Battle of browsers at its peak

The availability of browsers like Opera and Firefox alongside IE has caused serious confusion to lots of Internet users within the past two years or more. This article is Star Tech's effort at solving this confusion.

Internet Explorer has for a while been the sole browser for users all over the world. Microsoft shipped Internet Explorer as the default browser in all versions of Microsoft Windows since Windows 95 OSR1. The last major upgrade to Internet Explorer 6.0 was included in Windows XP Service Pack 2 and Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 as the Beta version of Internet Explorer 7. The preview version of IE has been available since July 27, 2005.

Due to its initial foothold in this sector, IE has the maximum number of users worldwide.

One of IE's major competitors is Mozilla Firefox, a free, open source cross-platform, graphical web browser developed by the Mozilla Corporation and other volunteers.

After the initial release of Firefox 1.0, the browser never looked back. The browser had over 25 million downloads in 99 days. Could these 25 million be the disgruntled users of IE 6? Highly possible!

Due to its unnerving success, the browser also acquired national acclaim through Forbes and 'The Wall Street Journal'. And its number is still growing.

But Opera is still a worthy opponent in this triple threat bout!

The browser got its name from the software company of the same name based in Oslo, Norway.

The browser runs on a variety of operating systems, including Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Solaris, FreeBSD and GNU/Linux systems and mobile phones too.

So what makes Opera and Firefox special?

First and foremost, Firefox has a very neat and clean interface compared to IE and Opera. Firefox supports tabbed browsing, which allows users to open multiple web pages in the same browser window.

Users no longer have to minimise a window and check the other window of IE they have opened.

Similarly, Opera gives users the same option of tabbed browsing. Additionally, users can save these windows as a session for latter use.

Firefox blocks pop-ups, supports various forms of keyboard navigation such as tabbing navigation and caret navigation, "find as you type" feature, a built in search engine and a "custom keyword" facilities feature.

Opera, on the other hand, allows the use of access keys, mouse gestures, page zooming and "fit to windows" options.

These unique accessibility features were not available in IE 6, which has caused the browsers to gain an edge over it.

Also in their respective arsenal, these two browsers have lots of unique aspects, which caused Microsoft to wake up and smell the coffee.

Opera offers a download manager, through which files, images, videos can be efficiently downloaded to the computer. Firefox has a similar feature too.

Firefox is highly customisable enabling users to activate and deactivate features according to their whims and wishes.

Opera users can also customize user interfaces themes, allowing users to change the location and style of toolbars, buttons and menus.

As far as standards are concerned, these two browsers are fighting a head to head battle.

Firefox has extensive support for most basic standards including HTML, XML, XHTML, CSS, ECMA Script (JavaScript), DOM, MathML, DTD, XSL and XPath. The browser also supports PNG images and variable transparency.

Up to its 6.0 version, Opera supported most common web standards, Netscape plugins and some other recent standards such as WAP and WML for wireless devices.

Version 7.0 introduced the faster and more powerful Presto layout engine. Version 8.0 introduced support for Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) 1.1 Tiny.

The two browsers have their own range of unique features also.

Opera can reformat any webpage for narrow tall view-ports, such as smartphones and PDA displays. This can also be used with Panels.

There is also an Opera Mini, a free compact browser for mobile phones and other handheld devices. Opera Mini has Java ME installed in it.

This uses Opera's servers to render and compress pages before sending the binary data to a small display program run by the phone. The method makes many pages mobile-compatible.

Firefox browser has been translated into a number of different languages like Hindi, Latvian, Thai, Vietnamese, Malay, Arabic, and Persian. Firefox also has "Live Bookmarking" features that allow users to dynamically monitor changes to their favourite news sources.

These are some of the major features of the two popular browsers. Microsoft has identified these strengths of the two browsers.

Therefore, the IE 7 has features like tabbed browsing, Quick Tabs, and treating tabs. With this new feature, user can find, open, close, and refresh opened tabs easily.

The new IE also has International Domain Names (IDN) support with anti-spoofing technology, a search box to aid fast searches, support for per-pixel alpha transparency in PNG images and Web feed support.

Remember those irritating pop-ups which was one of the reasons for the downfall of IE 6?

Well the IE 7 has ActiveX Opt-In blocks ActiveX Control unless it allowed to be installed. This feature improves security from unverifiable and vulnerable controls.

Also, a number of improvements to CSS and HTML support have been made.

Microsoft has also improved other features and fixed bugs which caused problems for developers in version 7.

Also, IE 7 is no longer integrated with the Windows Explorer shell and old protocols and technologies like Gopher, Telnet, CDF, DirectAnimation, XBM and Scriptlets have been removed.

Therefore, IE is putting up a fight through its Beta version. Rumour has it that the original release of the IE 7 may have a number of other unique features that will once again make it "the King of the Browser Hill."

But Microsoft should tread carefully as Mozilla Firefox and Opera may have other tricks up their sleeves.

Whatever the consequences, things are and will just get better for users through this battle of the browsers.