Redmondmag on Dumping IE 442
nSignIfikaNt writes "Here is yet another article discussing options to using IE. This one is from redmondmag.com who claims to be the independent voice of the microsoft IT community."
"I don't believe in sweeping social change being manifested by one person, unless he has an atomic weapon." -- Howard Chaykin
should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Insightful)
And besides, IE is not even an option for anyone serious about, well, serious about anything.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Funny)
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Funny)
1. Download/Install Firefox itself
2. Download/Install Sun Java Runtime, do necessary fiddling to get Firefox to use it
3. Download/Install Flash plugin
4. Download/Install Shockwave plugin
5. Download/Install all necessary streaming media plugins
6. Download/Install Googlebar plugin. This is optional but probably a Good Thing. Configure until said clueless n00b offers free coffee.
7. Add 'obvious' trusted sites like mozilla.org to trusted sites list (I can't believe mozilla forgot this!) Be very careful here.
8. Turn on all automatic updates (remember, we are talking about clueless n00bs here)
9. Make sure all bookmarks, cookies etc have been correctly migrated by checking with, yes, you guessed it, the clueless n00b... (I've never had a problem).
10. Delete all unnecessary IE icons (or if they are really clueless then just redirect them to Firefox)
11. While you're at it remove PDF from MIME associations, Acrobat takes zonks to load up, make sure it doesn't load in a tab but downloads as necessary. [While you're at it why not clean Acrobar of the unused plugins? It'll make it load an order of magnitude faster]
12. Set default download directory to something more sensible than the desktop (optional). Go through the options (possibly consulting your n00b), configure.
13. Teach n00b how to use tabbed browsing, integrated searching, pressing '/' to find something etc etc. Teach common keyboard shortcuts. RSS bookmarks if not THAT much of a n00b. Watch n00b face light up with unrestrained glee! Relish free food, foot massage etc by n00b.
14. Explain your undying hero worship for Charles Babbage, why Darl McBride is Satan, the contents of Bruce Schneier's latest cryptogram, and why Eberlin's Slashbot rhyme r0xxors. Attempt explanation of the concept of bash.org. Get kicked out by increasingly freaked out n00b, safe in the knowledge that you are battling Evil.
WARNING: above not to be used in ALL situations, only for the 'I want my IntarWeb' types.
I'll leave links/more detailed steps/other suggestions/corrections/'u 5uxx0rs' to people who need the karma. If you're going to Spread Firefox then do it right!
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Funny)
Slashbot Rhyme
I make a dash to the Slash to the D-O-T
Coz them news for nerds makes sense to me
So let this serve as a warning to the spammers and trolls
You may have a fat pipe but you ain't got bawls.
There's a new manifesto by ESR
And the stats of the watts of a hybrid car
I gots love for Perens and miguel, et al
And I voted CowboyNeal on the Slashdot Poll
I'm Microsoft bashin' like every single day
Coz the OS got holes and Exploder's teh gay
Now SCO's talkin' trash so I give firefox a ride
To reply as a Coward so I can hate on McBride
I will flame you with language I won't say to your face
And I bet you can't guess who gots all your base
There's one way to know if your server is rotting
Just post a link and you'll get a slashdotting
You can mod me down coz I'm a karma whore
And I'm a decorated veteran of a recent flame war
Where they fought about an app with a K or a G
And a heated debate on what was meant by "Free"
As a slashbot, when Linux receives a threat,
My palms begin to sweat and my evil bit is set
You best believe I'll be posting a rant
And I'll be surfin' Slashdot 'til my mom says I can't.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Informative)
Mozillia.org is not defaulted as a trusted site because it could be comprimised when you install. Given that the home page defaults to mozilla.org, this would be unacceptable for a parinoid security policy.
Although, given that the senario being discussed is migrating from IE to Moz, that doesn't make much sense.....
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Informative)
They didn't forget. This is on purpose.
If you place mozilla.org as a trusted site, this would include bugzilla.mozilla.org as trusted (since it matches against the end of the domain). Anyone can upload anything to bugzilla.mozilla.org as an attachment to a bug report - including XPIs.
This would make it very easy for a malicious user to make you install a bad XPI from a "trusted" site.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Informative)
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:4, Interesting)
I use Firefox.
I like Firefox.
What I don't like about Firefox is its installer. When new a new version comes out you have to uninstall the old one before you install the new one, or else you end up with two entries in your "Add/Remove programs". If you then remove the old one, the new one breaks and must be installed again. This was last noticed when upgrading from b0.93 to PR1.0
This behaviour makes it more difficult to support clueless noobs than it should be, as when a new vuln is discovered it is not as simple as it should be for them to upgrade their systems (after be prompted to by yours truly) by themselves. It becomes necessary to provide them with step by step instructions which often look rather daunting to clueless users. "I never had to do stuff like that before" is a common response.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Insightful)
With the latest version of firefox, it checks for program updates automatically, it downloads program patches, and it attempts to find necessary plugins for pages and install them if you tell it to. Firefox is about to reach the point to where the adoption rates start increasing exponentially.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Insightful)
Sounds like everything i hate about IE with default configuration ?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Linux Desktop (Score:3, Insightful)
Graphics card -> ATI and Nvidia are clearly not ready
Databases -> mySQL is actually pretty damn good
UI -> KDE and GNOME is good but still flawed
Browsers -> Firefox hmmm....
Viruses -> good shape
Spyware -> good shape
Adware -> good shape
Office -> still no good email client
Games -> Argh!
Dev -> Still think it needs a good GUI dev tool like visual basic to knock
Re:Linux Desktop (Score:3, Insightful)
There are a lot of Databases that work well depending on need.
Evolution, is very good for the Outlook crowd and there are several others for everyone else. I like Mozilla Mail myself.
Re:Linux Desktop (Score:3, Informative)
BTW what's so bad about thunderbird or evolution? I agree with you about KDE and Gnome though.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Insightful)
So what does your prefence of desktops have to do with whether they are open source or not? If Windows went open source, what OS would you run in its place??
What are the actual user benefits of closed source applications over open source once you eliminate the economic benefit to the person selling it?
I run Windows, but would be happier if it were open source.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Informative)
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Insightful)
I use both Firefox and Opera, and I still can't quite 100% dump IE. The truth of the matter is that it's still not so easy to get rid of, especially when one visits sites with video content.
Thank Microsoft, thank crappy web developers, I don't care. There's still more that needs to be done. On a side note, I just ran into this problem a couple of minutes before this article materialized. Doesn't happen often.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Funny)
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Interesting)
In Linux mplayer can play every single type of video ever. There are no exceptions I have ever found. Every single video file I have ever seen plays correctly and better in mplayer than anything else ever. heck, it can even do full scree
Only need IE to get past 'unknown browser' screens (Score:4, Informative)
Once you go in with IE, you can find the real target URL, and 9 times out of 10 it works fine in Firefox. If I care about the site, I just bookmark the inside page.
I suppose there are tricks I could do to set Fox to pretend to be IE, but I'm too lazy for that. If I were on Linux fulltime, I suppose I'd have to, but I just periodically import my Firefox bookmarks from Windows into the Linux version.
Re:Only need IE to get past 'unknown browser' scre (Score:5, Informative)
User Agent Switcher.
Re:Only need IE to get past 'unknown browser' scre (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, so you are counted as one more IE user. May work in the short term, but it will contribute to shift the statistics towards IE, what is we *definitly* don't want.
Re:Only need IE to get past 'unknown browser' scre (Score:3, Insightful)
obedience (Score:3, Insightful)
By switching to IE, then you are jumping through the hoop the website developers have set in front of you. I recommend you just ignore the site and move on. There's plenty of other content on the web that's not obfuscated from visitors with browser requirements. Maybe over time, the developers of said sites will realize they can increase their page hits if they open up their site to W3 standards.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Funny)
I recommend lightening up.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:4, Informative)
I have only encountered one website (other then MS windows update page) that gives me a problem via FireFox, and then it is only a loss of part of its functionality.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Insightful)
Well it certainly comes up quite a bit whenever Slashdot links to a site with video in it.
I've seen "It doesn't work in Firefox!" at least twice in the last week or so when Slashdot pointed to an article. That's not really Firefox's fault, though, it's MS's stupid web implementation of Media Player.
I think my point has been misinterpreted. It wasn't a poke at alternative browsers, it was a statement that IE still has to be used once in a while. You can look at it from the "well that's just 1 of millions of pages" point of view, or you can look at it from the "DOH!!! Dammit!!!" point of view when the one time you can't visit a site you do end up firing up IE. Anybody not using Windows is completely left out in the cold.
Be dismissive all you like, but the mere fact that you can write a page that is inoperable in anything but IE is a problem. I'm not talking about looking at the browser via scripting, I'm talking about broken web standards. That shit happens all the time because too many peeps test only with IE, and it's just a leetle too forgiving when it comes to malformed HTML. (And we all know about their standards adherence.)
I'm really annoyed that my previous post was modded as troll. Give me an f'in break. I don't see how Slashdot can cook up a number of "It doesn't work in Firefox!! @#$#@$@#$" comments and not recognize the validity of what I said.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Insightful)
If what you really meant was that you have to use IE for the vast minority of sites, then you misspoke.
implies that IE is superior to FF for most of the web, which is just plain wrong.
I'm not actually convinced that you meant what you claim to have meant; I have you marked as a foe because you'r
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Interesting)
Close, but no. What I meant was that IE gets you to more places than the other browsers. In other words, it's still useful despite the claim (that I was replying to) that IE is not serious for anything.
"implies that IE is superior to FF for most of the web, which is just plain wrong."
No. It doesn't say anything about the browser's superiority. Superioritiy is a term too broad to measure that wa
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Insightful)
This isn't OSS zealotry refusing to acknowledge any criticism of certain software, this is simply people giving their response to a comment that was flawed in a number of ways.
Firstly, it was poorly worded; it certainly implied to me that you thought IE was the better option for 99.9999% of the web, and I think the responses to your original comment demonstrate that I'm not the only one who misinterpreted you.
Secondly, you were responding to a comment which was essentially correct as if it was wrong; for
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:5, Interesting)
The problem is when a server sends data to the browser it will tell the (MIME) type of the data in the HTTP response. Browsers SHOULD handle the data according to this type according to the HTTP specification. Mozilla does this, and is probably not willing to use the Microsoft way specified below.
As usual, Microsoft doesn't keep to the specifications and just looks at the file-type according to the header of the file (and maybe the extension of the filename). Then it takes an educated guess. So a site which returns a movie with the MIME type set to TEXT/HTML (the default in those badly configured webservers) will render OK in internet explorer, but will show garbage (a bit like as in the Matrix, Neo will probably be able to watch the movie) in Mozilla, and any other browser.
The Launchy plugin (for Mozilla) makes you make the educated guess yourself, and save and play also works. Unless the site works with a stupid JavaScript referer in which case you are in trouble. I usually get to the HTML source and figure it out, but for most people that would not really be an option.
Phew. Glad I got to the end of that.
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Interesting)
I have the exact oposite problem... A design I'm making (http://new.lillesvin.net.nyud.net:8090 [nyud.net]) works in anything but IE (Tested in Firefox/Mozilla, Opera and Konqueror - unfortunately don't have access to a Safari). It's XHTML 1.0 Strict and CSS 2 - yet IE is so far from rendering it correctly that I'm actually t
Re:should read "Alternatives to..." (Score:3, Insightful)
Used to be MCP Magzine (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Used to be MCP Magzine (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Used to be MCP Magzine (Score:5, Funny)
Gee, I always thought it stood for Master Control Program -- you know, the operating system from Tron that is hellbent on world domination and is in fact the Ultimate Evil... oh, wait. Same thing.
Who cut the cheese? (Score:5, Funny)
I'd think it was more like the Limburger of software - it stinks.
Wow, this is incredibly interesting (Score:3, Insightful)
What does Roland Pikapuile think of all this? Please include a link to his blog in the submission.
An idea to beat Microsoft (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:An idea to beat Microsoft (Score:5, Informative)
ummm.. yeah.. nevermind that OPERA HAD IT FIRST
Re:An idea to beat Microsoft (Score:2)
Re:An idea to beat Microsoft (Score:5, Funny)
Re:An idea to beat Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:An idea to beat Microsoft (Score:3, Insightful)
It isn't wise to tit for tat here. Pattens would eventualy come back and byte someone. It is best to leave then alone in my opinion.
Re:An idea to beat Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)
Opera had tabs ages before mozilla, and that is very recent history. That in the context of browsing, of course, tabs are a ubiquitous interface.
Anyhow, you should remember that software patents are really evil, more evil than Microsoft, and they need to be destroyed much more than IE. IE only hurts their users, but software patents hurt everyone!
Gratifying to see it in the wild (Score:4, Insightful)
When was this article written? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:When was this article written? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:When was this article written? (Score:2)
Not a very up-to-date article, but what do you expect from a, yada, yada, yada.
Re:When was this article written? (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, if you "hurry" to www.netscape.com, you will see right on the front page they advertise Netscape 7.2. The article claims to have been written in October, when, in fact, Netscape 7.2 was released [mozillazine.org] in August, and AOL announced they would make that release [mozillazine.org] back in March; also stating that:
could this be a trojan horse? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not trying to stereotype microsoft users, I am merely presenting a "devils advocate" viewpoint.
Re:could this be a trojan horse? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:could this be a trojan horse? (Score:4, Insightful)
There _is_ a fair bit of fanaticism around here... but that's not what's spreading firefox... the fact that it is flat out BETTER is.
Ehh... Ask your folks (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:could this be a trojan horse? (Score:5, Insightful)
how does one get turned off by a feature that is totally non-intrusive if you want it to be? it's not like firefox forces you to use tabs. but for the people out there (like myself) who never knew what they were missing, it may be a very welcomed change and a reason to leave IE for good.
Re:could this be a trojan horse? (Score:3, Informative)
You're quite right, that's actually what one of my coworkers said. He had got tired of IE popups and security problems and I mentioned he could try Firefox. He liked the tabbed browsing and the popup blocking, but he didn't like the pluggin support (actually having to download plugins when most of the necessary ones are installed by default on IE such as Java). Also, our internal bug management system has a web frontend with lots of java that would ran
Quasi-OT: Opera's voice mode (Score:5, Interesting)
You can even select a bunch of text and tell it to "speak", and it will read it to you.
Incidentaly, I had just discovered WinXP's onboard voice synth. A group of people were at a Krystal's and wanted to contact a friend.
We realized that:
--Nobody had a cell phone
--Krystal's has wifi! (I boot up my laptop)
--Our friend wasn't on AIM or similar
--I have a VoIP client... we can call him!
--We have no microphone
--WinXP has a voice synth!
So, with a little mixer tweaking, I routed the voice synth output into Skype's input, called the poor schmuck, and had Microsoft Sam read him a message. (which was, if I recall, "We will be playing Starcraft at ten o'clock and such-and-such a place. Interested?")
Obligatory Mastercard Commercial (Score:5, Funny)
Wireless Access Point: $80
Broadband Internet: $40
VOIP Service: $20
Calling your tinfoil wearing, goverment conspiracy theory lovin' friend with a computer generated voice to play a game of strategic conquest: Priceless.
You forgot something (Score:3, Funny)
Using a phone booth, $0.35. When your brain works, things are easy. For everything else, there's a credit card waiting to suck the rest of your life.
XP users, they are so clever.
Re:Quasi-OT: Opera's voice mode (Score:3, Interesting)
Is IE even "free" anymore? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Is IE even "free" anymore? (Score:5, Funny)
AdSense (Score:5, Informative)
My Web site uses Google AdSense to display context-sensitive ads to my users. The AdSense administration site works only with IE
This seems dubious. The google site claims that you just need javascript. Can anyone who uses AdSense verify this? I'm guessing the popup blocker in firefox thwarted this guy's limited computer savvy.
Re:AdSense (Score:5, Informative)
Re:AdSense (Score:2)
Here's a wierd one for you: My wife can't use Firefox to read her work's Exchange-driven webmail system, but it works just fine with Konqueror.
Re:AdSense (Score:2, Informative)
Re:AdSense (Score:5, Informative)
Complete bullshit.
Bad facts... (Score:5, Informative)
Which brings me to the real question: Can you live without IE? I try to use Firefox as my main browser, but I find myself firing up IE from time to time out of sheer necessity. My Web site uses Google AdSense to display context-sensitive ads to my users. The AdSense administration site works only with IE...
Well, I've been using Adsense for about 2 months now, and I have yet to open it in IE. I've only used Firfox so far, both on Windows and Linux, and never had any problems.
Time to Dump IE? (Score:5, Insightful)
The darned thing still does not have tabbed browsing for god's sake. How long does it take MSFT to copy that one.
Oh yeah? (Score:5, Funny)
But corporate users don't spend a lot of time playing with DirectX-based games, listening to Windows Media Player, or checking e-mail with Outlook Express.
I don't think they know the same corporate people that I know.
Re:Oh yeah? (Score:3, Insightful)
Outlook Express? No trace of it, even IE is at 5.0 or so... We do use Outlook 98, but as I said.. properly firewalled.
I don't think that corporate setting is somehow exceptional.
Why doesn't (Score:5, Insightful)
To my knowledge, MS only makes money off of IE by licensing it to people like AOL (and that is a wierd thing, and another discussion), but they make nothing off of having it bundled with the OS, and would loose nothing by bundling some other browser.
It seems evident that there are issues with having a webbrowser tied so closely to the OS. Most of people's issues with switching from IE is that 1) ie is just there, so what else is there to use, and what else is better? 2) There are a few too many broken websites that end users blame the browser for if the website does not work properly.
And if someone feels like adding a completely off topic tangent here. What is up with the IIS websites and those damn "go to # on this page" links or whatever? They are annoying because I don't know what they are doing, and they sometimes break (even in ie) if I open them up in a new window or tab. Grrrrr....
Re:Why doesn't (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why doesn't (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously. IE a crucial one of many, many means MS has of keeping people locked into their OS, which is their real cash machine. Giving up any of many, many means usually gains them nothing and potentially loses them everything. They would be dumb as hell to surrender on the browser front (or any other front, for that matter). It is in their best financial interest to keep people locked into their stuff as long as possible.
cunclusions retarded (Score:3, Informative)
Re:conclusion - missed the point (Score:3, Informative)
Re:cunclusions retarded (Score:3, Informative)
Last I checked, Mozilla and Opera did not offer such things.
Please advise.
Better than dropping it, remove it (Score:5, Informative)
Create Windows installation CDs that won't install IE (and/or many other things, like Outlook):
A howto + files for Windows 2000 [vorck.com]
Free (as in beer) software with no howto for Windows 2000, 2003, and XP [msfn.org]
Fallacies or misconceptions? (Score:5, Insightful)
What about Netscape 7.2 [netscape.com]? Technically, it is Mozilla 1.7, but it does have AOL-produced add-ons.
For example, Mozilla issued a patch that stops the browser from allowing an attacker to execute applications on a Windows system--something we're used to dealing with in IE.
For those of us that remember, the shell: vulnerability was because Mozilla passed it on to Windows to handle, and Windows failed at handling it. That's why Mozilla "patched" it.
Anything ActiveX-based won't work
There is an ActiveX addon for Mozilla.
Interesting too that he brings up the issue that non-IE browsers would be harder to manage using Microsoft products (ISA Server, etc.). I wonder why that is so.
AdSense FUD (Score:5, Insightful)
-Pete
OF COURSE Microsoft wants this known. (Score:5, Insightful)
Firefox' little secret (Score:5, Interesting)
This is what Microsoft must be afraid of: cross-platform user interfaces with pluggable scripting languages and super-easy application deployment. This is why they originally fought Netscape - they were afraid that Netscape would become a "platform" independent from the operating system layer. And now exactly that is happening, thanks to open source. The people who designed this stuff were some true visionaries.
The Spread Firefox [spreadfirefox.com] initiative may seem like a trite marketing effort. But in reality, it is one of the best ways to enable people to switch to other platforms tomorrow. I really hope that the Firefox hackers will get SVG support ready soon, as this is one of the other key features that can have immediate amazing benefits.
Security (Score:3, Insightful)
I use a Mac and I liked the article (Score:5, Insightful)
That said, all of these problems can be overcome by a good admin who thinks creatively, and I seriously doubt that much active development is going into ActiveX using sites these days.
I dumped IE a long time ago... (Score:3, Informative)
Ironic, but expected... (Score:4, Insightful)
All in all I think the only thing that IE is good for is to cause my Mom's Dell to download viruses and trojans so I get the Support call!
CB@#$%^&
Firefox is cool - on the PC (Score:4, Informative)
I've installed it on my wife's Portable (XP) though, and feel a lot better. Her IT guy seems to be quite good, but it's always me trying to keep her PC up to date, so that's one less worry.
I've noticed that FF behaves a lot better on a PC than on the Mac - compared to the alternative. Doesn't crash, is faster and overall renders better.
If it weren't for Safari, I'd probably be using Firefox too. I'm curious how much marketshare FF has on the mac.
Re:Firefox is cool - on the PC (Score:3, Insightful)
Even DirectX? (Score:3, Insightful)
Wasn't that the point of DirectX? To provide more direct access to hardware for purposes such as graphics? That's why you couldn't play games in windows 3.1 and had to use DOS; you couldn't get at the hardware. The trick is how to do it safely.
It sounds like this guy's taking one idea and applying it to everything here. There are some things that do need kernel integration for performance reasons. As for doing it with your browser, I don't really see the point. Integrate all the browser's IO by way of tcp/ip, win32, directx, etc and leave all the rendering engine out of kernel space. But microsoft is probably doing exactly that for the most part. It's hard to say what's part of the windows operating system (kernel) and what just ships with it. Sure there's a lot of stuff that you can't uninstall but that doesn't mean that stuff isn't bound by the same rules that an application like firefox is bound by. It's pretty hard to say how integrated IE really is or if most of these bugs are just there because MS ships when stuff is just "good enough.
Opera User in Pain (Score:3, Interesting)
Too bad as I find it an excellent browser.
MSI repackaging tools (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, you could use MSI repackaging tools for easier deployment through SMS, Group Policy or some other tool, but it's a shame that these vendors haven't realized the market potential and made their products more accessible to corporate IT departments.
Now, to be honest I have no idea what an "MSI repackaging tool" is. Like an RPM packager or something? Maybe someone can explain. Anyway, it sounds like it might be relatively easy for someone who has this tool to do, and (if they're feeling in the spirit) make the package available. Or heck, maybe even sell and support it! It sounds like this might have a major appeal to corporate IT departments, who usually have some money to toss around.
It's amazing! People still run IE? (Score:3, Insightful)
On the other side of the age spectrum, Firefox is the ultimate geriatric browser since old-folks who will click on nearly anything that moves can do the least amount of damage to their PC's.
However, I wouldn't count IE out just yet. People will be flocking back in droves when the new Palladium/DRM IE arrives. It will keep users safe from any copyright infringement while installing even more spyware.
Properly formatted karma whoring article text (Score:5, Informative)
Internet Explorer is a hacker's dream. Can you (and should you) drop it right now?
October 2004 by Don Jones
Internet Explorer is the Swiss Cheese of software--it's full of holes. Holes in software are never good, but when the browser is so integrated with the OS as to be as one--you've got problems. Add to that the sheer ubiquity of the Microsoft browser, and it's no wonder IE has become the hackers' No. 1 playground.
Now we're beset by increasingly common--and dangerous--security vulnerabilities. We knew IE was integrated with Windows, but we didn't have any idea how integrated it was. Even Microsoft doesn't seem to have a firm grasp on IE's internals, judging from the weeks it took to deliver an actual fix for the recent Download.Ject Trojan.
Not to say an integrated browser is all bad. To a developer, an integrated browser is cool because it gives you a built-in HTML rendering engine. You can then write apps that use HTML, knowing that the OS can render that HTML for you. IE can begin to take over the regular Windows Explorer shell and, in fact, has become so tightly integrated with Windows Explorer that it's a bit difficult to see where the shell ends and the browser begins.
The downside is a real downer. With a regular Web browser, a security vulnerability might let someone crash the browser. With an integrated Web browser they can crash the whole operating system. The tight ties to Windows means that the slightest IE security issue becomes an OS-wide panic. It's not just IE, either: Windows Media Player, Outlook Express, and even DirectX, are all, in my opinion, overly integrated and give hackers too much access to core PC functions.
But corporate users don't spend a lot of time playing with DirectX-based games, listening to Windows Media Player, or checking e-mail with Outlook Express. They do spend a lot of time in IE, and the more they surf the more they're vulnerable to its eccentricities. That's why more than a few corporations, not to mention individual users, are looking at alternatives--any alternative--to the built-in browser.
Browsing the Alternatives
Despite dire predictions from Netscape (now a unit of America Online, which, weirdly, continues to bundle IE with its software), the market for non-Microsoft browsers didn't go away. It sure as heck got small, though, with Microsoft now commanding around 95 percent of the market, according to some sources. But the times, they are a-changin'. San Diego Web metrics company WebSideStory recently reported IE losing 1 percent of that market, the first time IE has stumbled. IE is now down to 94 percent. Who's gaining? Mozilla.
The open-source code base of the Netscape browser, Mozilla offers a couple of browsers. Mozilla 1.7 is its base product (1.8 is in beta as of this writing); Firefox (currently at 0.9) is the next-generation browser. Both are available from www.mozilla.org. Netscape also offers 7.1 of its venerable browser based on Mozilla code. It's available from www.netscape.com, but you'd better hurry: It'll be the last Netscape-branded browser AOL produces.
There's also the well-known Opera Web browser, currently at version 7.53, available from www.opera.com. All of the Mozilla products, including Netscape's browser, are completely free. Opera offers a free, advertising-supported browser as well as a $40 version sans ads. And those are just the Windows browsers (see online extras for more on browsers for other OSes). While these are the major contenders, others exist: Search Download.com for "Web browser" and you'll get 356 results, many of which are small-footprint, self-contained Web browsers. Be aware that some of these simply throw a new cosmetic face on Windows' built-in IE objects, meaning you're still using IE. Others are completely self-contained and count as true alternatives.
Pros and Cons of Straying From the Pack
Forgetting security for a moment, there are functional
Re:Disconcerting IE (Score:3, Informative)
Then it is not a good setup..
You are looking for the wrong solution. You should NEVER trust the settings of $application on a client machine for a security purpose. What you need to do is block all outgoing port 80 traffic for everything but your proxy server(s) (or setup a working transparent proxy solution which wil
Re:more troll food from the slashdot founders... (Score:5, Informative)
What you mean is... (Score:3, Interesting)
We have one such system at work - for which the login page has some awful script which detects when you hit enter on a textbox and then submits the form (with no submit button at all on the page). I can rewrite the "SubmitMe()" function to be cross-compatible, or perhaps add a button to the page, but I could see how other companies without some