Today's web technology is developed all over the world, by aspiring programmers everywhere. These developers use open source web browsers to test their products and eventually release the latest and greatest web plugins and interfaces. Internet Explorer as you know is a licensed trademark under Microsoft. The best developers do not work for Microsoft. With that said, the programming guys at MS are usually the last to catch up to the latest web developments causing Internet Explorer not to be compatible with with the latest and greatest until months later. IE has monopolized the web by being shipped with windows as the default web browser and focuses more on security than compatibility. That would be fine if IE updates were more current and security wasn't overbearingly abnoxious. It's almost axiomatically impossible for IE to be the number one web browser due to these issues.
Internet Explorer 8's new security features make it more of a hassle to use than ever. Just opening the browser for the first time forces users to change their current settings and alter settings they have no clue about anyway. Not only that, but I'm tired of seeing (BLOPE)"The content of this page is unsafe, (BLOPE)Click here to download this activeX controller, (BLOPE) Internet Explorer has blocked this download =D, (BLOPE) You can't open this popup. (BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)(BLOPE)
...BTW, we can't display this content corretly because we don't yet support that style of CSS.
So Shawn... What browser should we use? Well, here are my personal suggestions.
#1) - OPERA - Simply the fastest and easiest browser out there.
•Much less (if not none at all) vulnerability to IE exploits.
•Stereo browsing. Open several windows simultaneously without cluttering your desktop.
•Some advanced privacy features, like automatically deleting all new cookies on exit, or suppressing referers.
•Save and restore “sessions” (in short, memorize all currently open URLs).
•Search on amazon and search engines with a few key strokes (e.g., use “g keyword” as ‘URL’ to search on Google).
•You can redefine the keys completely.
•Spell checking for edit boxes [just remember to use them :)].
•Open a complete bookmark branch with one click, which means all pages opening in the chosen bookmark category simultaneously.
#2) FIREFOX - The world's biggest open source browser.
• Originality
• In the most recent version of IE 8, you'll find a lot of cool new features - unfortunately, almost all of these features have been in Firefox for years now. With Firefox, you'll have the latest and best features straight out of the box.
• Cleaner Interface
• Firefox's interface is clean, and easy to use. Additionally, you have the ability to customize the navigation to just about any specification, as well as easily implementing thousands of new themes to personalize Firefox.
• Easy to Use
• If you know how to use Internet Explorer, you'll know how to use Firefox - all of the keyboard shortcuts are the same, and Firefox will import your bookmarks and settings for you, meaning no learning curve for you. Just download and surf.
• Free and Open
• Firefox is completely free and supported by a dedicated community of developers to constantly make it better. since it's "open source", that means that anyone can make improvements to the software and could possibly make it into the next release of Firefox.
• Customization with Plugins and Extensions
• The real power of Firefox lies in it's added functionality through the use of 'extensions'. Thousands of developers program small additional tools for the browser that allow you to do almost whatever your heart desires, and make your life easier.
There are other good browsers out there, but these two are my personal favs. Google Chrome is making a pretty big splash but I personally don't care for it...
