Choose the best Web browser - Part 3

Choose the best Web browser - Part 1

Choose the best Web browser - Part 2

Michael Muchmore

Windows Internet Explorer 8

The difficult time for Microsoft, with job cuts, the European Union intervened on them again and besides Firefox was gradually taking over Internet Explorer's market share. More than ever, Microsoft needs success in IE8 to maintain its advantage. Therefore, this browser has been added a number of new ways to be malicious, improving the convenience of accessing web resources with Accelerator and WebSlice. The color-coded tab system, improved bar and its enhanced privacy issues are also notable. Now, IE8 has been released under the final form, and we really don't hesitate to advise people to make a discovery after doing some tests with this new browser. This browser has added some security features and helper features that you don't see in any browser.

Browser versions are provided for both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Vista operating systems, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, and Windows XP. Note that you must accept that IE8 will become the only browser for your IE browser. You cannot run IE7 and IE8 side by side. 13.5MB download settings (16.5 for 64-bit operating systems) require you to reboot the system.

Besides, you should not try to install this version if you are using Windows 7 - because then you will get the message " Internet Explorer 8 is not supported on this operating system " - ' Internet Explorer 8 cannot be support on this operating system '. This means, Windows 7 is in a separate development path, and it gives us a different way of running a new browser version on older operating systems.

Windows Internet Explorer 8

Company: Microsoft

Website : http://www.microsoft.com

Specifications:

Type : Business, Personal, Enterprise, Professional

Free

Compatible operating system : Windows Vista, Windows XP

Unlike Firefox (Opera and Safari), Internet Explorer is only for Windows operating systems. This seems to be in their interest, because maybe Microsoft wants to make IE a standard and another reason they can stick to is that the number of people using Apple or Linux is still small.

Browse tabs

IE8 has made great strides and unique improvements in managing tabs. When you open multiple tabs and launch a new tab from within one of the opened tabs, the color of the newly created tab will correspond to its parent tab color. All tabs of the same color will be grouped together, so your new tab may not appear to the right as usual. Once you get used to the change, it will be a very useful visual signal not found in competing products. A Firefox extension also allows tabs to have different colors, but not logically grouped. When closing the tab of the page you're viewing, the new focus will be the relevant tab, not the right or left tab.

However, there is a weakness related to the tabs that other browsers still hit on IE, including the ability to drag and drop tabs . Here it means if you have a page open in a window and want to drag it to your main browser window, Firefox, Safari, Opera, and Chrome will allow you to do that. In Safari and Chrome, you can even drag a tab to the desktop to open a new window.

This version of IE also improves some of the performance aspects of new tabs . When creating a tab , what you find is much more useful. You can use a variety of fairly useful actions such as reopening closed tabs , start browsing in InPrivate mode (the mode does not save the session to your History ), or select the Accelerator service among the Web services are provided when you highlight text. IE8 is also a browser that allows you to close only the current tabs instead of all of them when you click the X- shaped icon.

Internet Explorer does not have the " Save session and close " option as in Firefox 3, the top option in its Tools menu is Reopen Last Browsing Session , so you still cannot close the last open tab and start completely New as Firefox. While this may not be important, sometimes you just want the browser to be ready without displaying the last page you visit.

Bar and address

Firefox 3 has many innovations with the bar. With the help of your history and favorites , it almost always predicts exactly where you want to go on the web as soon as you start typing the URL.

Maybe Microsoft imitates, but IE8 shows that they have more than they still have in Firefox. Not only display suggestions from your history and favorites , this browser also groups them: by URL , Autocomplete Suggestion (will launch when you most Shift-Enter ), History , Favorites , and Feeds . The results of History have been transferred to the top of the feeds completely optional.

Microsoft has stated that their design experts calculate the design so that Shift-Enter can get you to the site you want. However, Firefox's location bar still has a feature that IE doesn't have: If you enter a cluster, such as " Carnegie Mellon University " or " Ford Motor Co., " with spaces, the browser will make a prediction - mostly true - and take you straight to the organization's site. In IE8, you still have to look in the search results to get the page you need. The reorganization is necessary, but ultimately, the ability to get to the site you want to go to is fast, in this regard, Firefox still proved to be more successful than IE8.

The search function of the browser has also been upgraded with lots of interesting features. For example, you can quickly add any site that has a search box to the list of search providers. Clicking on the search box in IE will appear the icons of those providers, you can now switch between the default search provider to a search provider you want. Suggestions that appear in the drop-down list when you type in keywords can include thumbnails and are grouped into categories - history , favorites , etc. You can click the red X next to the suggestions if Don't want to see them again. Site developers can build searchable catalogs and images using IE8's open XML API.

Another new feature of IE8 that search on the site also works like the same feature in Firefox; however, instead of turning on a new dialog, it resides in the upper part of the browser area and allows you to jump to each event sequentially according to your search. The feature in IE8 will show you the number of events it finds. Besides, like Firefox's site search feature, IE also marks all found items, but only Firefox allows you to turn it off.

Accelerators, Web Slices, other interface improvements

Accelerators introduced in IE8 are basically Web services on the page. To use them, mark some text, then a green arrow icon will appear near. Clicking on this icon will see a list of actions or events, such as search , map , or blog . Choose an action, for example, select " map ", then the map will appear when you highlight its entry in the list of events. This is a great way to collect additional information related to the event you bookmarked without leaving the page you are visiting. Experiment with the word ' Hanoi ', surely you will see the position of Hanoi Capital appear immediately.

WebSlices allows you to easily access frequently updated web data, such as lists or items of a news site on eBay. When you hover your mouse over the content area in a page that supports this feature, a blue box will appear around the content that may be WebSlice , then a green button will appear nearby. Clicking on this button will allow you to create a WebSlice for the page component - a toolbar can pull down updated information on this item at any time. This range of information also appears in your Feed sidebar , allowing you to access from the top left star of your browser.

In this new version, IE8 also addresses the issue that is considered the leading cause of browser slowdown: toolbars . There are indeed too many extension toolbar users may not need them, such as search , links , auto completes , RSS readers , etc. This browser allows you to easily turn off these toolbar without having to access Any settings dialog box. Just click on the inserted X to the right of the toolbar you don't want.

The new Add-on Manager is now not only closely associated with standard add-ons, but also toolbar, search provider, Accelerator , and InPrivate Filtering list (will be introduced later). The interface is pretty good: when you mark an entry, all the details will appear in the panel below, this is where you can, in case the search provider or Accelerator has been set by default. , change its position in the menu or disable it. In Firefox, a link will allow you to browse for new add-ons. However, IE8's selection will not be too much and you will not see the extensions available right in the Add-on dialog .

The new Suggested Sites feature requires activation, which is what you need to do inside Advanced Options . Hopefully Microsoft will make this switch even more intuitive in future releases, but note that it requires you to share your browsing history with Microsoft so that the browser can suggest similar pages.

You can also find a ' one-click ' Favorites button. This button is displayed to the right of the Favorites star icon, when this button is clicked, the browser will add your current page immediately to the Favorite link in the toolbar . However, some people still prefer to drag the site icon to a certain location on the toolbar they want to select. If you use this auto feature, you will surely have to rearrange the location of the links at your disposal. IE also adds domain markup, which will display the main part of the URL in the address bar with a darker and more intuitive color than the rest. This will allow you to quickly see if the page you want to access is actually a phishing site.

One problem with IE is that it lacks a download manager - the feature you'll see in other browsers. Many people understand why Microsoft developers overlook such a useful feature. There will probably be many times when you have downloaded a file but do not remember where they are stored on your hard drive. With Firefox, Opera, and Safari, you can easily find folders that contain them. Besides all three browsers also allow you to pause and restart downloads, even they allow you to search for files that you have downloaded before. Is it possible that IE8 wants to protect the files you download!

Privacy and privacy

IE8 has a lot of security and privacy improvements for web surfers , its Safety menu will take you to the options you need for privacy and privacy. InPrivate Browsing , similar to features in Safari, will hide browser actions for browser history when enabled. You can turn on I nPrivate Browsing when opening a blank tab or from the Safety menu, a bar next to the address bar will clearly show that you have enabled this browsing mode.

This capability in IE8 goes far beyond Safari by enabling you to enable I nPrivate Filtering . This is a feature that blocks websites of third parties, which provide content to the site you are visiting, collecting information from your browsing session. You can even select sites that you will allow access to such data. In fact, you can enable InPrivate Filtering without turning on InPrivate browsing . An icon below the program window will allow you to enable and disable this feature easily.

Another interesting privacy related option also appears when you delete private data. IE8 allows you to delete most of that data but only retains the settings and login information for sites in your Favorites . Since you will surely have to re-enter this information, this is a quite useful option. Internet Explorer 8 puts this option at the top of the dialog box so that users are more easily identifiable.

A key component of IE8's security strategy, SmartScreen filter, blocking phishing sites ( phishing ) and distributing malware ( malware ). When you set foot on one of the sites, you will receive a red page with a warning. Users can ignore this warning, but IE8 will switch this option to the " More informatio n " section asking for another click. If you are not sure about the site you visit, you can check it from the Safety menu, where you can report the destination you suspect contains malicious code.

Another threat to web browsing is cross-site scripting (XSS). In this exploit, you can get an email (taking an example) with a link to access a pretty perfect site, just like a bank's site. However, the cluster of characters attached to the URL will run a script that can send your keystrokes to the malware writer. IE8 can lock this script while still giving you access to the site. In the test we performed, Firefox failed to block the sample XSS site provided by Microsoft, although Mozilla's browser is still thought to be capable of preventing such attacks. Microsoft also said that they have invested a lot of effort in making ActiveX content, data mashup, and data execution more secure.

IE development engineers added an additional defense weapon known as " clickjacking ". The development team described this attack as a technique to trick web users into revealing important information or taking control of their computers. This can happen when you click on what appears as a button, but there is actually a frame overlaid on that button, for example, the buttons in your online account, such as the account e-mail account or online trading account. This new feature allows users to view the site in a separate window. Any weapon that can resist this scam can also be used. According to Microsoft's project manager, James Pratt, IE is currently the only browser that provides clickjacking protection.

Performance, support for standards and stability

Developers for both Firefox 3 and IE8 say they have increased the rendering speed of JavaScript and improved memory and cleanup performance. We ran tests on the 2-GHz dual-core Athlon computer with 1GB of RAM to test those claims. SunSpider performs a variety of JavaScript activities to ensure accurate results. IE8 defeated the beta 2 version of itself in this test, resulting in 10,108ms compared to 12,866ms in beta and far removed from IE behind with the result of 49,587ms. However, IE8 still lost to Firefox 3, (6,701ms) and Chrome (led with 2,689ms).

Microsoft's IE team paid attention to illustrating the importance of this type of measurement. They recorded page load times in Chrome, Firefox, and IE8 for the top 25 websites that are using high-speed video cameras and as a result most of the other browsers have loaded faster than IE8. Try now with MSN and Microsoft.com on Firefox and you'll find Firefox loads much faster than IE8.

Start-up speed has never been a big problem for IE7, but IE8 has improved the browser's Start-up speed a lot more.

The memory usage problem seems to be made more stringent with every bit: Firefox is still the winner but the gap is not as wide as it used to be. It is possible to explain that IE runs many processes, which leads to more system resources, but today it can promote the strengths of multi-core CPU systems. The real benefit of IE lies in that, if a process dies , you won't lose your entire browsing session - you can test it yourself: the browser itself will never crash, even Only if a page generates an error. The Chrome browser runs each process in a separate tab, but it still appears to be less efficient in memory usage than the two browsers.

During testing compatibility with standards, IE8 passed the Acid2 Browser Test (a test that supports CSS) with quite interesting results. However, in the process of testing the Acid3 Web standards, a program focused on DOM (document object model) and JavaScript support, IE8 still produces results like beta 2, getting a score of 20 out of 100, better more than IE7 (only 12 points). However, compared to Firefox 71 points, Chrome 79 points and Opera 100 points, IE still has a long distance.

The IE development team is also very interested in the subject matter, as you can see through the group's blog: This blog has submitted 3,708 test cases for CSS 2.1 to W3C. The ability to navigate the browser on AJAX sites is also improved.

During a test on an external real site, sites that failed to recognize IE8 in previously released beta versions now no longer have this problem. Picasa Web Albums, previously no good render in beta 2, now worked perfectly. Click the Compatibility icon, the icon is like a broken page icon between the URL and the Refresh button, then the browser will render the pages in IE7 mode. Not only can you add sites to the list you always need to use in compatibility mode, but you can also register a list of Microsoft sites that need it.

In a nutshell, Microsoft has done a lot of new things for IE: convenience in browsing, tab behavior, security protection and support for standards, etc. However, despite great improvements. but some are still defeated by Mozilla's Firefox, such as Firefox, which is more economical in memory usage, offers Mac and Linux versions, lots of extensions and has a download manager.