tech – text/plain

Captive Portals

When you join a public WiFi network, sometimes you’ll notice that you have to accept “Terms of Use” or provide a password or payment to use the network. Your browser opens or navigates to a page that shows the network’s legal terms or web log on form, you fill it out, and you’re on yourContinue reading “Captive Portals”

“Batteries-Included” vs “Bloated”

Fundamentals are invisible. Features are controversial. One of the few common complaints against Microsoft Edge is that “It’s bloated– there’s too much stuff in it!” A big philosophical question for designers of popular software concerns whether the product should include features that might not be useful for everyone or even a majority of users. ThereContinue reading ““Batteries-Included” vs “Bloated””

Microsoft Edge Tips and Tricks

Last Updated: June 3, 2022. The intent of this post is to capture a list of non-obvious features of the browser that might be useful to you. Q: How do I find the tab playing audio? It’s cool that Microsoft Edge shows the volume icon in the tab playing music and I can click toContinue reading “Microsoft Edge Tips and Tricks”

Losing your cookies

“My browser lost its cookies” has long been one of the most longstanding Support complaints in the history of browsers. Unfortunately, the reason that it has been such a longstanding issue is that it’s not the result of a single problem, and if the problem is intermittent (as it often is), troubleshooting the root causeContinue reading “Losing your cookies”

Thoughts on Impact

In this post, I talk a lot about Microsoft, but it’s not only applicable to Microsoft. It’s once again “Connect Season” at Microsoft, a biannual-ish period when Microsoft employees are tasked with filling out a document about their core priorities, key deliverables, and accomplishments over the past year, concluding with a look ahead to theirContinue reading “Thoughts on Impact”

Unexpectedly HTTPS?

While I’m a firm believer that every site should be using HTTPS, sadly, not every site is yet doing so. Looking at Chrome data, today around 92% of navigations are HTTPS: …and the pages loaded account for around 95% of browsing time: Browsers are working hard to get these numbers up, by locking down non-secureContinue reading “Unexpectedly HTTPS?”

Chromium Internals: PAK Files

Web browsers are made up of much more than the native code (mostly compiled C++) that makes up their .exe and .dll files. A significant portion of the browser’s functionality (and bulk) is what we’d call “resources”, which include things like: Images (at two resolutions, regular and “high-DPI”) Localized UI Strings HTML, JavaScript, and CSSContinue reading “Chromium Internals: PAK Files”

Chromium’s DNS Cache

From the mailbag: Q: How long does Chromium cache hostnames? I know a user can clear the hostname cache using the Clear host cache button on about://net-internals/#dns, but how long it will take for the cache to be removed if no manual action is taken? After changing DNS records on my server, nslookup from aContinue reading “Chromium’s DNS Cache”

The “Magical” Back Button

From the mailbag: Eric, when I am on bing.com in Edge or Chrome and I type https://portal.microsoft.com in the address bar, I go through some authentication redirections and end up on the Office website. If I then click the browser’s Back button, I go back to bing.com. But if I try the same thing inContinue reading “The “Magical” Back Button”

Edge/Chrome Policy Registry Entries

One of the more common problems reported by Enterprises is that certain Edge/Chrome policies do not seem to work properly when the values are written to the registry. For instance, when using the about:policy page to examine the browser’s view of the applied policy, the customer might complain that a policy value they’ve entered inContinue reading “Edge/Chrome Policy Registry Entries”