[rbyers]

Of course Microsoft has now shown the DO value compatibility enough to implement Touch Events, and is even one of the most active members in the Touch Events community group working to improve Touch Events in the W3C.

[mbrubeck]

Also worth noting, for those who don't already know, that Apple has not participated in any of the W3C efforts to standardize Pointer Events or Touch Events.

In fact, Apple worked to hinder the standardization and implementation of Touch Events, by applying for patents on the API and refusing to license them under the W3C patent policy. So it's a bit rich for Apple to criticize other browsers for not implementing an API that Apple was trying to keep proprietary. (Or to chastise other vendors about compatibility when they won't even participate in the relevant standards groups.)

[camhenlin]

Please show documentation where Apple refused to license under W3C patent policy. From everything that I have seen, things went more like this: Apple was doing due diligence and reported their patents to the W3C. The W3C then abandoned the recommendation process at that time without pursuing patent licensing discussions of any kind with Apple.

[bsimpson]

As someone who's been using Wacom tablets since before the iPad existed, one of the nice things about Pointer Events is that they provide native support for every pointer-based input device. The only way to utilize a tablet on the web before was either

a) through mouse emulation, or

b) with a barely maintained proprietary plugin from Wacom that only worked in JS, at a time when most rich apps were in Flash.

Pressure and tilt on the web will enable a new class of applications that progressively enhance on hardware that's barely been an afterthought until now.

[integraton]

As far as I can see, touch events are not yet supported in IE: http://caniuse.com/#feat=touch

And also note that the posting on the webkit list is from 2012.

[mbrubeck]

IE11 for Windows Phone supports Touch Events; IE11 for Windows desktop does not. (It's true that at the time of that email, neither did.)

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2014/07/31/the-mobile-web...

The latest IE "tech preview" release supports Touch Events on all platforms, and so do Project Spartan preview builds.