If there was any universal immutable truth to the internet, it’s that things vanish from it all the time. Those pages you bookmarked last year? They may be gone. Those forums posts that contained a wealth of useful information? They may be gone as well.

There are several different ways to archive web pages.

You could use ScreenGrab for Firefox. But the problem is that you can text-search anything in an image.

You could use PDF Creator and "print" pages to PDF. This does allow text searching, but the PDF rarely looks anything like the original page and any images present look "off."

What truly works are MHT files. I’ve mentioned this before but have a few extra goodies to make it even easier.

What’s the difference between an MHT and a regular "Save Page As.."? The MHT is an actual single-file archive that contains all the code and images. It’s a great way to archive web pages that contain information you want to save.

Firefox does not have native ability to read or save MHT files, however with UnMHT, you can. It will even read MHTs saved by Internet Explorer, and IE will also read MHTs saved by Firefox. In addition to that, UnMHT has the ability to save all open tabs at once – something that IE 8 doesn’t do.

See video below for details on how it all works.

In our last episode.. I talked about how much web browsers suck. But now it’s time to discuss how great they are.

The best way to describe the greatness of modern web browsers is to point out the features we have now that most people take for granted.

1. Tabbed Document Interface

Most people know this as simply tabs. This was one of the best improvements ever made in a web browser. And said honestly, I cannot browse without them. I first remember first using a tabbed interface with Maxthon (which used the IE engine). IE took a very long time to develop a tabbed version of their own, but finally brought one to the table with IE 7. Better late than never, I suppose.

2. Zoom

I first used a zoom feature in Opera way back at version 5 and it was great. Unfortunately Opera was a pay-browser back then so that was a no-go for me. IE always did have the ability to increase text size but not images (that wasn’t until much later). Firefox always had a zoom but it didn’t work properly until version 3. Fortunately, all browsers now have a proper zoom feature. They will even zoom Flash content now.

3. Better bookmarks

Bookmarks now not only hold information on the URL of the site you want to go to, but also the "favicon" (small image representing the site, should it have one) and can also contain keyword tags in browsers like Firefox.

4. In-browser search bar using search engine of choice

This is something a ton of people take for granted. Early browsers had absolutely no search bar whatsoever. You had the address bar and that was it. If you wanted to search Yahoo, you had to physically go to www.yahoo.com to do it.

Before the search bar there were add-on toolbars for both Netscape and IE. One of the more popular offerings was Google Toolbar (which is still available). However with any toolbar you were forced to the search engine provided and no other.. that is unless you wanted to install yet another toolbar. And of course people remember their Netscapes and IEs back then with 2 or more toolbars in it. Rather terrible. And crash-prone.

Search bars now allow any engine to be used with no additional memory munched up since it’s integrated into the browser.

5. Full screen mode.

This is yet another vastly underrated feature. It is (to the best of my knowledge) universally accessible on the Windows platform by pressing F11 in IE, Firefox or Opera. You press F11 again to go back to windowed mode.

Full screen mode is great because it dedicates your entire screen to whatever web page you’re viewing. In fact, you can make it "book like" by pressing F11, then increasing the zoom a few times (CTRL-plus or just plus in Opera) for maximum readability.

A small note for those looking to buy a netbook: Know your full-screen feature in your browser because I’ll guarantee that you will use it. A lot.

What features of modern browsers do you like?

Chime in with a comment or two.

The web browser is the most used application on your computer, period. Even when you’re not using it, it’s probably minimized to the taskbar/dock/panel.

Unfortunately web browsers still to this day have a fair degree of suck factor. Here are 5 reasons why web browsers suck:

1. Plugins are the browser’s own worst enemy

I call them plugins. Call then "add-ons" or "extensions" or whatever else you want. They’re plugins.

Plugins are a wonderful way to seriously screw up your browser in short order.

In Internet Explorer 8: In Manage Add-ons there is absolutely no way to uninstall anything there. Not possible. This sucks. You can "disable", but not uninstall. This is because add-ons in IE are "tied" directly to external programs. So in order to get rid of it, you must actually go uninstall the program that uses IE – assuming you know which to uninstall.

In Mozilla Firefox: Many plugins create SQL tables internally to the browser in order for them to work. On an uninstall of many different plugins, files are left behind and the SQL tables remain – in several different places. And darned if you know which tables within Firefox you’re supposed to drop. Thought you could kill this stuff with a registry/file cleaner? Wrong. Has to be done manually. This is assuming you actually know where to look.

And, of course, whenever a new version of the browser is released, plugins break.

2. Proprietary crapola

Internet Explorer is the one to blame for this catastrophe. The fact there are still web sites to this day that are "IE only" is simply ridiculous.

And if you put a tag on your site that says, "Best viewed with Firefox", that’s just as bad. You should be ashamed of yourself for doing such a thing.

3. Copy/paste text from a web page is still a nightmare

Sometimes all you want to do is copy a little piece of text rather than type it out. Good luck with that, because you’ll need it.

Some web pages have it so you can copy/paste text easily. But on others when you attempt to highlight anything this huge BLOCK of text is copied. Then when you try to adjust the highlight you made, it gets even worse.

Let’s say for the moment you’re successful in copying some text to the buffer. Okay, we’re good, right? Wrong. On paste into something as simple as Notepad these huge SPACES happen. "Wait, wait.. I didn’t copy any big-ass spaces.." Well, Mr. Browser thinks you did.

Out of frustration you just have to type out whatever you wanted to copy yourself.

4. Printing web pages is still terrible

Some web sites make it easy to print things. For example, many bank web sites smartly offer PDF versions of bank statements for print-out. This is great because PDFs always print exactly the way you see them.

But let’s say you’re not on a bank site and you want to print something out. The text is either too big or too small on the printed page, the graphics (should any exist) look terrible, and what is that font that printed? That’s not what’s on the web page..

5. Slow!

Believe it or not, there was a time when IE was a really fast browser. That was way back at version 3. And it was wonderful.

Believe it or not, there was a time when Firefox was a really fast browser. That was way back at version 1.5. And it was wonderful.

Both are now are memory hogging, plugin-infested lumps of digital slowness.

Want to know why Google Chrome and Safari appear to run faster? It’s not because of less memory consumption or faster scripting. It’s because you’re not using the same plugins as in your IE or FF.

Unfortunately most don’t like Chrome or Safari.

Am I saying to run IE or FF with no plugins at all? Well, if you can browse that way, I’d say go right ahead. Ditch the toolbars and any plugins installed to breathe life back into the browser. It will speed up quite a bit. That is until you open up a few tabs with some Flash, and then.. it.. gets.. slower.. and….. slower…… and, well.. it would be faster for you to go to the kitchen and make a sandwich.

What do you hate about web browsers the most?

Let us know by writing a comment or two.

For those who remember installing Internet Explorer either an an upgrade or fresh install, the process was specifically tailored to replace your default browser settings when electing to use the "Express" installation method. This is no longer the case.

This comes shortly after it was announced that Windows 7 upgrade for UK users would not come with IE 8 preinstalled due to an anti-trust ruling.

What will happen now is that if you choose to install Internet Explorer 8, the first run will be much more straightforward, directly asking you, "Do you want to make Internet Explorer your default browser?"

This is a welcome change that was applauded by not only Windows users but other competing browser software makers, such as Mozilla.

From then to now

Fortunately we now live in a time when most software we install doesn’t try to hijack any settings you don’t want changed. This is drastically different compared to what it used to be like 10 years ago.

For example, in 1999 software like AOL and RealPlayer tried to hijack everything. It was a sad time for computer software back then.

This is not to say that all software stays on the Light Side of The Force. Some titles still do things that are, shall we say, unethical.

Do you know of software that still pulls hijacking tricks?

Let us know in the comments.

How are pre-order sales of Windows 7 doing in the UK? Very well. However there are two major differences compared to the US version.

First, it is required to have a clean install. For most people this means the drive must be wiped in order to use it to get rid of the old Windows (Vista or XP).

Second, there is no Internet Explorer in the UK version. This is probably the reason why the clean install is mandatory for 7. UK’s 7 doesn’t have IE because of a European Commission anti-trust ruling.

Can you install IE 8 after you install the OS? Yes. It will most likely be listed as an optional (keyword there) download in Windows Update. There may even be an icon purposely placed on the desktop that says "Download Internet Explorer" or something similar. And to be honest I hope that’s the case because otherwise a whole bunch of people wouldn’t really know how to get it.

You can’t say, "Download Firefox to a USB stick from another PC, plug it in to the new one and install to 7 that way", because if it’s the only PC the user has, what are they going to do? Go to a command prompt, connect via FTP over to ftp.mozilla.org and get a browser that way? Would you want to instruct a newbie how to do that? Probably not.

This marks the first time Windows will be sold without a browser since Windows 95. For those who remember, the very first edition of 95 did not have IE preinstalled.

It is also clear that Microsoft does appear to have a winner on its hands with Windows 7 on both sides of the pond, even though the UK version is IE-less.

For those of you out there using the Internet Explorer 8 web browser, customizing the Command Bar makes it a lot easier to get to specific functions in IE 8 faster.

This is what mine looks like:

From left to right:

Home, InPrivate Browsing, Internet Options, Page, Safety, Tools, Manage Add-Ons, Zoom

In particular, I really like having the InPrivate, Internet Options, Manage Add-Ons and Zoom there because it saves me from having to hunt for them (as some are quite buried).

To modify, right-click an empty area of the Command Bar, then click Customize, Add or Remove Commands…, like this:

You’ll see this window:

Add, move or remove your selectable buttons in the Command Bar from here.

Also remember that to see all the icons you add in there, uncheck the option for Lock the Toolbars (see screen shot above) so you can drag the bar out to see everything, then re-lock afterwards if you like.

Yesterday a ton of people (possibly you included) received an auto-update from Microsoft patching the security flaw recently discovered in IE 7. If you haven’t received it yet for auto-update you will soon enough.

Not to be outdone, malware authors have already begun work on alternate ways of exploiting security holes in that browser.

One of the ways mention that people get suckered in to getting their PCs infected with malware is by receiving a Microsoft Word document file attachment with an embedded ActiveX control via e-mail, then opening the document which activates the trigger for the control.

I think people need to exercise common sense when it comes to file attachments.

Rule #1 of file attachments from those you don’t know is: DON’T OPEN THEM, period. Don’t do it. Delete it. Don’t bother scanning it or any other of that crapola. Just don’t open it and get rid of it immediately.

Rule #2 of file attachments is that if you do receive an attachment from someone you do know: DON’T OPEN IT.

However, if you feel that you must open an attached document anyway, my suggestion is to use Google Docs or ThinkFree. Just bring the file out of your e-mail, send it over to Google Docs and let that open it up.

"But that’s inconvenient."

What’s more inconvenient? Getting infected with malware or bringing a document into a safer environment to open it? The answer is obvious.

In addition, saying "Use Firefox" or "Use Opera" is not a proper course of action. What is proper, as mentioned a moment ago, to exercise common sense. That alone is better than all the anti-virus/spyware/malware/whatever-ware you have installed on your computer.

You absolutely should not solely rely on software for protection. Use your head and the vast majority of the time you’ll avoid all the bad stuff on the internet.