CNET: IBM backs Firefox in-house

May 13 2005

Firefox is already used by about 10 percent of IBM's staff, or about 30,000 people. Starting Friday, IBM workers can download the browser from internal servers and get support from the company's help desk staff.
...
For IBM, the move is a significant step in lessening dependence on a product from rival Microsoft.

By supporting Firefox internally, IBM is also furthering its commitment to open-source products based on industry standards, said Brian Truskowski, chief information officer at IBM.
This is very good news.  I've been using Firefox almost exclusively for many many months.  There are still two IBM applications I access today that are IE-only; with this announcement, plans have been conveyed as to when those go away.  I'm still not quite ready to move my primary desktop environment to Linux, though there are a lot of IBMers doing so.

And as long as I'm writing about ways to move away from Microsoft technology, I'm thinking about buying a Mac Mini for my daughter to use....

Link: CNET: IBM backs Firefox in-house >

Ed Brill | Highland Park, IL USA Category:  IBM  Add/View Comments [41]

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  1. 1  Stu Mac www.syan.co.uk | 5/13/2005 7:59:09 AM

    Good for you Ed - "Ed the MacHead" here we come ;-)

  1. 2  Bill Dorge  | 5/13/2005 8:29:29 AM

    I've been thinking about the Mac Mini for my kids also, nice little package, doesn't take up much room. I was hoping it would do everthing they want and wouldn't require me to fix Windows every other week for them.

  1. 3  Steven Adler  | 5/13/2005 9:01:34 AM

    Sametime conferencing (atleast v3.1) doesn't work with Firefox... does 6.5.1?

  1. 4  Thom Rosario http://www.macdork.com/ | 5/13/2005 9:28:32 AM

    I don't think you'll be disappointed w/ a mini if you get one -- it's spec'ed just right for what you're looking for.

  1. 5  Ralph Unden http://allralph.blogspot.com/ | 5/13/2005 9:35:08 AM

    I suppose this was the next logical step for IBM to do.

    Hasn´t IBM been funding the Mozilla Foundation and therefore pushing Firefox againt IE anyways?

  1. 6  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 5/13/2005 9:49:09 AM

    Good news with it becoming more "official". I only use IE when I absolutely have to (the building society who hold my savings account are in the hall of shame) and I feel like I want to get out of it and back to Firefox as soon as possible.

  1. 7  Ben Rose http://www.jaffacake.net | 5/13/2005 10:05:06 AM

    Lets hope this give Firefox an incentive to fix their bugs faster.

    { Link }

  1. 8  Greg gsimmonssc.blogspot.com | 5/13/2005 10:05:33 AM

    Well, well, it's about time IBM. Methinks the status quo has shifted and poor old Microsoft isn't quite sure what to do about it.

    That's one reason the new operating system is code named "Longhorn" - it's full of bull and loaded with crap

  1. 9  Brian Green  | 5/13/2005 10:33:32 AM

    I use Firefox for just about everything. Banking and Financial web sites are the exception. How much do you trust the web developers at your bank? Is it worth the personal risk?

  1. 10  Bill Geimer  | 5/13/2005 10:55:18 AM

    I sure hope this gives IBM some incentive to support Firefox in DWA. Its okay for Inbox and Calendar, but it just won't display the Workspace Tab at all. (Hint: the sooner, the better for all.)

  1. 11  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 5/13/2005 11:06:18 AM

    @9 - DWA support for Firefox is under consideration for Domino 7. Win32 and Linux at the moment...still working on Mac.

  1. 12  Gaston www.dblookup.info | 5/13/2005 11:07:24 AM

    Ed,

    Maybe you'll need an Linux client of Lotus Notes before moving to linux....

    Gaston

  1. 13  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 5/13/2005 11:14:17 AM

    WINE/Crossover are options for now...

  1. 14  Ben Rose http://www.jaffacake.net | 5/13/2005 11:17:14 AM

    @12 - That supported/certified now then?

  1. 15  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 5/13/2005 11:22:25 AM

    no :)

  1. 16  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 5/13/2005 11:43:46 AM

    @11 - given that there'll be a Notes plug-in for Workplace Client Technology on Linux, eventually Notes functionality will be supported on a Linux client. That will make a move more feasible.

    @7 - I like the Longhorn gag.

  1. 17  Gregg Eldred http://www.ns-tech.com/blog/geldred.nsf | 5/13/2005 12:16:29 PM

    Ed:

    I have had a few conversations with Volker on kids and Macs. Bottom line, there aren't a lot of games for the kids, but beyond that, it is an excellent platform for them (or anyone, except Domino Developers - sorry). Both of my kids have Macs and I will be replacing one of them with a newer model, maybe the mini. Selfishly, I like the Mac because when their friends come over, none of them "fix" the Mac because they can't find the Start button. :-) I don't have many Tech Support calls from my kids.

  1. 18  Bob Obringer http://bob-obringer.com | 5/13/2005 12:39:23 PM

    As I'm sure you will be encouraging your daughter to learn Domino Designer early... does this mean we will someday soon see the Designer back on OSX? Oh, how that would change my entire world... ;-)

  1. 19  Andres Gorostidi  | 5/13/2005 1:39:48 PM

    @17 ... I guess that Ed's will encorauge his daugther to learn WorkPlace Designer instead Domino Designer..:-) And will learn J2EE too.....:-) Just kidding. ;-)

  1. 20  Mike Brown  | 5/13/2005 2:18:38 PM

    There's actually more than you might think. See { Link }

    Okay, there's nowhere near as many as for the PC, but there's some surprisingly big hitters in there, such as:

    * World of Warcraft

    * Call of Duty (+ United Offensive expansion pack)

    * Doom 3

    (There's actually only one version of WOW, which is a combined PC/Mac version).

    And no, I've never played any of them in their Mac versions, and I'm not at all sure that a Mac Mini would be an ideal platform upon which to run them.

    Cheers,

    - Mike

  1. 21  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 5/13/2005 2:29:52 PM

    @19 - why not?

    I'm thinking more like "Dora the Explorer" games though. :)

  1. 22  Mike Brown  | 5/13/2005 3:56:38 PM

    Just looking at the specs of the Mac Mini, at least in its default version, it just looks under-specced as a gaming machine to me. Great for web browsing, day to day work etc. Hell, it would probably even run Notes 6 pretty good!

    But for decent gaming, you've nearly always got to have top of the range stuff, or one level behind, to get decent performance.

    I know nothing of this "Dora the Explorer" of which you speak, Earthman.

  1. 23  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 5/13/2005 4:06:13 PM

    @21 - she has a monkey friend who wear red boots and he's called... errr... Boots. And there's a fox who swipes things and he's called Swiper (I think). A fox? That ties in with the original point of the thread ;o)

  1. 24  Josh Powell  | 5/13/2005 5:33:18 PM

    @6: Please take a look at the following article about the difference in time it takes Microsoft to patch Internet Explorer security breaches versus the time it takes Mozilla to patch Firefox breaches (you'll have to scroll down past the ad at the top):

    { Link }

    IE: 200 unpatched days in 2004 with in-the-wild breaches

    Firefox: ZERO (0) unpatched days in 2004 with in-the-wild breaches

  1. 25  Hosun Lee  | 5/13/2005 5:51:44 PM

    Hopefully this will encourage more websites and corporations to convert their IE-only applications to something more universal. I think that dependency on existing ActiveX/IE optimized application will have a significant impact on Firefox's adoption. I'm hoping someone will develop a tool that allows for easy conversion of these IE-only applications.

  1. 26  Scott http://techlifeblogged.blogspot.com | 5/13/2005 6:31:22 PM

    Awsome! This made Mozillazine too. See link. { Link }

  1. 27  Bill Ballantyne  | 5/13/2005 9:29:25 PM

    Yes, hopefully we'll now see some of the IBM products support Firefox -- iNotes especially, and how 'bout full functionality for Quickplace (instead of the crippled Netscape way that it works now).

  1. 28  Bill Ballantyne  | 5/13/2005 9:34:04 PM

    @8 - Why don't use Firefox for banking or financial?

  1. 29  AJP  | 5/14/2005 9:14:33 AM

    wrt Mini Mac, I dare you to load a Notes Client on it, go on you know you want to :)

  1. 30  Subhan http://slate.blogspirit.com | 5/14/2005 9:38:02 AM

    Though 30,000 firefox users is a good number it still 10% of IBM workforce. Making IE as the standard browser across the corporate though will be a good case study for Corporate usage of firefox.

    Suggestion: Can IBM pack Firefox with all its Desktop softwares? Offering Firefox as an option to the user during S/w Installation.

  1. 31  Axel Janssen  | 5/14/2005 10:28:50 AM

    poor IBMers will miss IE7, which is in the pipe and will be great product.

  1. 32  Axel Janssen  | 5/14/2005 12:19:20 PM

    @28. That's not true. My bank - which is quite big one - works with Firefox.

  1. 33  John http://www.johndavidhead.com | 5/14/2005 1:03:59 PM

    Gaming on the mac ... while 1st tier games (those games that sell over 200,000 copies) always come out for the PC first, most of the children's and educational games come out for both mac and pc at the same time. Most of those games are done with flash today, so they work on both sides. There are still a few companies out there that port games to the mac, with Doom3 being the biggest game to be ported recently. Blizzard, the developer behind the warcraft, starcraft, and diablo series, have always done pc and mac releases on the same cd. But it is still 2 different games written from the ground up. They just have a strong mac preference.

    This will all change once Microsoft releases their new directx technologies, called XNA. The goal is to have a single technology base for the PC and XBox360 ... leaving mac's in the dust

  1. 34  Michael G  | 5/14/2005 3:12:17 PM

    Ed - Just some advice about the Mini. I purchased one the day they came out and loved it. About 3 months later, it ended up on eBay. I ended up getting a 12" Powerbook used on ebay. The specs were similar (1.33 GHz) but ended up with additional RAM on the PB. I primarily keep the PB docked. This way, I have both the portable and docked option. Keep in mind that a Mini is basically a laptop without a LCD. It does not have any of the features that a normal desktop has (expension, faster disks, etc...)

    It may be nice to give your daughter the option to take her laptop with her when you travel.....

  1. 35  Kevin S. www.ctstateu.edu | 5/14/2005 8:57:07 PM

    Ed:

    I am in the midst of converting to R6.5 and we are running into issues where non-IE browsers are not certified to work with Domino (e.g. iNotes.)

    Does this mean that Firefox et. al will be supported in R6.5 and 7?

  1. 36  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 5/14/2005 9:16:15 PM

    @35: Kevin, see my answer @11 above.

  1. 37  Brian Green  | 5/16/2005 10:25:24 AM

    @9,28 - I'm suggesting that Financial web site developers do more _testing_ with MSIE than with any other browser. If you trust them enough to use another browser, good for you.