We've moving to a plug-in-free world, the company says

Jul 3, 2015 12:46 GMT  ·  By

With the new Edge browser introduced in Windows 10, Microsoft is trying not only to provide users with a more secure and reliable solution for browsing the web but also to contribute to an interoperable browser world that would make the web faster no matter the app people are using.

As the other browsers are moving to a plug-in-free approach, Microsoft is trying to do the same with Edge, so today the software giant has announced that Silverlight is no longer a reliable solution for companies that previously used it.

In a long blog post detailing the advantages of HTML5, Microsoft says that Silverlight made sense a long time ago, when plug-ins were needed for rich content on the web, but in today's web industry, such a thing is no longer mandatory and alternative solutions already exist.

“We encourage companies that are using Silverlight for media to begin the transition to DASH/MSE/CENC/EME based designs and to follow a single, DRM-interoperable encoding work flow enabled by CENC. This represents the most broadly interoperable solution across browsers, platforms, content and devices going forward,” the company goes on to detail.

Microsoft Edge in Windows 10

Needless to say, Microsoft Edge is one of the pioneers of this transition from Silverlight to a plug-in free world, and the new browser fully supports DASH/MSE/CENC/EME media.

“Now, as the old plug-in models are being removed, replacements for them are needed. For media, a great forward looking replacement can be based on DASH, MSE, EME and CENC,” Redmond adds.

With Microsoft Edge, the company is also giving up on ActiveX, an old technology that was used for Internet Explorer, which allowed for additional website features and technologies.

Since there still are plenty of websites using ActiveX controls, despite the obvious security risks, of course, Redmond will continue to offer Internet Explorer as a backup solution to consumers, trying to make sure that all websites can be loaded correctly in Windows 10.

Edge will be the default browser, however, and Internet Explorer will be hidden within the operating system's Start menu.