Started evaluating CESM 3.0 and discovered that the web admin console requires Microsoft Silverlight.
My problem is that I’m in a mixed technology environment and Silverlight isn’t supported (well or at all) on Linux and Apple Mac … there are even issues with Silverlight on some Microsoft OS platforms (Win 8 ).
So, on reading a bit more about various Comodo products I see that Comodo is proudly touting Silverlight use (dependency) in several products besides CESM.
What’s the fascination with Silverlight ?
Why can’t you just use HTML5 ?
Comodo has some attractive technology that I could use, but this Silverlight dependency is problematic.
lol, no point in starting a religious flame war over it.
I would like to see HTML5 of course, if something works in a standard web browser there’s really no need for any kind of app.
I simply threw in the Windows app idea because I know there’s an already existing Windows Phone app for a prior version of ESM, hasn’t been updated in forever.
I’ve been able to run ESM Console on Ubuntu in Firefox, with the help of Pipelight package (Wine environment suited to run Flash/Unity3D/Silverlight plugins). Works pretty well, the only issue was to install self-signed cert properly, but this is required on Windows also. One guy told me ESM Console works on Mac pretty well too, as soon as you install certificate properly. I can write a how-to if anybody is interested.
I literally just purchased ESM for 2 years for 100 endpoints, to then have the chrome 45 update come and rain on my parade. Annoyance to both my users and my ability to manage this thing conveniently. This software just went from really nice to “one of those guys” that insists on using IE for everything >:(
How is it that HTML5 was in the works in 2013 for release “by the end of the year” and we’re still trying to grasp at workarounds for silverlight today?
First of all, thank you for the comment and feedback. We love our members who devoted their time to improve us and our products.
Your request has been captured and well understood. However, the request for dropping Silverlight doesn’t seem feasible at this time. Let me give you a little bit inside about how we see it.
What are the problems:
[ol]- We know that Silverlight is not coming with default browser installations and require an extra mile to install on top of browsers.
Chrome doesn’t support Silverlight
Edge doesn’t have Silverlight support
We mentioned to have it on the roadmap for a while ago[/ol]
Are they really problems?
[ol]- While it would have been better to have all products running on all native browsers without any dependency, it is not reality for ESM right now. It would have been very high priority and already implemented if this dependency was on a consumer product or on the shoulder of all end users, but it is not. Only admin needs to go through this extra mile and we trust on you guys, admins, to go over it for the greater good (Best protection over your endpoints).
We also like Chrome! We like Chromodo or IceDragon more but it might be a taste issue however, as users, we are using a lot of specific apps to do specific tasks. Again, it is you, admin needs to use another browser (Firefox, IE, IceDragon, Dragon, Etc… -Best Internet Browser 2022 | Free Secure Web Browser) to check on ESM portal once a while or when needed. The point is, there are easy alternatives to do the job.
Yes, Edge is a new project that is under development and progress. They didn’t place all extensions yet but they are checking the market needs and shaping their product. We don’t know what the future will bring to that product.
Yes, we would like to move away from Silverlight and migrate to a more fancy technology like HTML5. However, whenever we came to the decision point, we checked the roadmap items / customer request and compared the value in between. Is it really going to add a big value to the endpoint protection (core of the product and why we are discussing all of these topics) or do we have some other items with the same or less effort that our community would benefit more. So far, due to the alternatives and above reasons, we came up with more beneficial improvements and spent the resources for those. That is why you didn’t see it implemented yet. [/ol]
Bonus item: In addition to the browser alternatives, if you wish to have the same level end-point protection over cloud server and with MDM capabilities, you can and should try our Comodo Device Management solution (https://dm.comodo.com/). It might not have every report or configuration item that you get used to from ESM but it has an amazing interface, functionality and no dependency to a browser (for especially the browser fans )
I just use Internet Explorer and have added the url for ESM Console to my Favourites.
It’s the only think I use IE for TBH.
Everything else I do with Chromodo.