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I have to say it's working excellent for me using Outlook 07. I love it! I'm not sure what back-end Mobile Me is using. However, it operates just like connecting to an Exchange server.

Does Windows calendar and contacts support Exchange? You also have to keep in mind Mobile Me has to be compatible with Windows XP.

I agree that MobileMe is not worth the money at this point.  However, on my XP machine, if I go to Control Panel > MobileMe, mine gives me the options to sync contacts from Outlook, Windows Address Book, Google Contacts and Yahoo Contacts with MobileMe.  As for calendars, it only give me Outlook.  I have not tried it on Vista yet as I refuse to install iTunes on it.  Vista is my good machine -- don't want that POS on there ;)

I have to agree with you, Paul.  MobileMe (and .mac for that matter) are great for the Mac.  But Apple needs to look at the iphone/ipod userbase when building out MobileMe if they want to be a real player in this space.

It seems like the Windows side of things is very fragmented, even in the Microsoft-only software side, with the built-in applications in Vista being replaced by "live" versions and integration generally incomplete or spotty.  Could that be what they're trying to avoid?  Maybe Apple is waiting for the dust to settle and Microsoft to get their non-outlook-based solution ready for prime time?

I'm ignorant to that stuff, so I may be totally wrong.  Either way, Apple needs to take it's Windows users seriously with their services now that the iPhone is broad computing platform unto itself.  

Hopefully this will happen.  It's not like Microsoft is ready to go with Live Mesh yet, really, and the device story on the Microsoft side is pretty poor.  So Apple has maybe another year to really get this total solution working well delivering value for Windows users.  I hope they step it up.

On the positive front, the MobileMe web UI's are REALLY nice and their initially dreadful performance is already improving dramatically.  The round-trip integration with the iTunes devices is really great.  My family can use their Apple TVs to subscribe to my MobileMe gallery and see all of the latest family photos and videos is a great interface, up-to-date.  That's pretty sweet.

@jaw

great to hear that it's working well for you.  The XP support is a good point.  Are you an iPhone user?  Why did you go for it?

I've been using .Mac since the day it was announced, but just for testing purposes. MobileMe makes it a bit more interesting, but I've got to review it, so I'll be using it to figure out whether it's worth it for the typical Windows user.

I just launched my Vista Control Panel for the first time since installing iTunes 7.7, and I found a new applet for Mobile Me.  I did not purchase Mobile Me, nor did I ask iTunes to install the client software.  It just appeared.  I tried to open the applet, and it only allows me to sign in to a Mobile Me account (which I did not purchase) and provides information for me to learn more about Mobile Me.  Fortunately I know enough about Mobile Me to know that I would never want to purchase it, and never want to install the client software on my PC.

To add insult to injury, there is no way to remove this software!

How can Apple get away with pushing this craplet onto my PC without my permission?  Where is the outrage?

And let's not forget the "We didn't think a significant number of users browse with IE7 to make it worth testing as a platform" attitude toward Windows users .

Face it, Windows "support" sure looks like an afterthought rather than a design goal. Odd considering that most iPod and iPhone users never use a Macintosh at home or at work.

Compare that to the support matrix for Microsoft's Live Mesh.

"How can Apple get away with pushing this craplet onto my PC without my permission?  Where is the outrage?"

Cue the papster for a long-winded apology on Apple's behalf with recycled fanboi clichés about "improving the user experience by giving you what you need" and "it works better on a Mac - maybe you should switch".

(Hey, he calls me out on practically EVERY SINGLE ARTICLE that he writes on - now it's my turn!)

@rickhuizinga

Apparently, the lesson Apple learned from people being pissed about their "It's an upgrade" opt-out model for blasting Safari onto Windows users computers was not that opt-in is the only acceptable way.

They learned that asking is bad. Just install whatever unrelated software you want. Nobody will complain enough to matter.

@Rickhuizinga

Rick - if you're that upset about it, you can probably delete the .CPL file.  Search your Windows directory for .CPL files and you'll likely find the one for MobileMe.  Disclaimer: I haven't tried this, and you should be very careful about deleting the *right* CPL file.

@Paul

I agree that it would be incredibly short-sited to release MobileMe without a bare-minimum of Calendar and Contact support, though at least one person claims that this is working for them.Would you please follow up and confirm or deny that Outlook is supported for Calendar and Contact synchronization?  

One final thing - other than Hotmail, are there any other services on the market right now that support two-way e-mail, calendar and contact synch (not one or two of the three) with Outlook or other Windows programs?

I had initially had all kinds of problems getting sync to work correctly (as advertised) between iPhone 3G, MobileMe and Outlook 2007 in my Vista Ultimate box.  I believe the major contributor to all the problems were rollout issues with Apple's servers, which seem to be getting more reliable as time passes.

Sync works like this for me (using Firefox 3):

- Changes to the Calendar or Contacts in MobileMe sync to my iPhone within 15 seconds

- Changes to the Calendar or Contacts on my iPhone sync to MobileMe within 15 seconds

- Changes to MobileMe or my iPhone take up to 15 minutes to sync to Outlook 2007 on my Vista PC

- Changes to my Outlook 2007 Calendar or Contacts take up to 15 minutes to show up on MobileMe and my iPhone.

I have tested syncing in all ways I can figure and the above performance is repeatable each time.

I do get fairly regular "Server Error" messages within MobileMe as well as total freezes.  Shutting down the site and logging back in usually restores normal service.

All-in-all somewhat promising but still a good bit away from what I was hoping for.  I believe over time the wrinkles will be ironed out.

@BrightrevCarl

Looks like there isn't an actual MobileMe .CPL file to delete if you don't want an Apple advertisement cluttering up your Control Panel. I've only got two CPL files on my system that are less than 2 months old. One is QuickTime and the other is from an updated video driver.

It appears that the ad for the service that's shown in the control panel is actually a part of the QuickTime CPL applet so if you want QuickTime, you get the ad for MobileMe. Like it or not.

Of course, at 1.5MB, the QuickTime CPL is huge enough that you have to wonder what its actually doing.

I'm not sure what the current definition of Malware is, but installing an advertisement disguised as a system file in a users computer when they install a totally unrelated application sure sounds like it meets the requirements.

@santian I don't think it's ever going to be instant push going from your vista pc to the cloud. Apple put out a support document stating it will take around 15 minutes for this sync to happen on windows. Quite disappointing considering they advertised this so much as exchange for the rest of us when it's clearly not.

It looks like you can uninstall Mobile Me by uninstalling Apple Mobile Device Support. Of course, I wouldn't know for sure since it refuses to uninstall on my computer.

Interestingly, it hooks into Outlook without asking.

@sharp65

Yes, I saw that Apple Support article so I understand this may be how it works at the moment.  Hopefully Apple has plans to correct this misrepresentation and enable a more instantaneous solution.  As it is it works fairly well... certainly better that before when syncing required a USB cable and user intervention!  I'll take what I can get for the time being!

So... This thing is a freaking mess, sorry.

Yes, you can sync contacts and cal with Outlook. You can *only* sync cal with Outlook, however, so if you don't pay for something (either Outlook or MobileMe), as a Windows user, you can't sync calendars with the iPhone at all. No offense guys, but that's ridiculous.

You can sync contacts with Google Contacts now, which is interesting but useless: Google Contacts is horribly broken and should not be used for contacts management.

This stuff is so complicated it makes my head hurt. It errors out so often--Mac or PC or Web--that it makes me want to scream. It's just crappy software right now, sorry. That said, the push stuff (auto-immediate-sync) does work pretty well and very quickly. But man. It is soooo buggy.

I really don't get the "we don't fully support ie" thing....  I write complex web applications for the government and other clients using the full range of new technologies and cross browser compatible firefox, IE 6-7, heck they even work fine in safari and all other browsers/platforms with no problems what so ever with standards issues and apple can't?

sounds like limitations in this frame work they are pushing not IE

so many issues... well, I hope they get it together. I'm a paying CUSTOMER!!!

Speaking of buggy software - has anyone else have their iPhone go into a mode where it gets warm and drains a full battery in under 2 hours?

It's happened to me twice since upgrading to the 2.0 software, and has never happened to me with previous versions...

@mikegalos@msn.com

As far as I can see, the only thing the Quicktime .CPL icon does is take you to QuickTime Preferences, which you can do just as easily by opening the app itself.  

Want to try renaming that .CPL and seeing if it gets rid of the MobileMe control panel icon?  I don't have or need the new iTunes and I'm too lazy to install all this stuff in a VM to test removing the icon.

At the very least, there might be a way for people who see the MobileMe thing as a big problem to get rid of the icon.

@Paul,

Good to see you follow up with the addendum.. and that the Windows support is far more extensive than you first wrote.  That's good.  Apple needs to be treating their Windows support as equal priority.  I'd say that Apple needs to aim for being the best Windows developer.  That will engender more goodwill than anything else they could do.  The mac is great, but if your experience of Apple software on Windows sucks... that's not going to help you switch.

@waethorn,

I've never actively told anyone to switch to the mac on this site.  That's the worst kind of trolling.  I simply defend against unreasonable attacks on the platform I use and enjoy.  And if you had read my actual post above, you'd see what actual balanced commenting from an Apple fan sounds like, versus your vitriol-laden, blind partisan rancor.

As for the control panel... yeah, that's a pretty aggressive approach, installing the MobileMe control panel with iTunes.  No question Apple is pushing things with their roll out of "other" software and services via iTunes updates.  This gets back to ideology and geek ethics versus what's smart for business.  It's probably smart for Apple to do this particular thing.  But it irks us geeks to have any unwanted clutter.

You're such an Apple-hater, it's just downright weird.  Why not just stay in the Apple-free posts?  We all know what you're going to say in these Apple ones.

@Paul,

I 100% agree that it SUCKS for windows users to be required to buy a calendaring application in order to sync the iPhone's calendar on windows.  Is there any technical reason why they can't use Vista's calendar app?  Does Windows Live sync with Vista's calendar?  I thought there was a "live" version coming soon.

As for IE, I'm not sure what everyone is talking about.  Do the mobileme web apps not work in IE7?  Screw IE6.  But does it not work in 7?  Where is IE7 being snubbed?

@Paul

While I've been pretty positive in my comments I have to agree with you at a top level that the entire MobileMe implementation is pretty screwed up... but I believe (actually I hope!) Apple will see past their desire to thump Windows users and make the needed changes to the application.  Since I'm not an Exchange user this is the only opportunity I have at the moment (that I know of) to have OTA syncing for my calendar, contacts and email.

@johnpapola

What Paul means is that when you attempt to access the MobileMe website with IE7 you get the following message:

"Internet Explorer 7 is not fully supported.

Internet Explorer 7 has known compatibility issues with modern web standards which affect Web 2.0 applications such as MobileMe."

"You can use Internet Explorer 7, but you will not have access to all MobileMe features and will experience slower performance."

"For the best MobileMe experience, please use Firefox 3 or Safari 3."

Just another slam on Windows users and especially IE7.  

So if I have Office 2007 for Windows and/or Office 2008 for Mac [Special Media Edition] and Exchange at work, then I really don't need a MobileMe account for the iPhone. Is that correct? [Assuming that I can ever get either of them to sync with Exchange from work. talk about difficult to setup, I couldn't even setup Office 2003 ,2007 for Windows and 2004 for Mac with exchange! IT sent out a utility and it didn't even work, and yes, I had ever last bit of software updated on XP and Vista!]

@DRWAM

I believe you're correct.  If you use Exchange you won't need MobileMe.  Remember, the tag line for hyping MobileMe is "Exchange for the Rest of Us."

@Santian,

"Just another slam on Windows users and especially IE7. "

It's most certainly a slam against IE7... but I really have no idea how you consider this a slam against Windows USERS.  Firefox is free.  It's hardly a slam against the Windows community to favor it.  Perhaps it's a slam against the actual IE dev team... but that's it.

Seriously.  It very could be that in order to achieve the ultra-polished, mac-like UI on mobileme without flash or silverlight meant using more modern web standards that IE7 supports.  We all know that IE7 isn't a very good browser from a standards-compliance POV.  Hence the big push for standards support in IE8.

Doesn't really seem like a big deal.  Use firefox 3.  It seems like a better browser on Windows anyway.  In any event, they still have lots of work to do on mobileme, because as of right now the UI is still a bit slow.  It is super nice though.

The fact that all this crap is buried in iTunes is a joke. I mean, iTunes is ultimately the weak link on the Windows side, its bloated and looks like absolute hell. Its by far the ugliest, slowest software on my Vista machine.  iTunes has become this catch-all sync mechanism because Apple wants you looking at their Apple store every time you plug your iPhone/iPod in.  I have an iPod touch and love the darn thing but having to sync contacts and calendar through a music jukebox is a total joke.  Why they can't have a lightweight sync tool that handles the non-media stuff is beyond me.

@johnpapola

"It's most certainly a slam against IE7... but I really have no idea how you consider this a slam against Windows USERS."

Technically, you're absolutely right.  I was trying to communicate that Apple seems to put less into satisfying the needs of Windows users for their products that run on XP/Vista (like the less than ideal iTunes implementation compared to iTunes on the Mac).  I should have said a "slam against Microsoft" instead.

And I use Firefox 3 almost exclusively except for those times I need IE7 for sites optimized for it.  

I'm certainly giving MobileMe the room it needs to blossom... I have high hopes!  In the mean time it's doing OK for me.  All my syncing is OTA, albeit quite buggy!

@DRWAM yes as long as your Exchange server, serves up OWA to the internet, you can use Entourage (horrible product) to access your Exchange account, with many limitations.  Entourage use the same settings as you you would use for OWA, https://mail.company.com  domain user/password.  Same for Windows Mobile, the iPhone, and the new Blackberries (for email only).

IMAP with Outlook......SUCKS.  Always has, always will.  MobileMe/.Mac is IMAP.  It sucks because it forces you to create a PST along with your IMAP set of folders you download.  So you have your IMAP (MobileMe, Gmail) Inbox in a set of folders that you really use, and a Inbox on your PST folders that is worthless and you can remove it.  MS threw IMAP support into Outlook as an after thought.  If you could just create a PST that held your contacts and calendar is would be great.

That said Paul missed, but stated it later, the Outlook features in the control panel.  It works, and works pretty much as advertised in my testing, added many contacts in single sync.  As far as supporting other calendars outside of Outlook on the PC....what is there Vista calendar?   Nothing from MS that came with XP that I know of.  I have not tested MobileMe on Vista, but supporting Vista/Windows calendar sync should be an option since it supports iCal.  In fact that would be preferable to Outlook and more like OS X.

The whole is IE7 thing is a laugh at the Windows Fangirls here.  MS and their BS not opening up Sharepoint and OWA to fully support other browsers has been a bone of contention for a long time.  At one point the said OWA on 2007 was going to support premium features with FireFox and other browsers....the forgot that I guess.

Hotmail/MSN/Live mail or whatever they are calling it this week, throws a note to you in the middle of your screen stating the full version wont work.  In the case of Hotmail, its because other browsers dont support the MS way.  In the case of IE with MobileMe, IE does not support full standards.  I bet IE8 will...when MS finally gets it out.

Thanks all. I'm getting closer. Got a bad cold right now and I drove home from the shore so that the kids and wife wouldn't get it. So this is all good geek help. I think that my problem with Outlook and Entourage syncing is due to our VPN, so I'll call IT. Once I get it working, I'll do a sync from the Treo, then sync up the iPhone [if I buy it]. I would bet that all the fields sync. It's gonna be a pain, but I like to have a calender around as I have 3 offices and one hospital, many of which have assigned areas, so I need to know where the heck I am for the day, especially when someone wants to switch. I'm one of the nice guys, so I have become the switching whore.

Thanks again,

Doc

@rickhuizinga:

Ya, I've had some problems with that too. I've actually gone through 4 iPhones, 3 of which had battery problems (one of them ended up in a pool). I just got a new replacement one on July 6 (i.e. last Sunday), and it was working great on 1.1.4, or whatever the last update was. After installing 2.0 on Thursday, I noticed that some of the original apps run slower than they used to, and some of the new apps run slower that they should. My battery also heats up and runs down quick, which is why Apple replaced my iPhone last week- warm phones that die quick= a dying battery.

@Snakedoctor,

GREAT point about Microsoft's OWA nonsense.  I use OWA all the time in Safari (could be Firefox) and it's garbage compared to what you get in IE7.  Talk about a total snub on their crown jewels.  They're using some major proprietary stuff on those crucial web tools.  It looks like IE8 is moving in the right direction along with Microsoft in general, though I remain leery of their motives, given the history.

So, given that, it is funny to see Apple get people upset for supporting the standards and not bending to the kludgy programming required to get a complex site working perfectly in IE.  Even so, I bet it works better on IE7 than OWA works in Safari or Firefox.

Forget the "web standards ideology" about IE versus Firefox. If I was an Apple shareholder I'd be very pissed off that somebody made the decision to release a product that at least 75% of users cannot use well or at all even.

Great way to grow the business. I guess the Apple mentality is the: "Hey, we have 3% of the market, that's great" mentality.

Forget the "People *should* use Firefox/Safari/Opera argument", this is not a religion, or an ideology, it's business, and locking out 3/4s of your potential users for no good reason is really a bad business idea. I guess I'm glad I don't own Apple shares in this case.

@swat671 A couple of comments:

1) The pre-release iPhone firmware available on Thursday is actually the firmware for the iPhone 3G, not the original iPhone.  Many have reported that after re-installing the correct firmware (by doing a restore), the sluggishness will go away.  I can attest to the accuracy of these reports as the issue resolved itself after I installed the correct version of the firmware.

2) I suspect the draining battery issue that I am experiencing is due to a software issue where the iPhone is not properly going into sleep/standby/low-power mode when idle.  I have never had a quick-draining battery issue prior to upgrading to the new firmware, and twice in the couple of days since.

@ggolher, maybe you use the product before let loose with that logic.

Firs off IE does work for the most part, just some stuff does not.  I logged in with IE7, opened mail, sent mail, deleted mail, looked at my contacts, my calendar etc.  I had no problems with IE.  I think it might choke when you drag and drop a message from the inbox to a folder, since that part of it is the new stuff based on the "web 2.0" or whatever you call it.  So IE basically works.

That said, MobileMe is a replacement for .Mac, which I am going to go out on a limb here and say that 98% of .Mac members were using Mac's, maybe more.  100% of those Mac users dont use IE......so I am not exactly sure how Apple screwed up here???

Yes they now have some support for Windows/PC's.  If you watch the MobileMe video that walks through everything with live video, the focus on PC's is more of "When a Mac user has to use a PC (insert reason here) you can now sync your .Mac email, contacts, and calendar with Outook with MobileMe.  

The focus is not to target Windows only users, to get them to sign up for MobileMe.  It maybe if your a iPhone user, but even then iPhone/Windows users got their Exchange update which was probably the "BIG UPDATE" in all of this.

@ggolcher,

Regarding Apple's shareholders... I think they've been pretty happy with Apple's "outpace the whole PC market's growth by a factor of three, dominate digital music worldwide and triple the size of your revenues, profits and cash on hand" mentality.  

I don't think there's any religion here.  As Snakedoctor pointed out, there are some things that IE7 just can't do that Apple wanted their UI to be capable of.  This is why Microsoft is working on IE8.  It's call progress, and if people don't push Microsoft, they don't move.  Just look how long IE6 sat there being ignored.

As for the 15 push times... that seems to be driven by the desktop app sending/checking.  Push to and from the web and the iPhone are near instant, just like a blackberry or exchange-based system.  Mail.app works on 15 minute intervals, hence the 15 minute delay.

They highlighted that at http://www.macrumors.com/

John, you make some good points, but I disagree with a couple: If MobileMe is targeted at Apple users that have to use a Windows PC... why did iTunes install a Control Panel icon for the service on EVERYBODY who got upgraded to 7.7 (which should be pretty much all users)? Sounds to me like a cheap way of gaining a lot more exposure, maybe they're aiming to expand to non-Mac users... regardless of what the video says... and if so, not fully supporting IE 7 is not a wise choice.

The other point I disagree is with what IE7 can or cannot do. Regarding drag-and-drop for example, Microsoft made it work really well in Hotmail in IE7, and Apple probably has the resources to make stuff like that work. There is no reason IE7 doesn't provide as good an experience.

Don't get me wrong, on other fronts, Apple has done a great job, but this just doesn't seem well executed at all.

Oh, I agree with you that Apple needs to approach Windows users with a world-class solution, not an after-thought or a half-baked approach.  Apple needs to do better on Windows overall.  No doubt about that.

I think what Apple is trying to do with MobileMe is very new for them.  They're using this "sproutcore" AJAX framework that supposedly is designed based on Cocoa's programming model.  This is great for Apple's team, but doesn't seem to yet be producing a really lean, fast experience.  It's lush and very desktop-like.  Very "thick client".  But it's sluggish.  This is probably why they're also grinding away at the "squirrelfish" javascript engine for Safari 4 that is supposedly delivering MASSIVE speed gains in the beta already.  This is ultimately going to result in Safari being the premiere AJAX browser, but it's taking them some time.  I think it's very nearly the fastest AJAX browser already.  

When you couple this effort with Safari including a "save as web app" functionality, you have a totally open-standards based approach to RIA (rich internet application) development.. compared to Adobe and Microsoft's totally proprietary plugin-based approach.  This is big stuff and we should all champion the effort.  They're trying to avoid lock-in and losing control while Adobe and Microsoft are trying to gain control.

As for IE7 being able to do everything... I really don't know.  I'm not a web dev.  My guess is that it's a limitation of Sproutcore and that addressing IE7's proprietary quirks may be too kludgy for what they're doing.  But that's a guess.  I don't think it's intentional, though.  iWeb generates IE7-compatible sites and .mac's web gallery works in IE7.  I think this is just Apple pushing themselves in a new market and having more work to do.

Just to put in a little history lesson here. (A histrionics lesson doesn't appear to be as needed...)

What people call "Web 2.0" in this case is the use of two technologies DHTML and XmlHttpRequest (which were later combined with the catchier name of AJAX) both of these originated as parts of Internet Explorer (version 5.x, if memory serves).

These combined technologies were first used to support Outlook Web Access. They were implemented in Safari and Firefox a little after they were released in IE and a few years later became an "official standard"

It's odd that Apple now considers it too difficult to implement technology that's been in IE since 2002 and an "official standard" since 2006.

You have to wonder why they can manage it in their browser and in a 3rd party browser but somehow just can manage to do it in the competitor's browser with the largest market share. Odd that it's just after they did a push install of their browser.

But, hey, maybe Apple's remaining devs really are so incompetent that they just found it too hard to support IE 7 after bleeding so much talent first to Google and then to Facebook.

They could have supported IE7 easily if they just bothered to actually sit down and code the thing and bug test.

I'm a Firefox 3 user, and use various platforms and IE6 is a swear word in my office :-) But all the same everything I do which is very much dependent on AJAX methods, XML and quite intricate layouts works fine in IE6 - it's not perfect but it's 99.9% tight aesthetic wise.

On IE7 it works without too much hassle.

I think it's pretty shoddy on Apple's part to play the "IE isn't quite..." card especially on IE7 which is for the most part just fine, just slower than Fx 3 I find.

@lisserentiy.....

Why does hotmail require IE6 or FireFox, why wont I get the "full experience" with Safari???

Why cant I only get the "Premium experience" in OWA 5.5/2003/2007 with ONLY IE and not FF or Safari???

Why do some features not work with Sharepoint unless you use IE???

Why when I go to look up the Vista hardware compatibility list, does it require only IE???? winqual.microsoft.com/.../BrowserNotSupported.html  I mean maybe people are thinking about switching from OS X to Vista and want to maker sure their hardware is going to work:)

Snakedoctor:

They're business decisions. With limited resources you can only do so much, so in most cases it makes very little sense to support Safari.

Now, I agree with you that it sucks and I wish all platforms, but I don't like what you are implying, that it's ok for Apple to not support IE7, because Microsoft does not support Safari. I just don't think two wrongs make a right, especially in the business world where it's about growing the business and making a profit, not getting hung trying to  "prove something".

If you want an example of thinking with business acumen: Microsoft software on OS X respects platform conventions, Apple software on Windows does not. Why does Microsoft do this when Apple does it? Because Microsoft wants products that OS X users like to make money.

Don't get so defensive next time, buddy. Jesus saves.

@ggolcher....yes Jesus does save...Amen!!

First off IE does work for the most part, I cant find what does not work in my limited testing with IE on me.com

Apple can choose to go its route with IE 6/7 for a few reasons.

1.  .Mac was a Mac only product for the most part, until this update.  It will still largely be a Mac only "used" product so Safari support should be #1.

2.  Windows users can download Safari and FF3.  In comparison IE can only be used on Windows, forcing you to use Windows if you need those features I talked about (Premium OWA etc).

3. Like I said IE7 works for the most part.

4. IE8 will probably fully work since its more inline with the standards.

MS needs to support more browsers with their products or release IE for OSX/Linux.....I dont see why or how Apple needs to do more than it has.

The light bulb has lit up at Apple.  It's dawned on them that 'just good enough' is all that is ever necessary, especially when you're establishing a dominant position in a fledgling market, in this case Web 2.0 services.  Microsoft perfected the tactic and Apple (actually NeXT) learned it well, don't you think?

The readership here criticize Apple either objectively or defensively, but let's face it we're a minority of nerds.  I see lines around phone stores and Apple stores where the iPhone is being sold.  They're comprised of people who don't read the nerdy stuff and who are predominantly Windows users.

The iPhone is hot and Apple is focusing on priority one, moving them out as fast as possible.  After the dust has settled, the polishing will come.

Don't worry (or do, if that's you're bias).

@SnakeDoctor1

You're missing (or choosing to ignore) a few key facts...

Most people who use an iPod or iPhone run Windows on all their computers. A few percent use both Mac and Windows. A very tiny minority are Apple only.

Most people who use Windows use Internet Explorer 7

Apple touted Windows support as a key feature of this product even to the point of changing the product name to something less proprietary (And, ironically, more Windows ME like)

Now, put those numbers together and, if you really are looking at this from a reasonable perspective, you'll see that Apple just flat out blew it.

snakedoctor1:

If you think I was just bashing Apple and ignoring MS... lol No way. But as ggolcher says, two wrongs don't make a right in this case. Microsoft's support for other clients has never been too hot.

But then Safari's implementation of XMLHTTPRequest wasn't too hot until at least 2.0.4 of Safari. Even Yahoo's new web mail in 2006 didn't support Safari.

Safari also didn't really exist when OWA came on to the scene so it couldn't be a target, KHTML/Konqueror arguably did but XMLHttpRequest support didn't arrive in a non IE browser for some years. As for why Exchange 2007 doesn't have the same support for all browsers, I don't know. I'm not a big enough user of OWA except to say it works in Firefox but it looks better in IE. It is again rather lazy though in this day and age.

What I am saying however is that I am a one girl band, I run about 11 very popular (tens of thousands of visits a day) websites, and I have managed compatibility right across the board.

For any big corporation to default on a certain browser, where an individual can get them to play ball largely is a pretty poor show, Apple or Microsoft.

The bottom line is there is no excuse for Apple to draw the IE isn't very standards savvy line, because we know it is, but in actual fact IE7 is not that bad and rarely needs that much work, and IE6 can be made to play ball if you work hard enough.

If Apple wants this MobileMe service to take off, they're going to have to support their largest user base properly and that is whether we like it or not, Windows users and Windows users using Internet Explorer, and if things look pap in IE, they'll usually see it as an Apple problem. Not exactly idea in Apple's interests.

I'm an Apple user myself, but I also use Linux and Windows. I just think it's a poor show for what is a bang up to date new 'cloud' app that has been programmed by a team in a large corporation.

Likewise I expect better from MS with their next version of Exchange and its OWA.

In reality we have to look at OWA's and Sharepoint's major users and they are IE users, at the time it probably made little sense to invest too much time getting the thing to work in all browsers, but I do think this will change. Macs just don't have corporate penetration anything like a Windows box.

But MobileMe could be the essential companion to an iPhone or an iPod Touch, but 75% of the world still browses with IE, whether we like it or not.

Amazing the innovations that came from Microsoft in the browser when they had a competitor.  They laid the foundation for modern AJAX and "web 2.0".  And then it all went dark once they achieved windows-like share of the browser.  Microsoft isn't "evil" per-say.  They're a monopolist.  And we all can see plainly what happens to price, product quality and innovation in a market with monopoly  power.

Windows users around the world should be praying every day that Apple achieves 20% or more of the PC market, the way Firefox + Safari is achieving in the browser market.  Nothing would do more for the health of their platform.  Everyone knows this... with any honesty.  Only the hateful partisan loons like Waethorn seem to wish away Apple and their competition.  Of course, he trolls for clients in their stores, so there's a motive factor to consider in his blind hate.

@Johnpapola...

Nice conspiracy theory but...

These innovations that came "when Microsoft had a competitor" actually were developed when there really was no competitor in the browser market.

Netscape had already imploded.

Mozilla foundation was busy throwing out most of Netscape's code and starting over to get something useful built.

Apple was using IE for Macintosh and was trying to stay alive after the Microsoft bail-out.

I guess there was Opera but I doubt that was the competition you meant.

Blocking innovation with government mandates is apparently a lot more effective way to stifle innovation than conspiracy theories about "competition". But innovation seems to be bad for competitor's profit margins so blocking innovation is what's lobbied for these days.

@Mike,

That's a very interesting point.  I don't know when these particular features were added to IE, but I'll take your word for it.  Still, it's hard to argue that IE development was essentially ended after IE6 and only was re-constituted when Firefox began to show a credible threat.

As for the leveraging of government, the most insidious monopoly of them all (and the only legal one that can enforce it's decrees with guns), I'll stand by almost any critique of the abuse of regulation to harm competition.  I am a pretty hard-core libertarian after all.  What educated geek wouldn't be?

Still, my essential point I think is pretty fair and pretty broadly agreed upon.  Microsoft does it's best work when they have a strong competitor.  It's called human nature.  It's why capitalism is a success and socialism is a failure.  Competition is the best driver for improvement, productivity and innovation.

@johnpapola

The innovations that created AJAX were done in IE 4 and IE 5.

What spurred them on was not some nameless competitor but vision. Starting with BillG's "Internet Tidal Wave" memo and continuing with management knowing that there was now a new open arena to play in and letting their teams go. I know. I was there at the time.

Thinking that innovation occurs from competition is overly simplistic. As is something as simple as Capitalism vs Socialism. I'd suggest you read "What the Dormouse Said" to understand that the Personal Computer revolution actually came out of the New Left of the 1960s and 1970s.

Oh, and most educated geeks I know rejected modern "Libertarianism" when they saw it was only the old big business Republicans with a tolerance for repeal of drug laws. If they support libertarianism at all, support a more traditional version that rejects state recognition of corporations. (Something that horrifies most Libertarian Party types who expect the state to be just big enough protect their business interests)

The Technology types I've seen who support the Libertarian Party variant are usually marketing types who have a goal of selling out to VC and retiring on their options and not geeks who want to build technology.

But that's way off topic.

I think XMLHTTPRequest emerged in IE 5/5.5, but it's possible to do AJAX like activity with an iframe which emerged with IE4, I think Google Maps still uses this method rather than XMLHTTPRequest, if it doesn't now it certainly used to.

So this would peg this in around 1999, which is when MS had a very dominant position with IE on Windows and Mac, Nutscrape was left for dead and Opera was a paid for browser so need I say anymore?

That said though, IE5.5 and 6 aren't exactly distant cousins and are pretty closely related and certainly the underpinning Trident HTML engine (mshtml.dll) isn't that much different from 5.5 to 6.

Anyway I digress...

@mikegalos,

I'm not ignoring the role of vision, or drive, or love of your work in the creation of new innovation.  But you simply cannot downplay the role that competition plays in keeping people on their toes and motivated.  As someone that works in a large organization, I can tell you that competitive spirit is essential.  Not singular, but essential.

As for your politics... I'm thinking this isn't the forum to go any further in this debate.  I was making a simple statement, not intending to open this door.  You appear to be quite farther to the left economically than I am... and that's fine.  You probably believe the internet's success is an example of government invest done right... where as I believe that the absolute, decentralized chaos of the market that allowed the peering system to come about post ARPANET is more important to that story.

I'd prefer to avoid quasi ad-hominem attacks about ideology as you're leaning toward with your rebuke of libertarianism as a "old big business GOP deal with legalized drugs".  I happen to fall into the more fundamentally structural critique of corporate personhood as well as the elimination of all corporate subsidies (and corporate-lead regulations aimed more at harming competitors and raising barriers to entry than helping the individual citizen).

indeed.  Off topic.  We'd have a fun time over coffee.

I'm not slamming MS here, really.  I'm just stating the obvious.  They do best when threatened by a competitor.  That's just the facts.  Those threats bring out the vision.  They keep everyone focused.

@johnpapola

"I'm not ignoring the role of vision, or drive, or love of your work in the creation of new innovation."

Actually, that's exactly what you're doing. And you are presenting it as a truism that doesn't require anything to back it up.

"But you simply cannot downplay the role that competition plays in keeping people on their toes and motivated. "

You bet I can.

In 20+ years in the PC business, I've never seen "Competition improve the breed" as the truism goes. What does, and in my experience, the only thing that does, is talented people who see the ability to see their work and visions implemented and having effect in the real world.

Competition as a motivator works well on people doing maintenence work in established fields and it works on B-school types and it works on sales reps. It does NOT work well as a motivator in new technology creative workers except when it means that the work they are doing might not ship. Aside from that, shipping the vision and doing things that are cool are the motivators.

That's a key area that managers blow when they assume that their developers are motivated by the same things that they are.

On the question of Libertarinism vs libertarianism, if you believe that goverment should treat a corporation as a legal fiction then perhaps it's time to rethink the role of government.

The flaw I've seen in the "pro-corporation" variant is that they seem to think the role of government is to be big enough to protect their business interests but too small to protect their partners and customers. And that doesn't fit with any consistent definition of philosophy.

Again, there are lots of libertarians who wildly disagree with that variant and I do not lump them together.

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