Firefox 1.0.2
- one product across platforms
- intuitive and streamlined GUI; easy to apply skins and rearrange icons
- completely standards based
- tabbed browsing
- smartNavigation in the address bar
- pop-up blocker by default (can easily turn it on/off via Preferences);
new beta patch for plug-in launched pop-ups
released April 4
- RSS news and blog headlines
in the bookmarks toolbar or bookmarks menu (via Live Bookmarks
feature)
- user scripts which lets users change not only how a site looks, but also how it functions (a.k.a. Mozilla/Firefox "Greasemonkey")
- very useful web developer tools extension available; a wide
variety of other useful extensions available (such as mouse
gestures, etc.)
- auto-update feature checks for newer versions, or on demand
- far superior on Win2k (all SPs) to IE
- March 2005 browser statistics listed at 21.8% ;
Rapidly expanding user base and significant press coverage
- seamless migration from Netscape Navigator or Mozilla
suite browser
- speedy browser for majority of sites
- VERY quick to address emerging security issues and alert users |
Firefox 1.0.2
- trails IE greatly in overall market share
- recently released as a version 1.0 product
- security issues on the increase due to accelerating popularity
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Internet Explorer (SP1 and SP2 versions)
- largest market share;
March 2005 browser statistics list 63.8% for IE
6
- only browser that works with Windows Updates (via web)
- speedy browser for high majority of sites
- the "default" option when a site doesn't load properly (granted this is the site's fault, but still a plus for those who want/need to get there)
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Internet Explorer (pre-XP SP2 and SP2 versions)
- additional security attack surface area (ActiveX COM objects, spyware can easily pose as browser helper objects, "trusted sites" which don't exist on other browsers can be infiltrated by phishing)
- no tabbed browsing
- Mac development has CEASED - no cross-platform solution since IE 5
- Very little development for standards-compliance and innovation; i.e.
CSS / XHTML. Despite repeated statements that Microsoft "supports" standards
pages designed to be compliant in Netscape, Firefox, Safari will often
break in IE. Does not gracefully degrade pages.
- not completely standards based (ex. uses own version of code parsers -> different interpretation of Javascript and DHTML)
- no popup blocking for Win2k or XP SP1 users
- large volume of cases on campus in which an IE user had so much spyware the machine/connection ground to a halt (often requiring a reformat) -> downtime removing spyware or backing up data and formatting |
Mozilla (browser) 1.7.6
- supported last year, current base of campus users is fairly large
- development only recently frozen
- current version similar to Firefox's
latest release
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Mozilla (browser) 1.7.6
- further development has ceased, security/bug fixes only
- product
will become more and more outdated as Firefox continues to
add features
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Opera 7.54
- one product across platforms
- VERY strict adherence to CSS/XHTML. Perhaps
because Hakon Lie, the "father of CSS," is
also the CTO of Opera. See "Cons."
- a new "free" version for education recently released,
no ads
- tabbed browsing, sessions, "wand" password manager, pop-up blocking
- default features such as: mouse gestures, voice
activated browsing (Windows only), mouseless operation,
and Opera Show (browser can be launched as a presentation tool).
In Firefox, similar features require downloading an
extension, or, are not available.
- user style sheets coming in version 8 (in beta)
- Integration with Adobe Creative Suite 2 as of April 4, 2005
- Small-Screen Rendering (SSR) technology reformats
Web pages to fit the screen of mobile phones, eliminating horizontal
scrolling
- Along with IBM and Motorola, submitted to the W3C a
proposal for a multimodal markup language standard called XHTML+Voice
(X+V for short), that provides a way to create multimodal Web applications
(i.e., Web applications that offer both a voice and visual interface).
- user style sheets coming in version 8 (in beta)
- Email questions answered PROMPTLY via telephone from Norway.
Interest in our web evaluation has lead to a WebSIG
Opera demo on April 21
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Opera 7.54
-
VERY strict adherence to CSS/XHTML.This can prove to be
very tedious for web designers and developers seeking to validate
the same web page against many platforms/browsers. See
"Pros."
- Downloading the education version involves filling out an application
and waiting for a password from Opera. Tedious for testing
purposes.
- GUI can easily become overwhelming and cluttered; provides lots
of information and alternatives, but, SO many choices as to prove
frustrating and difficult to manage
- has web developer tools extensions, but they are difficult to find,
download, and access quickly. In general, Opera extensions are
not nearly as easy to find, install and use as Firefox's.
- small market share; as of March only 1.8%;
not as widely adopted if you're looking at a product besides
IE
- seems more secure than IE and Firefox; however, is this "security
due to obscurity?"
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