Microsoft's Next Browser, Codenamed “Anaheim”

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Just heard the news about Microsoft's new browser in development. Wanted to share my ideas on it and further discuss it with you all. Taken from my most recent post on my website, [URL="https://willsitnews.com/"]https://willsitnews.com/[/URL]

Microsoft's Edge browser has been almost forgotten as of late, as per StatCounter, Edge had only about 2% of the browser market last month. Google Chrome recently celebrated its tenth birthday, and its widespread use and popularity soar past all other options. Why is this, and what is Microsoft doing to fix their browser's failures?

Microsoft's Edge has been plagued with errors since its inception three years ago and while they have been dramatically improving it by adding extensions and coming out on top during speed tests, Microsoft's Internet Explorer has actually had a more substantial increase in users than Edge in Q1 2018 (weird, I know).

Well, there is a light in the tunnel, so to speak, for Microsoft in the form of a new browser that is in development, codenamed “Anaheim.”

Per Windows Central, Microsoft is giving up EdgeHTML, the rendering engine used with Edge, and replacing it with Chromium; a codebase first widely used with Google's Chrome browser, Blink. This new browser, “Anaheim,” will replace Edge as the default browser for Windows 10.

The beauty of using Chromium is its ability to operate similarly to Google Chrome; seamlessly navigating websites and not falling victim to the same performance and instability issues that Edge has been inflicted with. For a little background on Chromium, it isn't really an engine, more of a codebase that initially used Webkit, which is an engine (many of the articles regarding this story refer to Chromium as an engine, and that is not entirely accurate).

Microsoft's transition to Chromium is powered by EdgeHTML falling short on getting its performance and features to work consistently. Microsoft is known to attempt to ‘reinvent the wheel' when creating new products, and I am glad to see that in this case, there are simply trying to augment it. It is important to note that Chrome OS is a completely different open-source project from Chromium open-source browser. Chromium's benefits, in my opinion, are having the flexibility and prior successful history needed to accomplish this task of creating a new browser.

While we still do not know much about Microsoft's “Anaheim,” I for one am excited to see what this new browser can do in terms of bridging the gap between itself, Chrome, Firefox, and Opera. When I first heard this news, I began to wonder how this new browser will differ from Edge regarding plugins, extensions, and mobile functionality. Additionally, it will be interesting to see if “Anaheim” will adopt Edge's UI or go in a completely different path. Currently, I have more questions than answers. However, I am sure Microsoft will make an announcement shortly, confirming or denying my initial suspicions.

Sources:

StatCounter. 4 Dec 2018. Browser Market Share Worldwide. Retrieved from [url=http://gs.statcounter.com/]StatCounter Global Stats - Browser, OS, Search Engine including Mobile Usage Share[/url].

Bowden, Zack. Windows Central. 3 Dec 2018. Microsoft is building a Chromium-powered web browser that will replace Edge on Windows 10. Retrieved from [URL="https://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft-building-chromium-powered-web-browser-windows-10"]https://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft-building-chromium-powered-web-browser-windows-10[/URL].
 
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Sounds more like Microsoft failed where Edge is concerned. Microsoft has become so inept at programming that it can no longer make and support it's own browser. Meanwhile the Chrome store is almost always loaded with something malicious, it'll be interesting
 
It's rather quite the opposite really. Edge was plagued with issues from the start sure, but over time Edge has come out to properly be a superior browser. Let's be realistic for a minute, IE was terrible it's entire lifespan and they managed to polish Edge into gold in 3 years. The problem being Google's approach to cram Chrome down everybody's throat with their adsense machine (aka going to Google and it says use a better browser every single time). As a long standing user of Chrome I am exceptionally sick and tired of just how ridiculously bloated this browser is in terms of something like Edge. The only absolute thing Chrome has over Edge is it's sandboxed nature and that's it. Again, as a signed in user for sync'd data on new machines that are not mine it's exceptionally annoying to constantly be nagged to sign in "for a better experience". This plus Microsoft retaining their reputation through IE and people automatically wanting to avoid Edge simply because it's Microsoft browser. We simply can't ignore the stigma Microsoft has carried for a little over 2 decades concerning their own browsers. I've also noticed a LOT of "standard" average Joe users actually think Edge was still IE and did not want to use it for this reason.

I would really say the only thing Microsoft is being inept over here is their constant bending over backwards with software development. They either make something really terrible, or develope something into being good then scrap it (or they buy something decent and make it more terrible).

Per Windows Central, Microsoft is giving up EdgeHTML, the rendering engine used with Edge, and replacing it with Chromium; a codebase first widely used with Google's Chrome browser, Blink. This new browser, “Anaheim,” will replace Edge as the default browser for Windows 10.
This is false, Edge nomenclature will remain and the backend of the browser is all that's being changed.

Microsoft's Edge has been plagued with errors since its inception three years ago and while they have been dramatically improving it by adding extensions and coming out on top during speed tests, Microsoft's Internet Explorer has actually had a more substantial increase in users than Edge in Q1 2018 (weird, I know).
This is due in part to Windows 7 coming soon to EOL status and enterprise environments moving to Windows 10 finally. IE was left for backwards compatibility and most places with software/content made to run with this browser still use it for this reason. My company being one such one. I also know a lot of places for some reason in their move to 10 decided to remove Chrome from software installation suites as well make Edge as inaccessible as possible. My company again being one such company, but later they reverted their stance. I can see people use IE being the only browser to browse the web in these cases where an alternative was not available for whatever reason. (Although being part of our W10 "tiger" team I still to this day have no idea why they initially didn't want alternate browsers being available when we had Chrome and Firefox on our W7 boxes)


In the end we will all have to see how things play out. I really really hope Microsoft can keep the slim browser experience they've had while only changing HTML engines. If Edge winds up being more of a resource hog than with EdgeHTML they will essentially be shooting themselves in both feet. A lot of us that actually uses Edge for how slim it is will stop because it'd be pointless at that point.
 
Dont think your watching the news..

https://www.theverge.com/2018/12/10/18134073/chromium-microsoft-browser-chrome-extensions-xbox-one

Edge is isnt dead.. its integrating Chromium.

Actually Edge was a big piece of crap, and M$ knew it.
While the modern look and feel has paid off for Edge, the underlying browser engine (EdgeHTML) has struggled to keep up with Chromium. Microsoft is finally giving up and moving its default Windows 10 browser to Chromium
https://www.theverge.com/2018/12/4/18125238/microsoft-chrome-browser-windows-10-edge-chromium
Microsoft is using Chrome because they can not compete with other browsers, and they would like to see more advert and data mining profits from it as Google does. So technically Edge is doa, but with the same name and new innards it can continue to live on
 
Microsoft Edge on Linux
Code:
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=2124602
https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/edge/pool/main/m/microsoft-edge-dev/microsoft-edge-dev_88.0.673.0-1_amd64.deb

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=2124702
https://packages.microsoft.com/yumrepos/edge/microsoft-edge-dev-88.0.673.0-1.x86_64.rpm
Sorry, I don't have any Linux at the moment, so I can't comment more.
 
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