I read an article over on A List apart today regarding Microsoft’s proposed fix for the internet because they broke it when IE7 came out.  I respect all the authors on that site but I have to say that this article just got my blood boiling and left me feeling disappointed and let down by Microsoft yet again.

Just to recap, if you aren’t already aware, Microsoft claim the web broke when IE7 came out because web pages failed.  Here’s a news flash for Microsoft: the web was fine it’s your damn non compliant ‘re-write the rules our way’ browser that broke!
I am seriously getting sick to the back teeth of Microsoft, I liked to think of myself as not entirely anti-Microsoft having actually developed one of their products in a past job but seriously they take the biscuit.

What has me so annoyed this time is their proposed ‘fix’ to ensure IE8 is standards compliant and to avoid breaking web pages.  What is this magical solution?  adherence to the standards already defined by the W3C? Well sort of but you’ll need to use a new meta tag to target particular browsers and versions of those browsers to get your page to render properly like so:

<meta http-equiv=”X-UA-Compatible” content=”IE=8;FF=3″ />

Those of you on the same page as me here will already be thinking about the horrors of browser sniffing.  In a world where we have compliant browsers rendering pages just fine thank you without the aid of a cobbled together safety net, Firefox, Opera and Safari anyone?, we can but wonder why the hell Microsoft are so intent on making it our problem to ‘fix’ our web sites so they render on their browser.

Well stuff that for a game of soldiers how about making IE8 fully compliant and adding the option for a switch for those who need to dial down the standards instead?  If this is progress them I’m afraid Microsoft have once again lost the plot.

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I get more convinced every day that Valve Software and the Steam Network are the best value for money a gamer can get.
There are some new updates coming soon for TeamFortress2 including new achievements to aim for and a cool new map with a new game type.  Goldrush introduces a new challenge.  the blu team must escort a mining cart through the map, the more blu players around the cart the faster it will move, if a red player gets near the cart the cart stops.  this is going to be a cool new addition to TF2 and I’m looking forward to playing this map I can tell you.  Frantic battles galore:0)

Normally I play on the [Q] clan’s servers as these are superb servers and if you donate, you get a reserved slot and immunity to the balancing that moves you from team to team during the game.  £10 for a three month subscription is superb value and they update their custom maps regular.  There’s also great comradeship on these servers, not to mention [Q]’s own set of stats that you can now view off their website.

A friend introduced me to some cool custom maps on the Wireplay servers:

Wireplay.co.uk TF2 <11> You Gotta Be Kidding
194.154.191.6:27027
mapcycle
variety of control point maps