Do you use Internet Explorer?

[bhaexpress]

Firefox has improved a lot over the last couple of releases, a lot of reviews and benchmarks have Firefox 5 at least comparable to Chrome in speed.

I'll try it !

 

[adrian29uk]

Chrome or Firefox they are both great. Microsoft had the opportunity years ago to start conforming with proper web standards, release up to date versions of their browser so they could be installed on Mac and Linux operating systems, but they decided to brush them aside and keeping everything as a closed shop.

I think mac did have IE 5 but it stopped there.

Firefox came along which worked across all platforms. And Chrome came along again works across all platforms. So if I am using Linux I can still use 99% of the plugins in Firefox like I can with Firefox in Windows.

Cross platform, people are happier when things work like this, are Microsoft aware of this? lol

Microsoft have gone down the same route with that stupid Silverlight. Alienating Linux users in the process.

Please correct me, but I don't see it as making any inroads or ever becoming as popular as flash. And now we have html5 which again works across all browsers everyone can use it regardless of operating system.

 

[The Terminator]

Chrome all the way

 

[bhaexpress]

Chrome or Firefox they are both great. Microsoft had the opportunity years ago to start conforming with proper web standards, release up to date versions of their browser so they could be installed on Mac and Linux operating systems, but they decided to brush them aside and keeping everything as a closed shop.

I think mac did have IE 5 but it stopped there.

Firefox came along which worked across all platforms. And Chrome came along again works across all platforms. So if I am using Linux I can still use 99% of the plugins in Firefox like I can with Firefox in Windows.

Cross platform, people are happier when things work like this, are Microsoft aware of this? lol

Microsoft have gone down the same route with that stupid Silverlight. Alienating Linux users in the process.

Please correct me, but I don't see it as making any inroads or ever becoming as popular as flash. And now we have html5 which again works across all browsers everyone can use it regardless of operating system.

The problem is that as IE comes installed with any Windows operating system then most organisations standardise on it as they know that their web applications should work with it (although rather a lot don't with versions 8 & 9). However it reduces support costs only having to support one browser. For the individual or home user this is not really an issue but multiply this a few thousand times and you have a different story. Whilst Firefox and Chrome should do the same as IE this often requires plug ins which in most organisations the individual can't install and their user ID doesn't tend to have Admin rights.

 

[Superphil]

i wonder how that study stripped out the effects of those using the internet from PCs they have no control over what browser is used?

Our company puts Firefox on every PC and asks us to use it in preference to IE or Chrome, but it is our choice. Personally, when logged onto our remote desktop/VPN/Terminal Server or whatever its called, IE is the better one to use, faster etc.

On my home PCs I use FF or IE depending what mood I'm in, can't see any difference TBH. On my Mac I use FF simply because I do not like Safari. I've tried Chrome, and regardless of whether its quicker, I just think it looks horrible, and I find it clumsy to use, so I don't bother.

 

[Max Paper]

Just downloaded Chrome, already prefer it to Firefox

 

[Superphil]

Firefox came along which worked across all platforms. And Chrome came along again works across all platforms. So if I am using Linux I can still use 99% of the plugins in Firefox like I can with Firefox in Windows.

Cross platform, people are happier when things work like this, are Microsoft aware of this? lol

Surely they are separately written programs, it is not one program that works on different OSs. Mozilla and Google have written them individually for each OS. Taking this on board, I guess Microsoft don't want/need to provide a Mac OS version any more, nothing to do with whether they can or not.

*oh, just realised, this is a Microsoft bashing exercise, carry on.

 

[Another Berkshire Seagull]

Chrome or Firefox they are both great. Microsoft had the opportunity years ago to start conforming with proper web standards, release up to date versions of their browser so they could be installed on Mac and Linux operating systems, but they decided to brush them aside and keeping everything as a closed shop.

I think mac did have IE 5 but it stopped there.

Firefox came along which worked across all platforms. And Chrome came along again works across all platforms. So if I am using Linux I can still use 99% of the plugins in Firefox like I can with Firefox in Windows.

Cross platform, people are happier when things work like this, are Microsoft aware of this? lol

Microsoft have gone down the same route with that stupid Silverlight. Alienating Linux users in the process.

Please correct me, but I don't see it as making any inroads or ever becoming as popular as flash. And now we have html5 which again works across all browsers everyone can use it regardless of operating system.

Bit out of date this, as IE9 is arguably the most standards compliant browser on the market.
Admittedly for the makers of Windows, Linux and Mac was never likely to be a focus area however.

 

[Grendel]

Microsoft have gone down the same route with that stupid Silverlight. Alienating Linux users in the process.

Moonlight provides Silverlight compatibility for Linux, and is developed in conjunction with Microsoft.

 

[bhaexpress]

Surely they are separately written programs, it is not one program that works on different OSs. Mozilla and Google have written them individually for each OS. Taking this on board, I guess Microsoft don't want/need to provide a Mac OS version any more, nothing to do with whether they can or not.

*oh, just realised, this is a Microsoft bashing exercise, carry on.

I wouldn't call this Microsoft bashing it's just a pure fact that IE in by no means the best browser. However as I've already said it'll always be the most widely used for the simple reason it's the default with any Windows system which whilst it might not suit the individual it doesn't suit most corporates. For example, Outlook Web Mail often has issues with non IE browsers, that's purely down to Microsoft who in turn can't be expected to write their applications to suit competitors.

 

[bhaexpress]

Bit out of date this, as IE9 is arguably the most standards compliant browser on the market.
Admittedly for the makers of Windows, Linux and Mac was never likely to be a focus area however.

No, not always, a site I was working at at the beginning of the year has a severe problem with people installing IE 8 & 9 as one of their applications wouldn't work with it. As you can't uninstall IE once it's loaded the only solution was to reimage the PC, a rather tiresome exercise.

 

[kip]

opera is also very fast, have used it for about a year now on an old laptop and makes browsing much quicker than IE.. Also sometimes use K-meleon on my PC and that is super quick but doesn't always load pages correctly.

 

[sam86]

Anyone that uses Internet Explorer out of choice is an idiot. There, I said it.

 

[kip]

Anyone that uses Internet Explorer out of choice is an idiot. There, I said it.

Agree!!

 

[Colossal Squid]

Chrome is clearly the best for every day surfing. Simple, quick, clutter free.

Firefox remains popular because of its incredible adaptability. It is still the browser of choice for most web developers I'd say, thanks to the almost infinite customisability with add ons and extensions. Chrome is catching up but doesn't yet have all the features of Firefox for serious techy users.

Where I used to work everybody used Firefox as the default and most of us had Chrome for personal browsing.

This link with IQ is probably a bit harsh but I would say it is fair to say, in general, that IE users aren't as computer savvy as the rest of us OR they're simply on a very restrictive corporate network where they don't have a choice.

I like this quote from the BBC article:

"They've got IE6 users with an IQ of around eighty. That's borderline deficient, marginally able to cope with the adult world."

BBC News - Internet Explorer users have lower IQ says study

 

[8ace]

The reason for the popularity of Firefox is that it's almost identical graphically to IE. Most corporates use IE as a standard because all applications work with it. There are but a handful of applications that don't work with Firefox and the others. Amusingly there are a lot of legacy apps that won't work with IE 8 or 9. I've had this happen quite a lot recently and it's a factor as so many business applications are now web based. Some places do allow users to install an alternative browser and these days it tends to be Chrome rather than Firefox purely for it's speed.

I'm not a web developer but I know someone who is and he says that IE is the worst at complying to the web standards, whereas Chrome and FF are usually fine. So he writes his app once to work the way the standards say then has to f*** about with it to make it work with all the different version of Internet Exploder.

 

[adrian29uk]

I'm not a web developer but I know someone who is and he says that IE is the worst at complying to the web standards, whereas Chrome and FF are usually fine. So he writes his app once to work the way the standards say then has to f*** about with it to make it work with all the different version of Internet Exploder.

I have noticed a large change. I used to develop sites to work for IE first and Firefox second and Firefox was always the browser which had the problem. Now its the other way around you spend half the day working on something, it looks fine in Firefox, Chrome, Opera and then I look at the site in IE and its wrong. It is annoying, so you ask yourself who is right and who is wrong.

 

[HovaGirl]

Firefox, which superceded Netscape. Never used IE, except at work, and hated it.

 

[HastingsSeagull]

No because it's pure pants. Always had issues with it so years ago swapped to firefox/mozilla with google crome as a back-up. When have to use ie places, it's sooooo slow and buggy drives me bonkers

 

[Fungus]

All a hoax, apparently! BBC News - Internet Explorer story was bogus