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Back in 2003 and 2004, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer had between 91% and 96% of the browser market. This number has been shrinking slowly since 2004 when Mozilla’s Firefox was introduced. According to Wikipedia, as of February 2009, Internet Explorer had 67.5% of the market share and Firefox came in at number two with almost 22%. Microsoft, with their latest iteration of their browser, hopes to turn this downward trend around.

I’ve been playing with IE8 since the final version was released last Thursday. It’s fast — lightning fast. In fact, in many of the speed tests conducted by various outlets, IE8 outperformed its browser counterparts. It’s definitely much faster than Internet Explorer 7.

There are many slick features in this latest version worth checking out. Microsoft has implemented Firefox’s idea of a “smart location bar,” which automatically searches through your browser history as you’re typing an address — great for those of us who have visited a page but can only remember a portion of the URL. They’ve also implemented the feature that restores your tabs if your browser crashes, which was sorely missed in IE7. A nice feature with IE8’s tabbed browsing is that each tab is it’s own process, similar to Google Chrome, so if a site crashes on a particular tab, the entire browser will not die on you. Simply close the bad tab and continue browsing. IE8 also does a great job of grouping tabs. When you open a new tab from a particular page, the tabs will change color and Internet Explorer 8 will automatically “group” these tabs by color. This is a handy feature for those of us that like to have many tabs open at a single time.

Microsoft beat Mozilla to the punch with “InPrivate” or anonymous browsing, which will delete any tracks of your web journey when you step back into “normal” mode. Another very interesting and neat, albeit somewhat confusing feature is Internet Explorer 8’s new “Accelerator” feature. Accelerator allows you to select any text on a page, then easily perform everyday web browsing tasks such as mapping or searches without navigating to other websites to get things done. For example, you could highlight an address on a web page, use the “Map with Live Maps” accelerator, then view a map of that address directly on the web page you’re currently viewing. Pretty neat.

Internet Explorer 8 has a ton of great features and is very, very quick, but none of this matters if it cannot display a web page correctly. Once of the very first pages I visited with IE8 was The Whirlwind, my school’s online newspaper. Although the page displays properly in every other web browser according to BrowserShots, a web utility that allows you to see screen shots of any web page in multiple browsers, the site displayed incorrectly in this newest version of Internet Explorer, yet displays just fine in Internet Explorer 7 and dozens of other web browsers. Things are supposed to get better not worse, aren’t they?

Overall, I was very impressed with the speed and additional features Internet Explorer 8 has to offer, but until they figure out a way to display web pages correctly or finally decide to comply with web standards their slowly diminishing share in the browser market will, most likely, continue to decline.

Final Word: IE8 does a good job of implementing many features that are already available in Firefox, either by default or with a plug-in. The “Accelerator” feature is worth checking out and if you have things to hide or are concerned about privacy, “InPrivate” browsing is a must have. I’m a Firefox user and have been for quite some time. Internet Explorer 8 did not impress me enough to make the switch back to IE, but if you are an Internet Explorer user, it would be worth your time to check it out. - JERRY SWIATEK

Microsoft Internet Explorer 8

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At noon today, Microsoft released Internet Explorer 8, the latest version of their web browser. Microsoft touts it as faster, easier, safer, all that stuff. It’s also got nifty features like Compatibility View, which fixes the view of sites designed for ancient browsers.

We’ll try to have a full review sometime in the future. Till then, we’d love to hear what you think about it. Is it worth the upgrade? How does it stack up to other browsers like Firefox and Chrome? Let us know in the comments. -BILL FERRIS

Microsoft Internet Explorer 8

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For every positive and supportive person out there on the internet, there are about 500 people being negative and acting like they’re super-cool know-it-alls. I mean, how was I supposed to know that it wasn’t cool anymore to use Netscape to surf the ‘net? Now I’m being told that no one says “surfing the ‘net” anymore, either. That’s enough from my new character, Guy Who’s Bewildered by Computers in 1998. You get the point.

First, please open up your Firefox web browsing program. Now, click here. Elliott Kosmicki, a web developer, marketing specialist and creator of the productivity website Good Plum, offers up a bunch of useful tips for getting some productivity out of Firefox. From keyboard shortcuts to some very handy extension plugins, Kosmicki offers up eight simple tricks you can use to impress other Firefox users.

Maybe you’re at a coffee shop and you want to look cool? These tips can make you look totally rad for someone who is watching you use a computer. Now I’m being told that people stopped saying “totally rad” a long time ago, then the hipsters brought it back for ironic usage, but now its been abandoned for good. I can’t win! -NICK YINGLING

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I love Firefox. Not only has it proved more stable as a browser than IE (Internet Explorer), and has some great built-in features (like spell check), it has a bunch of great add-ons (or plug-ins, or extensions). Many can be found on the Mozilla site (publisher of Firefox).

I’m going to focus today on the variety of search tools you can add to your browser. What’s really slick, is that this will give you one search box, with a pull-down menu listing all the possible sites to search. You can see some “top” choices for search engines by adding the search box, then clicking on the pull-down menu, and select “Manage Search Engines.” Here are my top five for educators:

1. CC is a Creative Commons search tool that is one of the “defaults” available when you click on “Manage Search Engines”
2. Google and Yahoo! are great, but you can also add Ask.
3. Need some reference sources? Let’s start with Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary.
4. Wikipedia anyone?
5. Search Flickr tags for that perfect photo.

I’m adding one more for elementary, that Yahooligans! (now Yahoo!Kids).

Happy Searching! -ALICE MERCER

Firefox Add-ons

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I remember in 1996 when someone told me that I didn’t just have to use AOL’s web browser to surf “the ‘Net” (that’s what everyone called it back then). Apparently, you could also use Internet Explorer to check out web pages! Surely, such mind-exploding information probably gave me an instant nose bleed.

Jump to early 2004 when someone tells me that there exists a way to put an end to all the rampant pop-ups and regular browser crashes I was experiencing with Internet Explorer. The answer: Mozilla Firefox. A love affair with Firefox blossomed, IE was banished from my computer and I turned into a total snob towards IE users.

Now Google is getting poised to toss their hat into the web browser ring with Google Chrome. Right now its only being released as Google Chrome Beta so they can gather user feedback, but you can see what direction they’re heading in and some of it definitely looks good. You can find out more about Google Chrome by just, well, Googling it, I suppose. But how about I give you a quick rundown while I’ve got your attention?

Pros:

1. Google Chrome is very clean and sleek — that’s probably why they named it Chrome. If the T-1000 from Terminator 2 turned into a web browser, this is how it would look. One thing I initially resisted, but now enjoy is that the status bar at the bottom of the browser is no longer there all the time. Chrome looks a bit like other browsers would in good old Full Screen, F11 viewing mode. At first I felt a little un-anchored on the web page, as though I was about to fall into the screen. Eventually, I started liking it more and more. Even though it’s just a very small part of the window of other browsers, what’s the point in just taking up space at the bottom of the screen and declaring “Done” the whole time? Chrome’s subdued status bar appears in the bottom left only when needed. Seems like I wrote a lot about one small thing, but hey, it’s the little things, right?
2. Stand alone tabs – No longer will a crash on one tab bring down your entire browser.
3. Speed – Chrome definitely seems fast, but without a few weeks’ worth of browser history and add-on browser applications bogging it down, I can’t say I’ve really put it through the paces yet.

Rather than list the following as “cons,” I’ll give Google the benefit of the doubt since this is a beta version.

Wait and see:

1. Safe browsing – I didn’t really buy anything online because this is still a beta version, and payday is next weekend, anyways. Also, I avoided visiting dubious websites because I’m at work and I wouldn’t want to shatter your illusions about me.
2. Web apps aren’t ready – If you’d like to set up Twitbin in Google Chrome so you can follow LEARN NC on Twitter, you’re just going to have to wait until the browser is able to support web applications. -NICK YINGLING

Google Chrome

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The Internet can be an overwhelming place for children, and can prove especially frustrating for those with autism. But these children can benefit just as much, if not more, from educational computer games and activities, as long as these resources are presented with their special needs in mind.

The ZAC (Zone for Autistic Children) browser is the first web browser developed specifically for children with autism and autism-related spectrum disorders like Asperger syndrome, pervasive developmental disorders (PDD), and PDD-NOS. It’s a free, downloadable program that basically takes over your computer, removing other distractions and controls, and simplifies the web, so children can focus and you can feel safe about the content they can access. The browser lets children interact with a diverse, hand-picked selection of games and activities from public Web sites that cater specifically to kids who display the characteristics of autism (impairments in social interaction and communication, restricted interests and repetitive behavior).

ZAC also offers a community forum for parents, caretakers, and teachers to share experiences and resources, as well as informative newsletters that you can subscribe to. The Internet can be a great resource for autistic children, and ZAC ensures that they can get the most out of it! — LAUREN FROHNE

ZAC Browser

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