Why doesn't Windows include native PDF reader support?

I agree that this is an interesting question/concept, and would like to see it
happen, if possible. Love to hear your opinions on this.
Please see:

http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00001943.html

 

From a security point of view, there would be absolute no gain on this.

As someone commented in f-secure weblog:

" Preview.app in Mac OS X has had its fair share of vulnerabilities: http://news.softpedia.com/news/Renowned-Hacker-Finds-20-Flaws-in-Apple-s-Preview-app-137926.shtml "

Therefore, a PDF Reader built-in in IE would have pretty much as many vulnerabilities as the Mac OS's native PDF Reader. Maybe more, because the scrutiny would be more intense.

Also, we all know that Microsoft is slow at fixing all vulnerabilities in IE. The IE Team focus on fixing all critical ones leaving several less critical ones unfixed. Just see Secunia report: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/21625/

From that, anyone can conclude: if Microsoft included a native PDF Reader in IE, it would probably end up with more unfixed vulnerabilities than the current situation IE + Adobe Reader or other alternative PDF Reader.

Remember that Adobe fixes ALL reported vulnerabilities in Adobe Reader, never leaving them unfixed (even not critical ones) for who knows how many time. Other PDF vendors also tend to fix any reported vulnerability, since their focus is PDF software.

Also remember that what I talked here was only the security point of view.

Other things, like Microsoft and Adobe relationship, could be shacked up with this act - like Apple prohibiting Flash on some of its platforms can result in some reaction from Adobe that will affect Apple negatively (not saying that this move by Apple wasn't a good thing).

 

Thank you for your response, guest, your analysis and reasoning convinces me that you are correct. I was also mainly thinking from a security
viewpoint.