Why you should dump IE

[Floppyman]

Originally posted by HAL9000 Blah blah blah... I have yet to receive a spyware browser hijack or virus thru IE... mebbe some people just need to learn safer internet habits.

Read my first post again...I wasn't looking for something that I shouldn't have been and it happened to me.

[HAL9000]

I read it, run IE and AdSubtract... no popups, no banner ads, run AdAware and Spybot once a week and have never found anything more than the standard old tracking cookies.

I HAVE run thru questionable sites that people have had the same problems on... fly thru it witout a prob.

Don't drive a Ford either.. mine caught on fire while parked and shut off.. .not safe.

[fftaz336]

I just switched to firefox .9 and I am loving it. It is so much faster thatn IE.

[HAL9000]

I hardly find it faster... find it VERY choppy loading images.

[TwoRails]

I actually haven't had any probems with IE either, but the speed feature is what I'm paying attention to. The site I frequent the most is right here, and even with 1.5 broadband, I feel like I'm on dialup, often taking 2-3-4 minutes just to load a post.

[Floppyman]

I still don't see why anyone here is not giving an opera a chance. If you don't like the buggyness of Firefox/Mozilla etc., why not try it?

[HAL9000]

I tried opera.. didn't mind it.. but I'm not paying for it to get rid of the ads.

[TwoRails]

Are the ads that intrusive?

[Vigo]

"My argument is simple: the benefits of using IE are too few - and the faults too great — to put off the adoption of an alternative any longer."

People will stay with IE as long as web developers program for IE first and other browsers second. Most lowl-key developers don't even bother developing sites while keeping mozilla-type browsers in mind. ASCII is another factor.

I don't put features, security (since I experience few problems security wise with any of the browsers I use), gimmicks, anti-trust arguments, he-said she-said, "fight for the little guys", etc, etc- at the top of my priority list.

I use IE because it has less trouble viewing all websites on the WWW than any other browser. I think a lot of people also enjoy that convenience. So until ALL developers consider ALL web browsers then the benefits of IE may be few but more important.

"The absolute worst browser when it comes to supporting the standards is Internet Explorer."

That must be a joke. Or maybe just a very narrow viewpoint.
IE is the standard for web developers. Anyone who develops a website and wants to generate traffic codes for IE first. And as mentioned IE is much more forigiving with html code then other browsers. I can't count how many MMORPGS, personal sites, and portals I've dealth with where there webmaster clearly states "screw the rest of the browsers". Its more work and that ammounts to more money (key factor for small businessess and novice developers). I myself said the words "screw Opera". Not because I dislike Opera, but because Flash layering in Opera isn't possible and there isn't a way (as far as I searched) to get some of my layered flash embeds to display properly.

And if you're already responding with "yes, but web developers would place other browsers higher on their ladder if we all switched" - if it truly worked like that then we'd all be using linux as our primary OS.

I don't think the article was very good at all. It was very one-sided and narrow minded. A web browser's first priority is displaying web pages. IE does it the best (sometimes i consider it unfortunate).

"I know, I know — you may have heard the same thing before from those that think it’s cool to hate Microsoft; but I’m not one of those guys."

He obviously needed to come out and say it because the article itself paints a different picture.

[Xayd]

It doesn't matter at this point, though. IE's death has been declared, there are no new features coming for it.

What happens when a standard comes out which surpasses IE's functionality (there are a few already)?

People will either deal with "the internet being broken" or get another browser. That will be the choice.

BTW there's more than one browser in the Mozilla project, for those trying it. Personally I don't care for Firefox/Firebird, it's too beta for me and still has some annoying bugs. But that's what you get with something that says 0.x as it's version number .

If you want a stable and 95%+ bug free browser, the full Mozilla suite (ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mozilla/releases/ ) is on version 1.7 now and quite stable in each of its components (browser, mail, html/css editor, and even an IRC client).

Oh, and Hal, one reason that Outhouse Express is unusable: proper IMAP standards compliance. It has NEVER been IMAP compliant and I'm not about to patch or modify my mail server to support a crappo mail client.

[0wain.]

Hello. i installed firefox 0.9 but it gets refused connection. i have checked in the options that it direct connects to the internet, i have a router but never had any trouble with IE connecting.
cheers.

--------------EDIT------------

working fine now

[HAL9000]

Originally posted by TwoRails Are the ads that intrusive?

I think so... I want to see what I'm browsing, not a big chunk of the window taken up by an advertisement for some crap I'm not intrested in anyway.

[TwoRails]

OK, thanks

[snooker]

Hi ... Here 2 more articles that fits this post if you care to read it ...

http://www.securityfocus.com/columnists/249

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/06..._crosses_line/

[AlwaysUp]

Amen, Hal9000. It infuriates me when folks find it more expediant to switch from a good product because they find the effort of taking precautions too much effort. You can lock down IE and OE. Microsoft is the big boy on the block so they are a much bigger target. For hackers and malicious code writers everywhere. Don't think that other browsers are so much more secure when they are not being sniped at like Microsoft products are. I generally ask those folks that have let their systems get to the point of inoperability....have you kept up to date with critical updates and security updates in Windows update? Ah what's Windows Update? Do you keep virus defination files current on your AV software? Uh well, I got McAffee when I got my computer three years ago! What is using a different browser gonna do for these lazies? I have no spyware, don't experience popups or pop-unders except from sites that I don't block, like PCMech. BTW, is there anyway to stop that pesky newsletter popup from happening, even though I have been subscribing from since we started it? Right on Hal9000!

[AlwaysUp]

Xayd, you forecast IE's death and declare it a done deal? I would fear for my credibility, if I made such a statement.

OE, unuseable? Darn, I been using it for years and have never failed to get my messages to others or experienced any other "real world" problems with it.....huh, I must have just thought I was satisfied.

[snooker]

To all IE user's ... You should read this its a security warning

http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105_2-524...=zdfd.newsfeed

http://news.com.com/Web+site+virus+a...3-5248279.html

[Xayd]

Originally posted by AlwaysUp Xayd, you forecast IE's death and declare it a done deal? I would fear for my credibility, if I made such a statement. OE, unuseable? Darn, I been using it for years and have never failed to get my messages to others or experienced any other "real world" problems with it.....huh, I must have just thought I was satisfied.

I'm not forecasting it, Microsoft has. They announced several months ago that there would be no future versions of IE past 6.0, there would ony be security updates for it.

They quit.

[kev7555]

OK, I'll bite. I am an IE user who has never really considered other alternatives, probably for the reasons mentioned (familiarity, not a seasoned user, etc.) but you've got me thinking about it.

Personally, I've never had any of the problems noted (browser hijacks, slowed performance, etc) but I am anal about updating software security, updating virus definitions and using anti-spyware.

ANTI-SPYWARE

Didn't see anything mentioned about this...
If one uses Spywareblaster to keep adware/spyware out of their computer to begin with, these problems usually don't arise (again, updated regularly). Products like Lavasoft Adaware 6.0 and Spybot Search and Destroy quickly and efficiently remove anything that SPW-Balster doesn't catch. And they allow the user the option to select what will and will not be removed, based on the severity of the threat. I remove everything that I didn't specifically ask to download.

All of the above-mentioned products are FREE, BTW...

I'm not advocating one browser over any other (especially since I already stated I haven't tried others) but I simply haven't had the security or performance problems mentioned in the original post.

Please excuse a greenie question while I'm here...

Why does Spywareblaster (which I feel is a great program) have a specific patch for guarding against Mozilla Firefox (or am I reading the user instructions improperly)?

Thanks for the info and I will try Mozilla after a little more investigation.

-Kev

[ja83]

Yeah I just starting using Mozilla Firefox a couple days ago after I reformatted my HDD because of the spyware. My brother actually told me about it, and I tried it. It is 10 times better than IE. No pop ups and no spyware. I can get use to this, lol!

[raftero]

i tried firefox and liked some features(no adds etc.) but wasn't completely satisfied so decided to un-install and try something else. i don't know why but now the programs i had in task bar wont open ,they say cant find firefox when i click on them,and i can no longer drag from favorites to desktop for quick launch.i have a post in xp-w2k forum on this. anyway i screwed up my spare computer with this glitch.so be careful.

[glc]

http://www.theregister.com/2004/06/2...itch_explorer/

[snooker]

Thanks glc ... This bit here goes with your post


US-CERT: Beware of IE
By Ryan Naraine

The U.S. government's Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) is warning Web surfers to stop using Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) browser.

On the heels of last week's sophisticated malware attack that targeted a known IE flaw, US-CERT updated an earlier advisory to recommend the use of alternative browsers because of "significant vulnerabilities" in technologies embedded in IE.

[patrickt]

Preaching to deaf ears isn't nearly as irritating as being preached to. Have you noticed it's the bizarre churches that do the most proselytizing. I'm in the camp with those who've never had a problem, never been hijacked, don't have popups or banner ads, and simply don't have a problem. I don't have a particularly fast connection, since I live in Mexico, but I certainly don't wait 2, 3, or 4 minutes for a post. With the cache cleared I wait 4.5 seconds for the PC-Media Tech Forum to open and I can live with that.

Oh, and I would have posted my scores on the test that was referred to earlier but since my browser blocks popups, I couldn't complete the test. It wasn't worth disabling the popup blocker for that site.

I've also noticed a lot of people use Opera or Firefox or whatever and they have Internet Explorer for those sites where Opera or Firefox or whatever doesn't work.

Edit: it took six seconds for this post to load.

[snooker]

Multiple browsers frame injection vulnerability , try a little test and see for yourself if your pass , click link below

http://secunia.com/multiple_browsers...rability_test/

Afterward if it doesn't go back to this link below

http://secunia.com/advisories/11966/

http://secunia.com/advisories/11978/

[aym]

The demo doesn't work with Firefox 0.9.1, haven't tried it with older versions.