Posted: Tue 31 October 2006

The Big Browser Showdown

So which side do you sit on, and indeed should you sit on, in the second round of the web browser wars?

Microsoft has made publicly available the next big update in its popular Internet Explorer (IE) web browser software - IE7. Hot on its heels, the Mozilla Foundation have released version 2.0 of its widely acclaimed Firefox web browser.

But which is the better of the two? And does your website display correctly in Microsoft's new baby? We'll cut through the hype and help you work out which of the two web browser heavyweights deserves to be your window onto the Internet...

First things first - Internet Explorer 7 is the much needed replacement for the horrendous Internet Explorer 6 web browser. It is touted as being more secure, which while not a hard task to accomplish given IE6s "gates-open" attitude to security, is obviously the most important aspect of this new browser. The user-interface has been revamped in IE7, and features that other browsers have had for years, such as tabbed-browsing, are now in place.

Microsoft are having to play catch-up. They have been losing ground to other web browsers, particularly Firefox, in recent years which have offered a more secure browsing experience along with features lacking from IE6, such as searching Google direct from the browser and the aforementioned tabbed-browsing.

All of this adds up for a huge release for Microsoft - IE7 is a huge leap beyond IE6. A much bigger step than the difference between Firefox 1.5 and Firefox 2.0 - the latest Firefox release.

The new Firefox web browser is more evolution than revolution. And rightly so - the Firefox web browser was so far beyond IE6 it was laughable. Firefox 2.0 therefore has very little in the way of noticeable changes from the previous 1.5 version. Welcome additions include performance improvements "under the hood" and an inline spell checker, that will check spelling as you type into forms on websites.

So which browser is the daddy? For the time-being I'd say Firefox. While IE7 has done a lot to catch up on the features-front, Firefox has been doing them longer - as such the implementation of these features is somewhat slicker.

On the security side of things, whilst IE7 should be much more secure than IE6, it is still an unknown quantity. I'd prefer to wait a few months until any gaping security holes are exposed (or not) before committing.

But this is not to diminish the importance of this release from Microsoft. IE7 has narrowed the ground between the browsers, and may well surpass Firefox in coming releases.

Also worth mentioning is that it has been reported that Microsoft will be including IE7 as part of its security update later this month. That means if you have automatic security updates enabled you may open your web browser one day to be greeted by IE7 - and once IE7 is installed, you can't roll back to IE6. So be warned.

Finally, I mentioned at the beginning of this article "does your website display correctly in Microsoft's new baby". Microsoft have changed the rendering engine in IE7. This means that a website that displayed just fine in IE6 could be a mangled mess in IE7. This shouldn't be an issue for a properly coded website; and even in the cases where it is you'll often find it only afflicts particular elements of a page.

Still - it'd be worth making sure. If Microsoft's predictions are accurate, this time next year 85% of web users will be using IE7.

Get in touch with us now, and we'll make sure your website it tip-top in IE7.

Happy browsing!

By: Simon
http://www.eazytiger.net
Web design and ecommerce Leicester

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