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A Tale of Two Web Browsers

wired.com — A couple of the year's most-anticipated releases -- new versions of Internet Explorer and Firefox -- arrive within a week of one another. So which one is best? Wired Magazine finds out.

Who dugg this? Made popular Oct 26, 2006

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  • thegreatsam, on 10/12/2007, -2/+52The spellchecker in Firefox was/is a great idea.

    Now if only it could force people to use punctuation.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -4/+31Congradulations!
    You are the 100th Site to create a comparison article on IE vs. FF!

    If you really wanna see which one performs best, stop reading everyone elses opinions and start thinking abou your own (That would mean download both and get the feel for which you like most yourself). Im not saying it's bad to read these articles but when you've seen like 4 or 5 of these already, and they just create the same ol' debate over and over again. It just sorta gets a little old...
    (Kind reminds of me of the egg or the chicken!)
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+15Wow how many IE7 vs. Firefox 2.0 reviews will make it to the front page?
  • randomgeek, on 10/12/2007, -1/+14Mozilla = Mosaic Killer.

    Or in street slang, Mozaic Killa - MOZ ILLA.

    Yes it was renamed to Netscape, but the Mozilla Foundation of today isn't a part of the current AOL-owned monstrosity that is Netscape.
  • randomgeek, on 10/12/2007, -9/+20IE continues to catch up, while Firefox continues to innovate.

    Move along, nothing to see here.
  • leobaby, on 10/12/2007, -2/+13I really like that IE and Opera can zoom web pages, not just enlarge text. It makes a huge difference on a high res laptop especially when the width of blogs is static.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+14I've heard mixed reviews of IE 7. Even if IE 7 is lock down, drop dead STELLAR, Firefox has plenty of chance to pull ahead given that Microsoft only upgrades its browser once every 5 years. I guess competition is a good thing. If it wasn't for firefox microsoft windows users would still be waiting for an upgrade to IE.
  • randomgeek, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12Well yeah, but you can't say that IE7 is good simply because competition forced them to make upgrades that were introduced to the market 4 years ago. They've done nothing innovative with this browser at all. They've introduced Tabs, Extensions, and Anti-Phishing - these are all things Firefox has had for years, with the exception of Anti-Phishing which 2.0 has.

    For any one that's *only* used IE for all these years, IE *is* going to be STELLAR, but it's really like comparing XP to ME. Firefox has been so far ahead for all this time, those that use Firefox are looking at IE7 going "so what?"

    In fact, I'll go a step further and say that is isn't that Firefox was ahead, it's that IE was behind. What browsers have tabs? Firefox, Opera, Safari, Camino, Omniweb, Epiphany, Galleon, and more that I can't even think of at the moment. So no, it's not even really that Firefox is "that good" but that IE is just "that bad".
  • Jessehk, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9I still think Opera does not get the credit it deserves.

    All these features the Firefox and IE people are boasting about have existed in Opera for a while now. Spell checking, X's on tabs, tabbed browsing, mouse gestures, optional email and IRC client, a variety of themes ( I'm running the Tango theme on GNOME. It almost looks native), and Integrated RSS support, plus much more I'm missing.

    Also, in case anyone is behind the times, there are NO ads whatsoever.
  • dattaway, on 10/12/2007, -3/+9All that firefox needs now is an extension to combine multi-page articles like that into one page.
  • leobaby, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8thats really funny, do you know where the word mozilla originated?
  • cesclaveria, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6but everyone feels the urge to compare them, in a few years it will be
    IE7.5 vs FF5, and by that point we probably have gone trough comparisons in every point release.



    PS: I want to see one between the 3, Opera, FF and IE
  • Vindstille, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5A comparison of web browsers, and they didn't have a look at Opera!
    People should begin to open their eyes. Firefox and Internet Explorer are not the only browsers out there. Opera, Camino (if you have a mac) and Flicks are very good alternatives (especially Opera).
  • Dracos, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4This is the most hedged "X vs Y" article I've ever read. The only definitive thing the authro says is that Firefox innovates faster (because it's open source).

    Firefox has 93% standards compliance. IE6 has 51%. IE7 has 56%. Saying all of these numbers are good is like saying a F grade is similar to an A.

    If IE's support didn't suck, the so called "web 2.0" would be more impressive, because developers would be able to spend time on their app's features rather than hacking around IE's shortcomings. Where are all the CSS selectors in IE7? Pseudo classes? Namespace support? Complete DOM events? Nowhere. As are a lot of things MS could have added instead of mangling the user interrface.

    Verdict: IE still sucks. Little additional standards support, mostly bug fixes. Never mind that you have to have XPSP2 to run it, and you don't get the extra-special security hacks unless you lateral to Vista.
  • aliengoods, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7Firefox 1.5 is better than IE 7. All that was added to IE 7 is tabbed browsing and some anti-phishing stuff. Where's the debate?
  • rand21althor, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5And besides, those aren't "new" features for a web browser. Microsoft is just catching up on the innovations of other browsers, like Firefox and Opera.
  • Jessehk, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5All the things you are talking about can be simply removed by right clicking on a button and clicking on "remove from toolbar". In addition, all toolbars can be completely customized.

    Look at the way I have opera configured: http://img46.imageshack.us/img46/9484/screenshot1wt3.png

    Mouse gestures (built-in, but only if you want them) replace buttons. A sidebar pops out with a bunch of features and options if I move my pointer the to left side of the screen and click. The contents of the sidebar are also configurable. It can be removed completely. All searches are controlled by keywords in the address bar.

    Google is g, Amazon is am. For example, "am lord of the rings". These can be added in the typical Firefox style by right-clicking on a search field.

    I'm not some sort of fanatic. I just feel that Opera is honestly better and I think people would benefit using it.
  • tdowling, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Here's a pretty little web page that has some info on that...
    http://bugclub.org/beginners/internet/mozilla.html

    "The beast (Godzilla) that ate Mozaic (the browser)."
  • Razster, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Sorry but I like my Opera and it's already installed mouse gestures.
  • dagr8tim, on 10/12/2007, -11/+14IE 7.0 is a rip off of Opera. I just hope that Firefox doesn't suddenly feel like it has to make it's interface similar to Opera & IE.
  • cesclaveria, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7I totally agree with the parent, but this is no place for that.

    Between this 2, FF is the winner, IE7 has nothing really new besides the need for new hacks for it to behave properly.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -5/+8You forgot the stuff that was removed. The thing is damn near useless without the menu bar (yes, I know you can re-enable it, but you shouldn't have to).
    If this is the way MS is moving everything, I dread to think how crap Office 2007 is going to be with its dopey ribbon.
  • i440, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6Not necessarily. IE was the first browser with a phishing filter, for instance.
  • Popdmb, on 10/12/2007, -3/+5Opera is so much better than the both of them. Let's hope the PR team will finally nix the name Opera soon...
  • mnordhoff, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2cesclaveria, don't you mean IE 7 SP 1 vs. Firefox 5.0.3.6.0.0.9.1.2? ;)
  • poracious, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Interestingly enough, IE7 still can't handle xml or xhtml whatsoever, either. The mime types (text/xml, application/xhtml+xml, etc) all cause IE7 to prompt you with a download for an "Unknown File Type". So hooray for tag soup, and everything still being sent as text/html!

    Sometimes I think it's totally not worth trying for fully compliant xhtml and css. :(
  • bluechocobo42, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Have you even used Office 2007? The ribbon interface is perhaps one of the best UI innovations Microsoft has come up with in a while.

    Admittedly, it does take about an hour or two to get used to it, but the benefit of a better flow (click, click over click, select, click, change value, click Apply) outweighs the time it takes to get used to the interface.
  • wmarcello, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I run XP and have ClearType turned on all the time, for every application. No gain for me there.
  • truck87bp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Win98 and ME can't upgrade to IE7...Whats this ?...Oh, Thank You Mozilla, Firefox2 works great.
  • tpaine, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4I dugg the article because I generally agree and I like wired, but I feel they are off the mark a bit on web standards. As a developer I find IE an absolute nightmare to work with. It's easy for the end user to browse some popular sites and say "oh gee, it looks great" but the amount of work someone had to do on the back-end to get it right in both browsers is obscene. It rises the cost of web development and design and it discourages people from using CSS. Sure IE fixed a few things, but they also "fixed" the IE hack that was so widely used to enable one style for IE and another for Firefox. Of all the things to fix .... *sigh*.


    p.s. inline spell checking FTW
  • nontroppo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2in opera: press full-stop — "." then type to find-as-you-type. It highlights all occurrences. F3 finds next instance shift+F3 finds previous instance. Use comma — "," to restrict your search to links.
  • Devz0r, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Innovate? What did they innovate?
  • TimDigg, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4I honestly don't like IE7...not because of some Anti-MS blah blah...but I really don't like the change in layout(which makes wonder how the new office will be received by the masses)

    I constantly forget where the home key is...

    I upgraded to FF2 yesterday, its nice...no noticeable differences yet...but I'm sure they'll arise
  • kurkpeterman, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I find it interesting that none of the reviews I've seen about IE7 make note of it's greatest new feature of all (IMO): ClearType Font rendering for all pages!! This not only affects IE7, but anything that is rendered using the IE engine (in my case: Outlook, Rhapsody,...) I love Firefox 2, but it's definitely worth grabbing IE7 for the apps that use the IE engine.
  • OdinThor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I used IE7 for 10 days, and it seems completely unintuitive to me.

    I really want to use just one Web browser (plus IE when I really have to) but I enjoy both FF and Opera so much that I find myself mixing it up. Part of this is because of my irrational anxiety that has me thinking of how I would hate to see one of these excellent browsers eventually die or turn into a crappy product for lack of a following and me be partially responsible for that (yes, I am more concerned about Opera). I wonder how the browser world would change if Opera/Presto ever became open source.

    BTW, perhaps they could lose the Opera name and instead go with something that emphasizes their Norwegian heritage. Something related to vikings would be cool. [I know, I know, of course the guy with the username OdinThor would say that]

  • detroitsux, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3No, the answer is, "YOU AND ME"

    Having the ability to choose between comparable and free browsers is just what we need. Leave all the ramblings for haters and fanboys.
  • drfloyd5, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2OK, I am going to say it.

    Has it occurred to NO ONE that Microsoft does NOT want IE to be fully compatible. Why would they? There is nothing for them to gain by doing so. What Google is becoming is what MS has been trying to prevent from the beginning of the web's popularity. So MS Released IE5 with the intent to destroy to momentum behind the evolution of Web Designs and Applications, and it succeeded.

    Now with the release of IE7 they "fix" a glitch that made it possible to code for the differences in IE5/6 verses everything else. Rendering a ton of code broken. Now instead of innovating and developing. You are playing catch-up. You always play catch-up when you partner with MS.

    Google and every other company that dreams of delivering applications via the web need to do EVERYTHING they can to ensure that a standards compliant browser becomes as popular as possible. Google is absolutely right for supporting FireFox. It's the platform their code runs on. Google would be out of their mind to try and compete with Microsoft in the Word Processing front using a product Microsoft is in control of.

    And as far as FireFox vs Opera vs XYZ. Stop fighting amongst yourselves and start focusing on the real opponent. You are fighting the wrong battle and loosing the war. You are fighting over the color of the interior of the car while driving off a cliff.

    (And the same goes for KDE vs GNOME vs FLOTW. Get together and create one damn desktop to fight against Windows. Fight the giant. Don't fight over what weapon to kill him with.)
  • poracious, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Actually, to counter my own comment, text/xml is handled - It'll just show you the DOM tree. My bad.
  • jmzook, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This article , like others, ignores one major flaw in IE7. You can't modify the interface in any meaningful way. I get the feeling that I am one of the few who are sticklers for being able to customize things. I have become accustomed to arranging the buttons and search bars in my web browsers a certain way, so for me the locked-in-stone interface in IE7 is psychologically painful to use. I'll stick with Opera.
  • jmzook, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Timdigg, I agree, the button placement in IE7 is idiotic, and the worst part is that you can't change it.

    scroundy , if you don't know, you can put the home button anywhere you want in Opera. All you do is right click on a toolbar, and select "customize". You can now drag and drop buttons and search bars to any toolbar you want, or remove any buttons you do not want.
  • randomgeek, on 10/12/2007, -4/+3What bugs me the most about Opera, and admittedly I haven't used it in awhile, is the horrible interface with all the buttons and tabs. Everything is big and bulky. I also don't like the MDI style, either. One window, one web page. Not one window with tons of web page windows inside it. Also take a look at current browsers, the interface is as minimal as possible. I'm looking at Safari right now and I see: Back, Forward, Home, Refresh, Menu, Search. That's it. Even IE7 is going minimal. Opera, from what I recall, has junk all over the place.
  • otip, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Mosaic Godzilla

    http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/M/Mozilla.html
  • yfph, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1You can also download the tabbrowser pref extension that allows you to customize how you want your tabs to behave and where to place the close button.
  • lane.montgomery, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3This is just a giant invitation for a flame war. It's a good thing most Digg users are Firefox users.
  • BigFoot48, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Go to about:config and adjust the browser.tabs.closeButtons setting to suit your needs.
  • guice, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Standards > All

    When standards between are comparable, then it's popularity and personal tastes. That's why Fx > Opera in some people's good and the other way around in other's. IE7 is still the bottom of the barrel for me due to it's, still, bad CSS standards support.
  • davedekker, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0Has anyone figured out how to have a folder of favorites along the toolbar and "open in tabs" like FF does? one of my favorite features... FF and Safari do it... I haven't played with IE7 much, so it may be hidden somewhere....

    DD

    http://www.trialsoftheswitch.com
  • mojos, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0I needed IE7 for develpment testing. so I upgraded. Tabs are old school by now but the thumbnail view is nice even though i dont see why i would really use it. Opening new tabs takes about 2 seconds in IE7 and there is a little text saying "Connecting..." even though the tab is opened at about:blank. Strange. I even turned off the super annoying pissing filter checker. I dont know what it is connecting to. The refresh and stop buttons are on the right which i hate and you can't move them. favorites are in a sidebar and i can't stand sidebars. there is wasted space if you only have 1 tab open. I like how FF removes that space if you only have 1 tab. Only thing that im impressed with is how you can print a webpage that will fit a whole page. Now my printed directions go on 1 page and i dont have to waste a second page to print a banner. Overall I'm not too happy with IE7. I hope the IE team will be making changes to it soon.
  • dmron, on 10/12/2007, -3/+2Jeez enough of the FF2 vs IE7 articles already... this one offered nothing new to the debate.
  • OleksijRak, on 10/12/2007, -4/+3Firefox rules simply because of it's add-ons ability.
    Opera was my favorite browser for about 2 years, but it has nothing to suggest against Firefox.
    IE7 suggested nothing serious. Is that all that they could do for last 2 or 3 years after IE6 release??
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