Google stopped supporting IE8 from November 15

This decision will have a significant impact on Windows XP - the operating system cannot run IE9 and the upcoming IE10.

In mid-November 2012, Google will stop supporting Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) browser to access its online services and applications, meaning that it will stop supporting multiple Windows XP users.

"IE10 will be released on October 26, 2012, and soon after, on November 15, 2012, we will not continue to support IE8 anymore," on Friday 14 September 2012, Google wrote. in a blog post. " After this date, IE8 users accessing Google Apps services will see a message requesting browser upgrade."

Because IE8 is Microsoft's latest browser running on Windows XP, and because Google previously "abandoned" E7 (in July 2011) and IE6 (in January 2010) - two other versions are also running on XP - So this move significantly affects Windows XP users who are using IE.

Neither IE9 (released by Microsoft in March 2011) nor IE10 (due to be released with Windows 8 by the end of October 2012) will not run on Windows XP.

 

Photo: Gizmodo

After November 15, 2012, users running IE8 may have difficulty with some features in Google Apps. And as before, many other services and websites - including Gmail and Google Calendar - can also be affected. Applications may stop working completely in IE8.

Google's policy is to support only the current version of a browser, and its preceding version.

Last year, when Google said it would stop supporting IE7, it only accounted for 7% of all browsers used worldwide, according to web analytics company Net Applications . But IE8 is different. IE8 is the most widely used browser version in the world in August 2012, with a 25% market share. Among those running one of the many different versions of IE, nearly half - 47% - ran IE8 in August 2012.

IE8 users, especially those running Windows XP, can switch to another browser, like the most recent versions of Firefox (Mozilla), Chrome (Google) or Opera (Opera Software's). to run Google Apps.

Google Apps' plan to end this support will not affect access to Google's search website when using older browsers.