The Browser War

5 Aug 2005

There are mainly three browsers for the Windows platform

Microsoft Internet Explorer
Mozilla Firefox
Opera

Though there are other browsers most of them use either the Internet Explorer engine or Mozilla. So we only need to talk about these three.

Internet Explorer

All of us are familiar with the Microsoft product. It is installed with Windows. But many hackers proved that Internet Explorer is buggy and therefore not very safe to use. Microsoft released Service Pack2 and claims that all bugs are fixed.

Advantages

Most of the web pages and web sites are optimized for Internet Explorer (IE).
Comes bundled with the Microsoft OS. User don’t need to go through another installation
Most of the users are familiar with the interface and therefore it is easy to use. (Well! There are also people who believes the other way)
Many plug-ins such as Flash, Cool 360, VRML etc are available
HTML page saving is efficient. (It creates a subdirectory for dependency files)

Disadvantages

Many security holes are found in Internet Explorer without Service Pack2
No Tabbed browsing. That is each page is opened in separate windows. (Some skinned browsers based on IE engine supports tabbed browsing. Eg: NeoPlanet)
When compared to other browsers, it is not very feature rich.
The page rendering is also slow when compared to the other two browsers
The system will be unstable if you open many browser windows.
It is crime to modify Internet Explorer in anyway because it is proprietary software – Not Open Source
Losing popularity

Future

It is a Microsoft product. So it will stay here
Internet Explorer 7 promises new features which also includes Tabbed Browsing and News Reader

Mozilla Firefox

This open source browser is gaining astonishing popularity. The web site claims more than 75 millions of downloads so far. This is really encouraging to the open source community. It is undoubtedly one of the fastest browsers. There are many plug-ins written for Firefox including tabbed browsing.

Advantages

Fast rendering of pages
Many plug-ins and add on features are available such as download managers, tabbed browsing, popup blockers etc.
More safe than IE
You are welcome to modify the software because it is from the Open Source Community

Disadvantages

Some plug-ins that are available for IE are not available for Firefox.
You need to install it manually (Installation is very easy and smooth)

Future

It is here to stay!
The future versions may have many more features bundled

Opera

They call it as the ‘fastest browser in the planet’. May be opposed by the Firefox fans. But it is surely the most feature rich browser. With a small download (Only 5 MB without Java Runtimes) it will change the way you browse.

Advantages

The most feature rich browser
Tabbed browsing. You can open as many child windows as you like. The system will be stable.
Fast rendering (may come 2nd to firefox)
Comes bundled with a download manager, news reader, email client, Password wanding etc
Supports voice browsing (With opera 8.0 and above and you also need to download another installation)
It is very easy to use once you become familiar with the interface
You can search in many search engines
You can control the display of images without going to the settings page
Built in popup control
You can save sessions.
The most popular browser for mobiles

Disadvantages

It is not completely free. The free version shows advertisements. (you can select the type of ads you want to receive)
HTML page saving is not very efficient. (Everything will be saved in the selected folder )
You need to install it manually.
Not Open source

Future

It is staying here for a long period and has a good reputation among users and will remain as one of the best browsers.
It will definitely add more revolutionary features as they have done previously

Final Verdict

Based on speed: Firefox > Opera > IE (i.e Firefox is best and Opera comes second in a very slight margin )

Based on Features: Opera > Firefox > IE (i.e Opera wins here without any doubt)

What you should do?

You must change to either Mozilla Firefox or Opera (The ad supported version is also better than IE).

Links:

“If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.”

This article is written by me and the views expressed are solely mine. You may send your feedback or queries to hafees.s@gmail.com

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