Microsoft Brands WebGL a 'Harmful' Technology 503
An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft has announced that it has no plans to support WebGL — a cross-platform low-level 3D graphics API designed for web use — in its future browsers, citing numerous security concerns over the technology and branding the basic principles as 'harmful.'"
Microsoft should know... (Score:5, Informative)
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Didn't they use to claim how Firefox and Linux are insecure?
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:4, Interesting)
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ActiveX is rarely used as a malware vector. Almost all malware is delivered these days from Flash, Java, PDF, and through user allowed trojans.
The fact is, ActiveX holds no more additional threat than do Trojans, as both require end users to agree to install them. In the distant past that was not the case, but now it is and virus makers don't even bother with it anymore as it's too limiting and with IE Protected mode, it's very hard to exploit anymore.
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe Processing [processing.org] has them scared as shit. Not only does it do OpenGL acceleration in a browser, but it's also open source and nearly a drop-in replacement for Flash or Silverlight.
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:4)
Processing is Java, what does have to do with WebGL? Do you mean Processing.js [processingjs.org]?
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Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm really surprised that everyone is jumping on the "lawl microsoft security" bandwagon here, rather than the "well of course it's dangerous tech – it's OpenGL based, not D3D based... it's dangerous for MS's market share" bandwagon.
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yup.
If it were WebDirectX they'd be all over it. Since it's WebGL, however, there are security concerns.
Which isn't to say that the security concerns aren't valid... If you're giving a web page low-level access to your hardware there's certainly a possibility for abuse. But I suspect that Microsoft's concern here is more about market share than security.
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If you're giving a web page low-level access to your hardware
Then your operating system is broken. A browser implementing WebGL makes calls to the operating system's implementation of OpenGL or Direct3D, which is supposed to protect each application using OpenGL or Direct3D from others. A broken 3D video driver is no different from a broken 2D video driver: both are security holes.
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If you're giving a web page low-level access to your hardware
Then your operating system is broken. A browser implementing WebGL makes calls to the operating system's implementation of OpenGL or Direct3D, which is supposed to protect each application using OpenGL or Direct3D from others. A broken 3D video driver is no different from a broken 2D video driver: both are security holes.
I guess that's true these days. I've had various games crash my 3D drivers and I just get a pop-up message stating that the driver had to be re-started.
I'm still thinking of the good ol' days where a video driver crash meant a BSOD.
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More likely, you have broken hardware. Microsoft's complaint is based on reality, not theory. In theory, the driver would contain no bugs and the hardware would provide enough isolation that multiple applications' command streams and memory accesses would be isolated and would be no more able to interact without operating system mediation than multiple unprivileged processes on the CPU. In practice, the hardware generally makes a half-arsed attempt at providing isolation, with numerous ways of bypassing
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A browser implementing WebGL makes calls to the operating system's implementation of OpenGL or Direct3D, which is supposed to protect each application using OpenGL or Direct3D from others.
The operating system "implements" OpenGL or D3D largely by deferring to the driver, since only that knows whether the call can be handed over to graphics hardware pretty much as is, or need to be broken down into smaller components. What's under question here is the security of the driver.
It's not normally an issue when we're talking about basic stuff such as "draw this here polygon", but WebGL also has shaders - i.e. code! - that runs on the GPU. And it's much harder to guarantee that the existing implemen
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:4, Insightful)
A good faith reaction would be to work with others to fix the security issues.
The problem is, a lot of the security problems with WebGL need fixing in silicon. With most GPUs currently out there, a small bug anywhere in the OpenGL stack - a huge chunk of code that was designed to run trusted code and so optimised heavily for speed, and not really designed with security in mind - can let shader code completely compromise the system, or at least let malicious code perform a DoS attack. This isn't much of a problem at the moment, because most users don't run OpenGL code that they don't trust. You rarely see GLSL code on servers, it's either running on compute nodes (where compromising the node isn't seen as a problem because you want the user to be able to get as much out of the hardware as possible) or on machines that are basically single-user, so it's already trusted by the only user with any important data on the system.
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That too was my first thought. And they still haven't been able to put the shit back into the horse. Once the web (internal and external) started hosting proprietary apps based on ActiveX and/or MSIE6, it has been amazingly hard to get business to move on. After all, they spent a LOT of money utilizing these technologies and they don't want to spend even more developing and migrating away from it.
That said, I am all but certain there must be a way to make WebGL safe.
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Even a stopped clock can be right once or twice a day. Concerns for the security of this popped up on slashdot not long ago, and seemed to be accepted, but now that MS has concerns, it's a great tech?
They should treat it like they treat all of their other insecure tech (scripting in word, html in emails with outlook, activex, silverlight that wants to do risky things) - prompt the users "Hey, do you want to do this, it's probably not a bright idea unless you really trust the source"
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:4, Insightful)
Except video drivers are about as secure and stable as IE4.
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Consequently, the Canvas element is obviously harmful too.
Video drivers do a lot more than just OpenGL. It's not clear to me that WebGL exposes any more potential security issues than anything else in a web browser.
WEBGL makes the drivers more visible. (Score:5, Insightful)
Anything that gets drawn in a browser is controlled by the browser. After 10 years of failure that part mosty is sandboxed into safety. The Code of web gl has almost complete access to the video driver. The video driver was never written for security. Speed and picture quality were the number one priorities. Since the application that ran them was alrady a local application that had a lot of access security was not really an issue. The application that access the drivers did not have to be checked extra, because they had already full access to the machine.
Display drivers are complex software, that might show the same level of vulnerabilities that plagues the browser.
However a subset of WEBGL that is more easy check could be implemented safely i think.
Re:WEBGL makes the drivers more visible. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:5, Insightful)
They must do everything they know how to keep profits rolling and 3D is finally catching on so it's back to their form of business. FUD before crud.
LoB
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:5, Interesting)
Something tells me they wouldn't create ActiveX today... they've had well over a decade to learn how bad the technology actually is, and try to mitigate their mistakes with it. It doesn't surprise me they'd make comments on WebGL like this today in 2011. A lot can happen in 15 years.
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They had 20 years of UNIX to learn from before they created ActiveX. Hell, even a fool with a comp-sci degree could have told them that unfettered access to the local machine from any remote machine was brain-dead stupid. The biggest pain with Java applets was the sandbox put around it, and Micosoft was well aware of the reason for it.
The "they didn't know it would be that bad" argument is just lame. If they didn't know, they were completely incompetent. If they knew, and chose to ignore common sense, t
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:4, Insightful)
To this day it is still easy to make Word Documents that phone home to a server with user info every time they are opened. But WebGL is harmful.
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The fundamental flaws in WebGL are an order of magnitude worse than almost any problem in Flash.
[citation needed]
Re:Microsoft should know... (Score:5, Insightful)
LoB
Good advise! (Score:2)
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For last few years, microsoft has done a lot for security. I understand that this is slashdot and microsoft bashing is always in vogue, but to claim that because company x was doing something wrong several years ago, and started doing it right many years ago makes for ancient history in IT world.
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You're right. Microsoft has done lots for the information security industry by selling a desktop and desktop derived server OS that has an security model that is insecure by default.
Just because we're Microsoft bashing, doesn't mean we don't have a point.
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Good recommending!!!
At least silverlight is save! (Score:4, Interesting)
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"Access devices and other system capabilities by calling into application COM components."
"Call existing unmanaged code directly from within Silverlight with PInvoke."
"Read and write files to the user’s My Documents folder, making it easier to find media files or create local copies of reports. Launch Microsoft Office and other desktop programs. Users can open Microsoft Outlook and create an e-mail message, or send a report to Word utilizing the power of Office."
T
They can't even spell (Score:4, Insightful)
"Although mitigatinos such as ARB_robustness [...]"
Nice Microsoft, nice.
Whilst I believe that WebGL _could_ become a vector for attack, I think this is actually "We want to push DX not GL, let's stick to NIH by saying it's dangerous instead"
Hate to Say This... (Score:5, Informative)
The security issue is a valid question.
In one of the links in the summary it shows that the video memory can be read and get a snapshot of the user's desktop (in the example a confidential document is viewable) - exceptionally bad. Use an exploit like this with something else means their is potential for a severe security breach.
Then again it's early stages and I'm sure the security issues will be resolved in time.
It's an exciting techology especially with regard to streaming games over the internet.
Who remembers VRML???
Mod parent up (Score:2)
I really wish we could have more discussions where MS is mentioned that don't immediately devolve into "MS is teh E V I L !!! Anything they say or do is wrong!"
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I completely agree. It needs to be fixed not dumped. This reminds me of WebSockets Experiment comparing Upgrade and CONNECT handshakes [ietf.org]. Microsoft didn't say they wanted websockets abandoned. If there isn't OpenGL support in other browsers HTML5 canvas will be better in IE than any other browser. In other words, convincing everyone OpenGL support is evil and scary when IE gets HTML5 canvas support it would put them in the front of graphically rich web interfaces.
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It will be better since it should mean that video memory will exist in protected mode instead of real mode (since it will be part of the same protected address space as system memory), thus proscribing programs from reading data not belonging to them.
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Good thing THAT'S never been done before!
No news (Score:3)
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Ha! If only that was true for CSS
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WebGL is as bad or worse than ActiveX ever was. Should be interesting.
I've already read security blogs from reputable security professionals about how WebGL is flawed from the ground up and can allow for kernel level security issues. ActiveX at least ran as the current user, not kernel.
I really think MS could get away with no implementing it.
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If WebGL takes off, they'll have no choice but to support it. If it doesn't, then no-one will care that they don't support it.
If it takes off, Microsoft will pull its standard Embrace, Extend, Extinguish strategy on it.
Microsoft should get out of browsers ASAP (Score:4, Insightful)
Microsoft has no business building browsers. The open architecture of the web will always conflict with IE being closed source and the EEE tactics Microsoft is constantly trying on various web technologies. In the past, Microsoft's hegemony over computer technology gave them enough influence that they might actually have a chance at "de-commoditizing" (as they say) some popular open web technologies, but that's over, they aren't the 800lb gorilla in the room anymore, they're just another dog in a fight with at least 2 other dogs (the Open dog and the Apple dog - and no they're not the same. Look at Safari's special HTML5 rendering. Familiar? Don't forget that an open web also poses a threat to Apple's mobile apps).
By continuing to work on browsers, Microsoft is fighting a war they can't win, but like all wars this one is still harmful to the other combatants and various innocent bystanders.
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Webkit is open source but Safari isn't, and Apple has shown they have no intention of following HTML5 standards, at least with Safari (although adding a ton of redundant vendor-specific HTML5 features to WebKit in the first place doesn't scream "openness"). If IE swapped its rendering engine to a WebKit fork tomorrow, it wouldn't make IE an open browser.
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The web sucks, except for everything else.
The biggest hurdle in designing something like the web is to get everybody to agree on standards. HTTP/HTML - that's 90% of the battle, and infinitely better than 30% of websites only working on flash, 20% only working on silverlight, 15% on XML/XSLT, 15% on PDF...
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If we move "beyond" browsers to client apps we'll be moving backwards (not that it can't happen, that seem to be the direction we're moving in these days).
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Because you're destroying the client-independence of the web. If you believe in an Apple-like One True Platform future I can see how you could consider moving to clients to be a forward move, but I'd just have to disagree.
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I'll admit that developing web apps does indeed suck. It sucks hard, but not because the actual app development sucks. That part is easy. Where I work we still do the meat and potatoes of the work with the same languages we would use for a desktop app. The only thing we use the web for is presentation and a little scripting for input -- which gets mirrored on the server anyway -- and that's the part that sucks. Mostly because browsers don't work the same way.
But customers are always right, and if they don'
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The same way you do on their browser-less European versions?
Re:Microsoft should get out of browsers ASAP (Score:4, Informative)
Windows doesn't come pre-loaded with wget yet (as far as I'm aware) so it's a little more difficult:
(Start / Run:) /pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/latest/win32/en-US/
cmd
ftp releases.mozilla.org
(User: anonymous)
(Pass: joe.blow@somewhere.com)
cd
binary
mget *.exe
(answer yes)
quit
dir Firefox*
(Run listed program)
Pretty sure I didn't miss anything...
They're right (Score:5, Insightful)
You really want websites to be able to freeze and possibly crash your graphics subsystem, possibly overheat reboot your machine?
Besides that, it's just sloppy, just like WebSQL is sloppy. It's just "hey lets compile opengl ES into our browser" or "lets compile SQLite into our browser" and neither are even half-hearted attempts at a proper standard. I originally said this as a joke, but it makes more sense to just link in the quake engine and support a "quake" tag, that takes a link to a PAK file as its .src attribute. That'd at least solve the (very real) security problems. Executing arbitrary shader code from random websites isn't a good idea.
Aside: apparently noone else supports WebGL either. The implementations in both FF and Chrome are broken. I've had problems with multiple textures, framebuffers, the list goes on. It's simply not working yet.
Of course, webGL would be trivial to reimplement in IE with a partial trust Silverlight plugin, which could just execute the GL natively, though that would be a much bigger security hole.
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it makes more sense to just link in the quake engine and support a "quake" tag
Yesterday's news, my good man - haven't you heard of Quake Live [quakelive.com]? Serve up the .pak with MIME type "application/x-id-quakelive" and Bob's your uncle!
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What hardware and OS did you try WebGL on? If it was Linux with poor (read: open source) drivers then there's your explanation. I've yet to see any open source driver for 3D hardware acceleration that actually works (and being able to run desktop compositing does not count - it's not even remotely an indication of how modern 3D rendering is done). I really hate to bash the open source drivers in that fashion, even though it's true.
Harmful... (Score:2)
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The strangelhold is over anyway, given the current markets. You have the Xbox and the PC which are DirectX, the rest uses OpenGL or OpenGL derivates. Almost 100% of all game makers use an existing engine, which is optimized for cross platform development anyway.
It is just a matter of time til those engines also have their webgl ports one way or the other.
Whatever Microsoft does in this area is only to the degree relevant that if they dont support it it wont be used in a corporate environment.
Not the first time (Score:2)
Microsoft has rejected interoperable technologies based on spurious "security concerns" before, only to release later a competing yet non-interoperable technology with far worse security problems than ever showed up on what they rejected. Remember browser plugins, passed over in favor of the steaming pile of fail that is ActiveX?
Look for WebDirect3D in the next version of IE, likely with every problem MS claims WebGL has and a few new ones.
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I am almost 100% sure about that WebGL will be the point where Microsoft again will fork away. I have been expecting that for months now.
Also so far all their efforts towards html5 are pretty half assed, even IE9 can be barely described as html5 compliant, but given the state of the current specs only time will tell if Microsoft again will be a burden on the web developing world.
It is a problem; but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Allowing the internet to do things to your machine is dangerous. It is also among the top reasons why most people bother to own a computer. Letting pages run Javascript opens you up to vulnerabilities in your JS engine. Support for images in webpages means that a bug in any of your image format renderers(and there have been a few of these) will allow the attacker to own you. Even HTML rendering isn't safe. People from the internet are running code on your CPU, through assorted layers of indirection, virtually continually... We put up with this blatantly dangerous situation because we want the functionality.
Other than the (im)maturity of OpenGL as something that is subject to maliciously crafted input, rather than just error by well-meaning application designers, I'm not seeing a fundamental difference. Everything that happens in your browser happens because filthy, possibly dangerous, 3rd party instructions are executed, through some number of intermediate interpreters and libraries and codecs, right on your hardware.
Now, I can definitely see the case to be made for "You really shouldn't enable WebGL, except for websites that you would also trust enough to download and execute with admin permissions executables from, until the OpenGL ecosystem has had time to finish wetting itself from pure fear and start improving things", it is quite likely the case that the large, complex, more-focused-on-speed-than-security, mass that is GPU firmware, GPU drivers, etc is a mass of potentially serious issues, having historically been sheltered from the more hostile side of things. However, that doesn't seem fundamentally different from the state of the stack sitting on top of the CPU that was inherited from a more innocent time before widespread network malice. Ultimately, we just had to fix that; because the alternative involved not being able to do what we wanted to do.
Amazing! (Score:2, Funny)
Microsoft claims competitor's technology harmful and everyone should use their safe & secure version :)
Tune in at 11 for more news from the No Shit, Sherlock dept
I tend to agree (Score:4, Insightful)
They're right. (Score:2)
n/t
It is true. It is harmful. (Score:3, Informative)
Can't trust MS's opinions (Score:5, Interesting)
What they mean by "security" is not what everyone else means. Security is just the biggest argument in the FUD arsenal. They mean control, to secure their bottom line.
For 25 plus years, that's been MS's real goal. They tried to kill off Ogg Vorbis over "insecurity"-- the supposed insecurity of no built in DRM. Security was probably one of the arguments they used to push OOXML over ODF when they were trying to maintain their file format lockdown. Talk about an outdated tactic, but then, MS has been slipping for some time now. They would have tried the old line suggesting no one would maintain the software without a large company backing it, another FUD favorite, but even they must see no one would buy that any more. And yet, they can't see the uselessness of the entire Windows Genuine Advantage program.
What specifically could they be trying to promote in place of webGL? Silverlight?
WebGL bugs already demonstrated (Score:5, Informative)
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Ya I read the bug report from Mozilla
This is a Firefox-specific implementation issue not a WebGL specification issue.
.. so I'm still not sure this issue will be as big as MS makes it. Possibly, but it is still to early to tell. Also, I've been working with webGL and loving it. I'm seriously contemplating building an entire RTS based on it. So I'm hoping it works out.
For once don't bash M$, read the article instead (Score:5, Insightful)
An essential factor in security is trust. You cannot trust a website you have never seen before to load code of its choosing to be executed on a driver supplied to you by third-party which may or may not have a stellar security record themselves. Especially when "modern" operating systems like Linux run drivers as part of their monolithic kernel and so probably WILL crash when the website code messes up the driver runtime. Windows is heading in all the right directions moving their graphics driver supporing infrastracture out of the kernel into userspace. At least that way, your entire OS won't crash bringing everything down with it. At worst, smart people will figure out doing their favourite things - injecting their code through good old buffer overflows and what not.
This is what you get when you pair three poorly isolating systems to eachother. Microsoft may have done a lot of their own mess during the years with their products' security, but for once, they are right. Not the least, becaue they probably have gotten so much flak for it they finally decided enough is enough and started going by security checklist documets and automated programs that eliminate all the obvious bugs. I sincerely hope they're getting it, for I for one am tired of hearing everyone bash them. Look into your own backyard when you get 20 million lines of code running wildly on a several hundred million computers around the globe, thanks. Or reduce your SLOC, but that, again, is another discussion.
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executed on a driver supplied to you by third-party which may or may not have a stellar security record themselves.
That is more of a critique of Microsoft Windows itself than of WebGL.
Re:For once don't bash M$, read the article instea (Score:5, Insightful)
Can you explain to me, from your security point of view, how this is any different than using flash or silverlight on the web? Using those technologies, you're loading code form a website to be executed on a driver supplied to you by a third party which does NOT have a stellar security record.
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Sure, gladly. You have half a point - indeed systems that communicate invariably affect and potentially may compromise each other. That's a fact, which can also be seen in any other field of engineering. Like they say, the only secure system is the one that is not connected [to the Internet]. But since we do connect systems, the factor here is the interface cross-section. Flash Player and Silverlight, ok I won't speak for Silverlight because I never said it is much better than WebGL, so yeah - Flash Player
Their concerns do make sense (Score:2)
the graphics there sums it up nicely: http://www.contextis.com/resources/blog/webgl/ [contextis.com] Web > Browser > graphics driver > kernel, and we all know graphics drivers are full of bugs/holes, and that even killing and restarting them is not a solution if the browser keeps bombarding them with spurious request. DOS and intrusion must be very easy that way.
It's also true that MS are picking an argument they like, and that they have, in the past and even now, created plenty of exploit avenues.
I think we nee
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maybe one solution would be to create an intermediary WebGL driver in userland with lots of security checks. Would that still be worth it, performance-wise
Don't you just hate it (Score:4, Interesting)
Don't you just hate it when Microsoft takes the high road on security and raises some valid points. We've been through this scenario a bunch of times where some class of programs that used to only be used by local programs became accessible on the web and suddenly there is a rash of exploits (jpeg and pdf come to mind), I'd rather not go through it again.
That said, I think Microsoft laid out the problems with enough specificity that they could be addressed.
WebGL is not that usefull yet for... (Score:2)
Games. No joystick and other input handling, no feedback and such. Now if the browsers would have this functionality possible as standard then I would say Microsoft would have a valid concern painting the devil on the wall that they think WebGL is. However without those crucial components its more likely not a valid concern... I argue that their own supposed IE9 3D accelerated rendered pages for 2D panes is already doing something they are now stating is inherently insecure... Microsoft is really now just
Sure, if vid drivers are in ring 0... (Score:2)
I am reminded of the day when Microsoft's server OS was changed so that unverified third-party video card drivers were run in ring 0. It didn't used to be that way, and it doesn't make sense in a server OS, but they did it anyway.
It's one of the reasons I consider Windows NT 3.51 to be the last decent server OS to come out of Microsoft.
I Brand Microsoft Windows A 'Harmful' Technology (Score:2)
WebGL _IS_ potentially dangerous (Score:2)
Any new major features which allows the execution of code off the Internet is potentially dangerous. Its direct connection to hardware is also another cause for concern, especially with immature technology. However, there is also massive demand for hardware acceleration of downloaded code.
The reality is that if the browser vendors do this right, this is no more of a problem than the potential for users to download executables off the Internet and running them. Users can always screw things up and it is the
I'm shocked. (Score:2)
Microsoft saying that using any graphics library other than their own -- which happens to only be available on their operating system -- is harmful and should be avoided. Shocking.
WebGL is not secure and MS are not actually stupid (Score:2)
Microsoft would prefer to push Silverlight (which does not support OpenGL or DirectX (good call) but still does some software 3D)
That doesn't make them wrong, WebGL is stupidly insecure, because making it secure means you start to destroy performances by having a large layer between the graphic card and WebGL, while right now you're basically calling OpenGL.
In fact, except by using a proper operating system (such as singularity incidentally) and a proper, fully controlled messaging system between the OpenGL
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Are you referring to Mobile Safari for iPhone/iPad? In that case, I think Microsoft have "pulled an Apple" already and failed to provide a plugin API for the Windows Phone 7 browser. If OTOH you're referring to IE for Windows, Apple's equivalent Safari for OSX supports plugins anyway. I don't see your point.
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The business world keeps Microsoft in power, not gamers.
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Don't underestimate gamers or the gaming industry.
If every gamer switched to Linux, you'd see Windows become as irrelevant as OS/2, which also had a sizeable installed base in the corporate world, or Mac OS, which had a huge installed base in education. Corporate users hardly ever upgrade, and many of their biggest apps have already been ported to at least one other OS, if not more. In the corporate world, they cater to the customer's needs and desires. In the home market, they dictate to the market.
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You may be right, but I'm not so sure. When OS/2 first came out, the motto was "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM". Now it's "nobody ever got fired for buying Microsoft". MS is entrenched in the business and government worlds and has been for decades, while OS/2 was mostly just toyed with for a short time.
Plus, almost every desktop computer made has Windows factory-installed. Only a tiny percentage of home PCs are used for serious aming. Then there are other programs, like TurboTax, that have no Linux e
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Hypothetical:
Developer: I'm going to make a great game for Linux, it's closed source.
Linux Community: closed source? BAH! No thank you, Linux is about Freedom man,
Result: Game does not become the widely adopted killer game converting people to Linux
Developer: I'm going to make a great game for Linux, it's open source.
Windows Community: Open source? Cool! *ports game to Windows*
Result: Game does not become the widely adopted killer game converting people to Linux
We missed an opportunity. (Score:3)
You are flat wrong on a few points:
It's not the access to high performance video drivers, as they don't exist.
Bullshit. The nVidia drivers benchmark comparably on Linux and Windows. ATI might still be worse.
And this is where I think the Linux community missed an opportunity. Back when Quake 3 was the hot new shit, and was how benchmarks were done, someone benchmarked Windows vs Wine vs native Linux. They found the performance went roughly in that order -- Quake 3 was faster under Wine on Linux than it was on Windows, and the native Linux port was faster still.
So you're right that
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Don't underestimate gamers or the gaming industry.
If every gamer switched to Linux, you'd see Windows become as irrelevant as OS/2, which also had a sizeable installed base in the corporate world, or Mac OS, which had a huge installed base in education. Corporate users hardly ever upgrade, and many of their biggest apps have already been ported to at least one other OS, if not more. In the corporate world, they cater to the customer's needs and desires. In the home market, they dictate to the market.
Agreed. At my workplace, there are three things driving decisions:
Does it work?
How much does it cost?
Do the CEO, his idiot brother-in-law, the CFO, the CIO, the various VPs of this and that, your boss, and your boss' boss personally get good vibes about this?
I'll leave it to the reader to determine which factors are more important than others. Either way, if the CEO had grown up playing video games on Linux, the only people using Linux workstations would be those who need specialized software that only exis
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And the business world uses Microsoft because that's what the CEO and CFO is familiar with.
And they're familiar with Windows because that's what their kid uses to play games.
The technical departments in the business world have been heavy unix users for a very long time.
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Well Linux is already a heavy weight in the server department but it is because most people still have a MS box at home that they know MS and therefore want a MS box to work at at work. If Linux was the king of gaming then they would buy Linux boxes for personal (and for their kids) gaming and then would ask for them to work on.
Gaming is the only reason they are not winning in my opinion.
Not that I agree with the general consensus that the Linux OS is better then Windows. MS because they are a company dedic
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Eh... RedHat is taking care of that bit..
Oh? Are they releasing 100% compatible versions of Windows XP, IE6, and Microsoft Office? I ask because these are the only things the business world uses.
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At home, yes, in business, not so much. Legacy apps and textophobe-friendly administration are MS' bread and butter in business. But they are slowly killing off their legacy compatibility (and looking at going muliti-arch with closed source code), and since Win Server 2008 they've switched to a Linux-like "CLI before GUI" design, so it'll be interesting to see what happens...
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WebGL won't deliver that. It's just going to deliver the next generation of what are currently Flash games, that run on Linux anyway (just not RMS' GNU/Linux because the player isn't free as in beards).
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End of story.
Linux gaming is a niche idea for a niche OS (-Linux on desktops for the masses. I know Linux in the enterprise is big). Microsoft isn't losing any sleep over the idea of Linux gaming going mainstream.
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When the standard sucks, it needs to be done.
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It's unlikely for security reasons, just that directX is still battling opengl, they're not about to give an edge to the alternative product, right?
Exactly, that's the best part. After saying that the basic principle is harmful and so on, Microsoft will come out with a proprietary clone called DirectGL or Silverlight3D, which will have the same inherent security problems, but on top of that, the typical Microsoft shoddy security and slow patching.
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Why don't you actually post something relevant to the discussion? MS actually have a point here, and the discussion about WebGL's security has been ongoing for months.