http://www.crn.com/sections/breakingnews/breakingnews.jhtml?articleId=185300343&cid=CRNBreakingNews
IE Changes On The Way
By Gregg Keizer, TechWeb.com
1:35 PM EDT Tue. Apr. 11, 2006
Microsoft Corp. will release Tuesday a security update for Internet
Explorer that will also change how users interact with Web sites.
Some sites that rely on popular ActiveX controls, such as Apple's
QuickTime, RealNetworks' RealPlayer, and Adobe's Flash and Acrobat,
are likely to give users fits.
The change, which Microsoft has been warning Web site developers about
since December 2005, was made to abide by a ruling in a patent
infringement lawsuit Microsoft lost in 2003 to the University of
California and its startup, Eolas Technologies Inc.
With the changes rolled out in a mandatory security fix, any IE user
who downloads and installs Tuesday's security patches -- either
manually or via an automated system such as Microsoft Update -- will
likely need to modify how they use those sites which haven't been
rewritten.
What should users expect?
--- By default, IE will now consider embedded ActiveX content as
inactive. Thus on unmodified sites, ActiveX content will not run. In
other words, music won't play or a Flash component won't launch.
--- To activate an interactive ActiveX control, move the mouse over
the content -- which now will be boxed -- and click on the pop-up tool
tip dialog.
--- Alternately, users can press the Tab key until the focus is set on
the content's box, then press either the spacebar or Enter key to
activate.
--- Each control on each page must be manually activated in this way.
Adobe has posted a short Flash-based demo that shows the activation
process. (Ironic note: If you're using IE after the Tuesday update has
been applied, you must active the Flash demo manually.)
___________________________________
Microsoft has acknowledged that not all Web site developers will have
modified their pages to account for IE's new behavior -- the easiest
way for developers to sidestep user activation is to call the ActiveX
controls via JavaScript -- and so will also release a patch on Tuesday
to delay the changes.
"We will create a "compatibility patch" (deployed like a hotfix) that
allows customers to turn off the change for a limited period of time
through the June update cycle (2nd Tuesday in June)," wrote Mike Nash,
Microsoft's head of security, in a blog posting last month.
The patch will put off the activation requirements until June 13.
"[This is] to provide time for enterprise customers to resolve
compatibility issues," added Nash.
--
Blue skies.
Dan Rossi
Carnegie Mellon University.
E-Mail: [log in to unmask]
Tel: (412) 268-9081
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