When Microsoft announced they were porting Microsoft Edge to Linux there were three reactions. The first reaction was meeeh who cares. The second reaction was "NOOOOOO NEVER!!!!!! I WONT TAINT MY LINUX SYSTEM WITH MICRO$OFT SHIT!!!!!" The third reaction was optimism with a pinch of skepticism. This is not the first time Microsoft has ported its web browsers to an alternative Operating System platform. Microsoft had IE on Macintosh and they had also ported IE to Unix. I used IE for Unix and while it worked great it looked out of place and that is because when it came to the UI elements not a lot of work was done on that front and it didn't last long before Microsoft quit.
Now enter Microsoft Edge. Microsoft decided that they were going to change the underlying engine to a Chromium base. Chromium is the open source engine and browser that lives in Chrome and Chrome OS. Microsoft released their final version on Mac OS, iOS, Android and on Windows and promised a port to Linux. The beta version of that dropped last Oct. While I dabbled in it I recently started using Microsoft Edge on Linux full time and I have to say. It is pretty great. It is extremely fast, uses the same extensions that you find on Chrome and uses native hardware acceleration. If you are using Facebook messenger or Google Meet it automatically chooses your input devices which is a vast improvement over its earlier betas. Microsoft Edge for Linux also allows users to take full advantage of Microsoft's services. If you are an IT shop that uses both platforms, Windows and Linux, Microsoft Edge for Linux also is a great tool for interoperability. The one improvement you can take note of is the speed. Microsoft Edge is perhaps the fastest Chromium based browser I have used. Now, there are some downsides. Netflix performance needs some improvements in Edge for Linux. Another downfall is that its still only a Beta product. For some people that will be a turnoff and there has been no statement from Microsoft when it will reach gold status.
Do I think the mass of Linux distributors will move to bundle Edge in lieu of Firefox and Chrome? No. In the Linux community there is still a lot of hesitancy when it comes to Microsoft and per past behavior Microsoft can get a little wishy washy on its nix support. IE for Unix was a great product. The only problem is that product was short lived. But, I'm optimistic because this is a new Microsoft. Satya Nadella GETS open source and he GETS user preference and he understands that not everyone will want to use Microsoft products. Working with a lot of clients who use mixed environments Powershell, Visual Studio CODE, Teams and SQL Server have alleviated a lot of pain and I can imagine Microsoft Edge for Linux will also be a huge product for those clients. In the high order bit, would we as a Linux distributor make Microsoft Edge our default browser? Probably. I look at software like this. Who makes the best tools and the most polished software? I do not get in religious fights. I would need some assurances that Microsoft Edge will not disappear in 9 months. We currently bundle CODE and Powershell in Xandros and Powershell in Linspire. People who want to use Firefox or Chrome can always just uninstall Edge and use whatever browser they like.
Until next time....
