IE9 Beta Released - "Beauty of the Web"

On September 15, Microsoft officially unveiled the first beta release of IE9, the latest version of Internet Explorer, the world's most popular web browser. IE9 has been dramatically changed, and is ready to take on other browsers in the market like Chrome and Firefox.

Here is a quick rundown of the biggest changes to IE9:

• New user interface
• Tabs are now located to the right of the address bar
• Unified search and address bar (like Google Chrome)
• Revamped download manager (similar to Firefox's implementation)
• Only works with Windows Vista or Windows 7 machines
• Jump list support
• Pinned web application support
• New speed dial interface for the new tab page

[Image courtesy of Ed Bott at ZDNet.com]

There have also been many behind the scene changes to IE9 including HTML5 support and hardware acceleration, which is enabled by default. For additional information about hardware acceleration take a look at our previous post "The Future of Web Browsers: Why You Should Be Excited Pt. 2."

If you are interested in downloading the newest beta release, I would encourage you to check out Microsoft's IE9 promotional website, www.beautyoftheweb.com.

Finally, if you are looking for a more in-depth review of IE9 including a full rundown of all of the major feature changes, check out Ed Bott's excellent blog post.

The Future of Web Browsers: Why You Should Be Excited Pt. 3

The future of web browsers is a great one, due to the introduction of HTML 5, hardware acceleration, and quickly changing user interfaces in the browser market.

If you do not know what a user interface is, Wikipedia provides a great description:

The user interface is (a place) where interaction between humans and machines occurs. The goal of interaction between a human and a machine at the user interface is effective operation and control of the machine, and feedback from the machine which aids the operator in making operational decisions.

In short, the user interface (also referred to as UI) is what you see when you are using a program. More and more web browsers are improving their UI's to make browsing the web easier on users. They are doing this by cleaning up the UI and making it easier to use and to look at.

Let's take a look at some examples to see the the common UI direction that web-browers are going. First, here are examples of Internet Explorer's UI.

Now, here is a look at the UI's of several recently updated alternative browsers:

The key thing to notice is that browsers are continuing to get more and more minimal. The different design teams have clearly worked hard to make some necessary changes to the browser landscape including:

- Eliminating or hiding unnecessary UI elements to make the browser easier to use.
- Pare down the number of drop-down menus
- Increase focus on the Address bar, back button, and search

Firefox's development team went so far as to create a heat map of the most frequently accessed tools in their browser. I found it to be incredibly interesting to see what tools people used the most. As you can see, this heat map shows where most of the focus in the new UI's of the browsers are coming from. These types of studies influence changes made to the browsers UI, which will benefit the average user.

The future continues to rely more and more on the web, and knowing that designer and developers are making it easier to use is a comforting thought.

Be sure to check out my post next week in this four part series on "The Future of Web Browsers: Why You Should be Excited." Next week I will talk about the interesting push toward web applications.

The Future of Web Browsers: Why You Should Be Excited Pt. 2

One of the most exciting new features of upcoming web browsers is the ability to utilize your computer's hardware for viewing the web. This promising new technology is called hardware acceleration and it is part of the revolution slowly taking place in web browsers.

Hardware acceleration allows your browser to take advantage of your computer's graphics processing unit (GPU), also known as your video card. By making use of the video card while web browsing, your browser will be capable of handling otherwise sluggish graphics with ease. For example, let's say you are watching a 1080p video in your browser on your computer. As opposed to slowing the browser down to a crawl and leaving you with a choppy video, the hardware acceleration will kick in and use your video card to help out. Ultimately, this will leave you with a much smoother browsing experience and will help with video and graphical issues that would otherwise be problematic.

In addition to the benefits gained from watching videos, web-based applications will also have improvements in overall usability. For example, there is increasing potential for web based video and photo editing applications such as Aviary's suite of products (which are all web-based).

If you are interested in trying out hardware acceleration I would recommend checking out Internet Explorer's recently released Platform Preview of IE9. The IE9 browser has hardware acceleration turned on by default and it is certainly noticeable. If you want to compare IE9 to your current web browser, here is the IE9 testing page, which is set to the default homepage in the IE9 Preview, that you can try to run on whatever browser you choose.

Here is a video comparing IE9 (with hardware acceleration) vs. other browsers, courtesy of Downloadsquad:


Finally, I would like to mention that because of the way hardware acceleration works, you will need to have a decent video card to fully take advantage of these benefits. While you will see improvements with regards to smoothness and choppiness no matter what GPU you have, owning a nicer GPUwill give you greater performance gains.

Faster, cleaner, improved graphics. The future of the web browser is looking brighter everyday in part due to the potential of hardware acceleration.

Be sure to check out the next part of my the "The Future of Web Browsers: Why You Should Be Excited" blog series throughout the upcoming weeks. Part three will discuss the changing user interfaces of future web browsers.

The Future of Web Browsers: Why You Should Be Excited Pt. 1

Believe it or not, web browsers have really not come all that far.

Yes, Internet Explorer, Firefox and Chrome have upped the ante when it comes to speed, usability, and safety, but the basics behind how a web page is rendered is still the same as it was in 1997, when HTML 4.0 was introduced.

The good news is that, beginning with the introduction of HTML 5, web browsers are beginning to make some serious changes that will benefit all users in the future. Many browsers have added HTML 5 support already including Firefox, Opera, Safari, and Chrome. Microsoft is planning HTML 5 support for Internet Explorer 9.

Let us look at why HTML 5 is going to help you:

• Better looking webpages, that are faster and leaner
• Advanced browser functionality such as "Drag and Drop" and embedded video that doesn't require a plugin, such as Flash.
• Offline storage

You can see that some of these features are already in use on sites such as Gmail, which allows you to "drag and drop" images into your email. Youtube is also adopting HTML 5 and allows some videos to be viewed without the required Adobe Flash plugin. Instead, you are able to watch the video using the HTML 5 player.

If you are running an HTML 5 compatible browser, you can join the beta testing group here for the HTML 5 Youtube video viewer. You can then check out this video of the world celebrating Landon Donovan's game-winning goal.

HTML 5 is just the beginning of why you should be excited about the future of web browsers. Be sure to check out Part 2 next week when I talk about my favorite upcoming feature: Hardware Acceleration.

Explorer? Firefox? Chrome? Competition among Internet Browsers Heats Up

Amy Barzdukas, a general manager at Microsoft in charge of the company's Internet Explorer browser, said that the recent announcement that Firefox – the chief competitor to Microsoft’s browser – has reached a billion downloads was "interesting math".

"It's an interesting number and I have not seen the math [but] how many Internet connected users are there? 1.1 billion, 1.5 billion, something in that area."

Firefox claimed it had passed the 1 billion downloads mark at the end of July, a figure which includes every update and all downloads made since the program was first launched in 2004.

Since its inception, Firefox has chipped away at Microsoft's dominant position and is now the world's second most popular web browser with 22% of the market, in comparison to 67% for the family of Internet Explorer programs.

If you have only used Internet Explorer as your browser, and are interested in trying some others, you might want to start here for an overview of what’s out there, or read a review of Google’s Chrome, the latest entry into the competitive browser field.

And if you are happy with Internet Explorer, but not yet using Microsoft’s latest release – IE 8 – click here for a review.

[via guardian.co.uk]

Google Chrome Ads Come to Television

Google has launched its first television advertising campaign for Google Chrome, the company’s nine-month-old web browser.

I find it a little odd to advertise web browsers on television. Late at night, watching reruns of The Simpsons, I usually don’t think to myself, “I wonder if I could be more productive with a better web browser?”

Nevertheless, the marketing people at Google know better than I do, I suppose. Clearly, the company is making a push to cash in on an increasingly large percentage of Internet users – estimated as high as 30-40% – who are looking for alternatives to Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

Let us know what you think:

Interested in Options to Internet Explorer? Here Is a Start

As Technology Librarian John Robertson and I were finishing up a Google Reader class for Library staff recently, we began to talk about different browsers. While we at The Tech Desk use mostly the open-source browser, Firefox, the majority of librarians at Troy use Internet Explorer. We taught the class using IE, but answered some questions about Firefox.

John mentioned that he uses Google Chrome as his browser. Many staff members were curious about it, never having heard of Chrome.

This made me wonder which browsers are being used by our readers. Since we use Google Analytics to track our readership, I was able to answer that question fairly easily.

First, let us look at the big picture. Worldwide, Internet Explorer’s share of the browser market is declining. Now, about 66% of surfers use IE. At the same time, Firefox has increased its market share to around 21%. Apple’s Safari browser makes up 8% of the market, and Google’s Chrome about 1%.

Our readers look a lot like those worldwide. About 57% use Internet Explorer, down about 5% since September 2008, when we started keeping statistics. Firefox use has remained fairly constant at 36%. Apple users are starting to find us in greater numbers, as Safari use is up almost 38%, to 3% of our users. Google’s Chrome, the newest entry in the field, is up 25% since September, to 2% of users.

However you look at these numbers, it is clear that a large percentage of Internet users – somewhere between 33% and 40% -- use a browser other than Internet Explorer.

If you are interested in looking at browser options for your surfing, compare Internet browsers of today and tomorrow.

And to learn more about Google Chrome, check out these short videos from the Official Google Blog. Some of them are pretty good.

Compare Internet Browsers of Today and Tomorrow

Recently, I posted how Windows 7 -- Microsoft's new operating system due out later this year -- might allow you to remove Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) web browser from your computer, if you use one of the alternative browsers -- Firefox, Safari, Google Chrome, Opera, etc. Today, about 1/3 of Internet surfers use a browser other than IE.

It occurred to me that many of you might be interested in an alternative to Internet Explorer, but might not know what other browsers exist or whether or not they are any good.

For you, here is a nice little review of 9 existing and beta browsers, Browser Battle: Nine Browsers of Today and Tomorrow Compared, from maximumpc.com.

[via Lifehacker]

Remove Internet Explorer from Your Computer with Windows 7

Windows 7 – the new Microsoft operating system set to replace Vista later this year – can be used to remove Internet Explorer from your computer, according to the AeroXperience blog. Up to this point, it has been impossible to remove easily Microsoft’s web browser once it is installed.

There is a small but growing percentage of Internet users (estimates of over 30%) who have sworn off IE, in place of Firefox, Google Chrome, Safari or one of the other browsers. Errors and security holes in IE have lead to the increase in alternate browsers.

If you are ready to leave Internet Explorer for good, Windows 7 might help you out.

[via Lifehacker]

Internet Explorer 8 Release Candidate 1 Available for Download

On January 26, Microsoft released Internet Explorer 8 Release Candidate 1 (IE8 RC1). In addition to upgraded security, what are some of the new features in this version of Internet Explorer?

• Autocomplete within the address bar -- Much like Firefox 3's "awesome bar," typing terms in the address bar will search your web history and favorites to find sites you may be interested in.


• InPrivate Browsing -- New browsing mode prevents information such as web history, temporary Internet files, and cookies from being retained by the browser.


• Accelerators -- Don't you hate the multiple steps it takes to map an address or define a term within a website? You have to highlight and copy the information, go to a different site, then paste it in. Accelerators make the process easier by not having to navigate away from your original page. When you highlight a text in a website a blue Accelerator icon will display above the text. Click on this icon, and you will have a list of options you can do, such as define the term, map the location if it is an address, search for it, etc.

Should you upgrade to this new version at this time? A release candidate is typically the final test version before the official release of a piece of software. All of the major features of the final version are included, and in the release candidate stage few bugs should be present.

In terms of IE8 RC1, PC Magazine's Michael Muchmore says "based on this code, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend that any IE7 user upgrade to IE8". You can read his full review here. Please note that if you upgrade to IE8 RC1 you will not have access to Internet Explorer 7.

Have you upgraded to IE8? If so, leave us a comment and let us know what you think.

Microsoft to Fix IE Security Hole

Microsoft Corp. is issuing an emergency fix for a security hole in its browser, Internet Explorer, which was reported yesterday.

The hole has exposed millions of users to having their computers taken over by hackers.

According to The New York Times, Microsoft said it plans to ship a security update, rated ''critical,'' for the browser on December 17. Those with the Windows Update feature activated on their computers will get the patch automatically.

Microsoft said it has seen attacks targeting the flaw only in Internet Explorer 7, the most widely used version, but has cautioned that all other current editions of the browser are vulnerable.

Computer Basics: Saving Passwords and Usernames in a Web Browser

At the Troy Public Library's Technology Center, we teach several classes that cover basic computer skills. However, in these classes we can't cover everything. Using our blog, I hope to cover some of those topics about which we receive many questions, but can't always address in classes.

One common question that we are asked is: How can my web browser remember my password information so that I don't have to type it in all the time? Follow the steps below to have Firefox 3 or Internet Explorer 7 remember this data to make life a little easier!

For Firefox 3:

1. Click on Tools, then click Options.

2. Click on the Privacy tab.

3. Make sure that there is a check next to "Remember what I enter in forms and the search bar." Also make sure there is no check next to "Always clear my private data." If this is checked, all saved data (information in forms, passwords) will be erased every time you close Firefox!

For Internet Explorer 7:

1. Click on Tools, then click Internet Options.

2. Click on the Content tab, then click on the Settings box under AutoComplete.

3. Make sure "Forms" and "User names and passwords on forms" is checked.

Use IE7Pro to Turn Internet Explorer 7 into an Ad-Blocking, More Useful Browser

Many people are starting to switch to Firefox (including your's truly) as a web browser, due to its stronger security, ad-blocking ability, and exhaustive list of add-ons. However, most computer users still use Internet Explorer 7, whether because of familiarity, corporate restriction, or just because its already on their computer.

If you are using IE7, a lot of the best Firefox features can be incorporated through one add-on -- IE7Pro, the self-titled "Ultimate Add-On" for Internet Explorer. And after using this add-on you will most likely agree that the name is pretty accurate.

From the developer's website:

IE7Pro is a must have add-on for Internet Explorer, which includes a lot of features and tweaks to make your IE friendlier, more useful, secure and customizable. IE7Pro includes Tabbed Browsing Management, Spell Check, Inline Search, Super Drag Drop, Crash Recovery, Proxy Switcher, Mouse Gesture, Tab History Browser, Web Accelerator, User Agent Switcher, Webpage Capturer, AD Blocker, Flash Block, Greasemonkey like User Scripts platform, User Plug-ins, MiniDM, Google sponsored search, IE Faster and many more power packed features. You can customize not just Internet Explorer, but even your favorite website according to your need and taste using IE7Pro.

The installation for IE7 Pro is simple. Go to www.ie7pro.com and click on "Download Free." Follow the links, and download the set up file to your desktop. Then go to your desktop, and double click on the set up file to begin the installation. You will have to restart Internet Explorer to see the changes.

IE7 Pro is a must have add-on for all Internet Explorer users. It adds functionality, better security and ad-blocking capabilities to this browser, turning it into a lean, mean, browsing machine.