I'm not sure that's something Microsoft can do. See for example the amount of XP deployments out there. Tell people that it's unsupported, no security updates, whatever. Enterprise customers and home customers who are terrified of change will not do it.
Part of me wishes MS forced updates like these. Sure it would probably break a few ancient mission critical ActiveX apps, and my god the outcry would be immense and furious, but it would be better for everyone in the long run. Better for software developers who can stop coding around the foibles of ancient versions of software, better for Microsoft who can devote resources to the newest things, and better for the internet at large not being subject to Microsoft's old shitty browsers.
It's kind of like ripping off a band aid that gets stickier as time goes by. Pull the damn thing off already and get it over with.
> Part of me wishes MS forced updates like these.
> Sure it would probably break a few ancient
> mission critical ActiveX apps, and
> my god the outcry would be immense and furious,
> but it would be better for everyone in the long run
YOU tell the famous doctors in hospitals you're going to break the medical-imaging app they use that depends on IE6. I'M not telling them that. Seriously. It's not as simple as ripping off a band-aid.
I never said it was simple. In fact, it'll be anything but. On top of that, what the hell is a life-critical app doing connected to the internet and pulling down windows updates anyways?
What I would do optimally is put down a drop dead date, say two years in the future. "On this date, any computers connected to Windows Update directly will be updated to IE10. This is not optional".
Vendors then have two years to get their poop in a group. If they still don't get it done, customers can complain to the vendors. What are they going to do, migrate to Linux?
Part of me wishes MS forced updates like these. Sure it would probably break a few ancient mission critical ActiveX apps, and my god the outcry would be immense and furious, but it would be better for everyone in the long run. Better for software developers who can stop coding around the foibles of ancient versions of software, better for Microsoft who can devote resources to the newest things, and better for the internet at large not being subject to Microsoft's old shitty browsers.
It's kind of like ripping off a band aid that gets stickier as time goes by. Pull the damn thing off already and get it over with.