This only works until they find out the Netscape is a dead company.

      I have explained to folks that Netscape = Mozilla (just ask em to type about: into their URL)...and then I explain the fact that Netscape 6+ = Mozilla + AOL Marketing...

      I already have my boss using Firefox and a few folks (parents and friends) using Firefox because of the recent exploits. Telling them that "it's their patriotic duty" [slashdot.org] isn't a bad idea either :)

  • Outlook Web Access = IE, != Anything Else (Score:4, Informative)

    by sam_van ( 602963 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:25PM (#9625318) Homepage
    Unfortunately, the "this website looks funny" issue may not be the only issue. Instead, "my webmail is crippled" may be a more visible issue, particularly for the PHBs in the group.

    At several of the organizations I've been involved with over the last couple of years, remote email (and calendar and discussion and ) has been via Outlook Web Access. Funny enough, usability tanks regarding attaching files, spell check, moving emails, preview panes, etc.

    IMHO, it is not the internet at large that's the issue with browser shifts; it's the intranet.

    • I use OWA in Firefox all the time, but then most windows people think I'm sick because I use gvim for my editor. Anyway, your point might be clarified by noting that MSDN (another site that looks bad in Firefox) lists IE in the Platforms tree, with all the OSes, not in the Applications tree. As I recall from my MCSE training back in the IIS 3 days, the IIS/IE system is an integrated platform designed to do three things:

      Make it fall-over simple to write ad deploy terribly insecure applications

      Do so by inte
  • First you need to get yourself promoted to a position where you specify software for the enterprise. That's the easy part. Second is you find out every website someone in the company might possibly visit, and you either
    1. Get the website to fix their websites to look good in your choice of browser
    2. Install a proxy to fix sites as they flow through. Plan in maintenance so the rules are updated as sites change.
    3. Convince the company to use a different resource that is complaint

    Then switch everyone

  • How I did it (Score:5, Informative)

    by Aliencow ( 653119 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:29PM (#9625396) Homepage Journal
    I had all customer service agents switched to Firefox in a weekend, all they use is the UPS website to check tracking numbers, so the rest of the stuff they do is usually not business related so they don't complain. Have a few java apps, they work well, one required me to install Java 1.5.0 (Err I mean Java 5!) instead of 1.4.2 because it was running dog slow in Firefox with 1.4.2 ....

    Imported Favorites and settings...made IE hidden..
    2 or 3 users are special cases and they really need IE for some IE specific ActiveX crap but that's it...

    I spent 5minutes clearing spyware in the past 6 weeks.

  • What I've found... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by chuckcolby ( 170019 ) * <chuck@NOspAm.rnoc.net> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:30PM (#9625404) Homepage
    Okay, I've not faced this specific problem yet. Most of the companies I deal with in my consultancy are willing to at least beta the idea and put up with some funny looking websites, as long as functionality isn't lost. So far, the tests are going well.

    In any event, when faced with a similar situation, I generally follow this tack:

    1. Write a memo (I'm better with the written word than the spoken word - additionally, the written word has a date on it) that clearly, unemotionally lays out the advantages/drawbacks to whatever I'm proposing. If you're fairly good with the written word, you can weight your bias, if you're so inclined. Even without bias, you can mention stuff like the TRUE costs of fighting a vulnerability (computer/worker downtime, multiplied by the number of users, estimated cost in your salary per instance, etc).
    2. Submit the memo, and don't get offended if your idea is not taken. Even well reasoned, compelling arguments are not always enough. Keep in mind that we're focusing on base hits, not home runs.
    3. Time is on your side. There will only be more vulnerabilities. This does not mean you should be happy with new vulnerabilities, but they are only serving to bolster your case. Hopefully you've made management aware of the associated costs of dealing with IE vulnerabilities. Keep in mind that management understands cost and benefit. They don't respond to features and feelings. Do a really good job of showing how the cost and benefits outweigh the inconvenience, and you'll usually have a green light.

    Anyway, I hope this helps.

    • [M]anagement understands cost and benefit. They don't respond to features and feelings.

      I would dispute this. I've seen any number of cases where management is dedicated to Microsoft and/or IBM. When I ask to see their numbers jjustifying this, they never have them. I've never seen anything approaching a financial study of the topic in any company. (Well, actually I did see one 15 years ago. That company converted over to Sun. ;-)

      Most managers just "know" that MS and/or IBM is the best. Since they

  • How to deal with ''Management Types'' (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Tom7 ( 102298 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:32PM (#9625433) Homepage Journal
    You might try communicating with "management types" instead of writing them off in the way you seem to do from the tone of your submission. I understand that the stereotype is humorous, but if you aren't able to communicate the reasons why Firefox is superior, then the blame falls as much on you as it does on him (or her).

  • Forward your boss.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by whoda ( 569082 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:36PM (#9625482) Homepage
    Forward your boss a few of those "Update your Ebay/Citibank/Capital One/Wells Fargo account details" emails.

    After he fills them all out and submits them, go into his office and explain to him what he just did.

    :)

  • How about creating mod_noie? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by kherr ( 602366 ) <`moc.daehteppup' `ta' `nivek'> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:38PM (#9625522) Homepage
    Let's stop IE at the webserver. Someone needs to create mod_noie, which returns a page to download FireFox and/or Mozilla if it detects the user is using MSIE. Warn the user they have an insecure browser that's hurting the internet and they need to upgrade.

    It worked for Microsoft to squelch DR-DOS [kickassgear.com], didn't it? Turnabout is fair play.

  • 837009 (Score:2, Funny)

    by TomGroves ( 622890 )
    How about spending your efforts applying updates and hotfixes? With some research and initial legwork this can be mostly automated. You (basically) say he is not moved or considering your viewpoints, but are you considering his?

  • 13 reasons (Score:3, Informative)

    by OmniVector ( 569062 ) <see my homepage> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:47PM (#9625635) Homepage
    13 Reasons to use firefox over IE [flexbeta.net]

    I think i once saw a page with like 100 reasons. But this covers the major ones.

  • It's all about money (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Kevster ( 102318 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:50PM (#9625674)
    Total up your costs for coping with IE's problems for each of the past several years, extrapolate that for the next few years, and compare all this with the costs of migrating to Firefox (or the browser of your choice). Show them the graphs of total money spent from five years ago to five years from now, and make it clear how much money you would have (or will) save by making the change.

    If you can't show the financial gain for the change, it doesn't make business sense. Period. Better = costs less overall. Period. "Less trouble for the tech guys" doesn't cut it. Neither does "but Firefox is more standards compliant!"

  • Siebel (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Feztaa ( 633745 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:56PM (#9625766) Homepage
    A lot of large companies use a webapp called Siebel for customer relationship management (CRM). Not only is siebel the worst application that I've ever seen in 10 years of computer use (and I mean it's really, profoundly bad in every possible way), but Siebel itself uses some weird combination of ActiveX controls and Java applets that manages to ONLY work with a very specific version of IE running on a very specific version of Windows.

    I know this because the place I work has been "upgrading" all the Win2K boxes to WinXP so that we can use siebel on them. They spent boatloads of money to both MS & Siebel on the upgrade, so yeah, they're probably not very eager to switch to a browser that will prevent them from using the most important part of their job (Siebel is the main system we use, there are a dozen or so peripheral systems that we use from time to time that may or may not work in FireFox as well).

    Consumer's looking to spend money on linux-friendly businesses should probably be avoiding AT&T Wireless... Verizon and General Electric also use Siebel...
  • Depending on your company size, the switch might not be worth it. Say there are 50 to 250 users, just putting in a firewall, and disabling ActiveX, ftp downloads, .exe, .cmd, .msi downloads, jacking up the 'security' settings would do. Installing and supporting a beta product from the Linux world on Windows takes away more man-hours even if reduces security man-hours.

    IE on win32 is pretty bad in security, but with the prevention steps, we've kept the support man-hours lower than what would be required for

  • Easiest way to get your boss to convert (Score:3, Insightful)

    by DaveJay ( 133437 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @04:59PM (#9625800)
    IE being IE, if you leave him long enough with his machine using IE, he WILL get some kind of worm, virus, or what-have-you.

    If he does, then you tell him how it happened. He'll lose his computer for a while while you fix it, and invariably ask "how can I keep this from happening again?" and you tell him.

    If he does NOT, then your company's security in other areas is making up for IE's weaknesses, in which case good for you. Still, it might be a good idea to tally up how much money you're spending to protect IE users from themselves, assuming you would actually be spending a lot less if IE wasn't a concern.

    And, at the end of the day, if his laptop isn't getting taken over by virii and such, and you can't make a good case for (a) saving money by switching, or (b) reducing non-boss employee downtime by switching...well, you don't really have a problem.

    FWIW, I had the same problem convincing my wife to switch. Before her computer got infected, she was highly reluctant. After she lost her computer for a week until I had the time to fix it, she became a convert, and now uses FireFox exclusively.

  • Do you know anybody decent in Legal? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by 0x69 ( 580798 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @05:41PM (#9626314) Journal
    Find somebody decent in the Legal Dept. Quietly express concern that, expecially now that the U.S. Goverment has gone on record against using security-swiss-cheese IE, you might face professional liability - similar to an electrician who'd been pressured into doing something clearly dangerous that caused a fire.

    Played right, this approach probably has a better chance than any other of getting a no-appeal "IE is banned" rule from on high.
  • A big problem I have seen is printing Web pages that has extras blank pages or misalignments with Mozilla v1.x (even 1.7). I know people who likes to print stuff from the Internet. Even Netscape Communicator v4.x does a better job with this area!
  • I know that MY (admittedly rather large) company will never be able to switch to non-IE browser because of all the extra "applications" which are on the intranet and require IE (and even if they have no real reason to, they refuse to talk to non-IE browser). "Little things" like filling a timecard, purchase order, travel request and such, all that is necessary for day-to-day office life. And of course even our IT people use FireFox for Internet browsing (though the ones I know are on UNIX/CAD side of the bu

  • Security Fixes (Score:3, Interesting)

    by NutscrapeSucks ( 446616 ) on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @06:09PM (#9626546)
    OK, the whole reason folks want to switch from IE is because Microsoft isn't providing timely patches. However, I'm not sure if Mozilla is either -- Mozilla seems to be a "work in progress", which means that potential security problems are fixed in the development branch, but that does not affect the release schedule. And Firefox is still in beta stages and probably isn't being patched at all.

    I read somewhere there's a remote hole in Moz 1.6 and FireFox 0.8. However, the advisory page [mozilla.org] doesn't list them, and hasn't been updated since November, so I don't know what to believe.

    Furthermore, some milestone releases aren't totally stable or may behave differently. It would be very difficult for a corporate deployment to follow Mozilla's release schedule, especially if they had to test intranet apps etc.

    I know that Mozilla security is not a huge real world problem yet, but maybe someone can clarify what exactly Mozilla's security patch policy really is.

    (Also, you'll have to prepare to uninstall and reinstall the whole browser because there isn't a patch procedure, but that probably could be scripted.)

  • No central management (Score:3, Interesting)

    by stevenbdjr ( 539653 ) <steven@mrchuckles.net> on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @06:41PM (#9626880) Homepage

    As a power user, I use Firefox as my sole browser on every machine I own and use daily. That being said, as a network admin my network still uses IE as the primary browser for one reason, group policy. I work at a school, so managing Internet settings centrally and locking them down is a requirement. Until I can easily manage Firefox centrally and deploy custom pacakges, I will continue to use IE on my network.

    We've never had a problem with IE, and we run an application-level firewall, so filtering the latest IE exploits is quite easy. Popup blocking is provided by the Google Toolbar. Spyware isn't a problem because my users don't run under a privledged account, and McAfee VirusScan 7 corporate picks up browser hijackers as viruses.

    • Amen brother. I would like to see someone try to migrate to Firefox in a corporate environment and then realise that they can't ensure that everyone has a standard configuration that is easily controlled. Don't get me wrong, Firefox is a great browser (although 0.9 doesn't seem to be as good as 0.8 was) but until we can manage it centrally it's not going to replace IE in the organisations I work with.

      And yes I know it's open source and I know that I could probably write some management modules, but that'
  • So help him make the decision. You can't help him with things he doesn't understand, like "standards compliance". And he probably doesn't care about the political reasons. You just have to put the plusses and minusses in terms that matter to him, and in a nice concise form. Use terms that are meaningful to him.

    Take a piece of paper and draw a line down the middle. Over the left, write "Advantages of Moving to Firefox" over the left "Disadvantages of Movign to Firefox".

    ---

    Advantages:

    Less chance of a

  • Take it slow (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dtfinch ( 661405 ) * on Tuesday July 06, 2004 @07:22PM (#9627205) Journal
    Switching to FireFox probably won't earn the company a lot of money. We all love FireFox, but whenever a major update comes out, every couple months, you'll probably have to completely delete the old FireFox off each machine, install the new one, and set it all up again. And they'll probably never encounter a website that won't work in IE, but they will see sites that will only work in IE. Every security decision comes with a price, and you have to justify every one of them financially.

    As an open source advocate and an employee, it's important not to let your beliefs prevent you from giving advice that's in the best interests of the company. Your boss would probably appreciate a bigger range of recommendations, from adjusting IE's security options to autoupdate to of course installing a new browser and making it the default, or just doing nothing about the problem, in which case state the risks and give past examples of problems that have resulted in loss to the company. You'll probably want to mention Thunderbird for email, since it's also pretty secure, has built in spam blocking, and blocks external images (used to verify good addresses).

    Where I work, a lot of us are using FireFox, but it's not a policy, people can still use IE, and the employers were already biased against MS to begin with.
  • I'm having problems with Firefox 0.91. Sometimes, a lot of times, it displays just a white screen. I hit Ctrl-- and then Ctrl-+ to make it display. Is this something we can require everyone to do?
  • Perhaps the boss has gotten the impression that you've not done adequate research. If somebody from Sun began a sales pitch by pointing out problems with a company's current Microsoft-centric setup and finished with "try our hardware -- you won't notice much of a change", that person would rightfully be called a loser.

    If your job involves making IT decisions then you should either learn to do legitimate investigation before trying to pitch an idea to the higher-ups or invest in a 401(k) and try to keep yo
  • First, after the last round of exploits, I simply said that we had to change. I explained that I could not keep the systems secure if IE was used.

    Second, everyone I've ever switched to Firefox has been really happy with it. It's got a good interface and better features than IE (no that IE has set the bar especailly high).
  • I've started what appears to be a rather successful campaign to move all of my clients to FireFox slowly and steadily. One person at a time. I ALWAYS install FireFox on new machines or any machine that I work on that doesn't have it. I started doing this simply for me. The faster and more efficiently I can get what I need off the 'net on a client's machine, the faster I'm finished working on it.

    At any rate, I started showing individuals FireFox (and Thunderbird as long as they aren't using the calandering

  • A Good Start (Score:3, Insightful)

    by alexpage ( 210348 ) on Wednesday July 07, 2004 @07:49AM (#9630425)
    Get yourself an ass-covering letter. Go to your boss and ask them to sign a letter which states that you, J Random Sysadmin, advised them to stop using Internet Explorer in favour of Firefox for reasons of security on suchandsuch a date.

    Be serious about this - on the one hand, it might make your boss realise that you're not dicking about. And if he still refuses to switch, and you've got a signed letter, it might save your job some day.

Slashdot Top Deals

An adequate bootstrap is a contradiction in terms.

Close