E.U. Regulators Seek Workable Solution In Browser Ballot

[engine]

E.U. Regulators Seek Workable Solution In Browser Ballot [reuters.com]

European Union antitrust regulators are seeking to ensure that an offer by U.S. software company Microsoft to give users the chance to choose rivals' Web browsers was workable for consumers and its rivals.

Microsoft proposed to the European Commission in July to install a ballot screen that would allow users to set up rival browsers on its latest Windows operating system, a move which could end a decade-long dispute with the EU executive.

A confidential Commission questionnaire obtained by Reuters showed regulators were concerned whether users would understand they were being offered a choice of browsers and whether they would actually use the ballot screen.

[bill]

I'm afraid that in reality users simply don't care about this issue and they'll probably be confused by this process. Anyone who is truly concerned about this issue will be savvy enough to install their own choice of browser.

[kaled]

All that's required is...

1) A set of checkboxes, one for each browser (all ticked by default).
2) A combobox (drop-down selection) with one choice for each browser.

The checkboxes should specify which browsers to install and the combobox should specify which browser to use as the default (this should be initialized to "none" so that the user has to make a positive choice). The sensible place to put this would be to make it a control-panel applet. It can then be called after the time, locale, and keyboard settings have been selected. This represents about two days work plus testing. (One day for the control-panel applet and one day for the installation adjustments - that's being generous.)

I wish all my problems were this easy!

Kaled.