Tony Yarusso's Blog

Okay, now for the explanation about the BBC.  I thought I should start off with something basic.  Now, that first issue of course is web browsers.  Why?  Well, anyone viewing this page right now is using one, so this affects 100% of those reading.  This also means that the web browser is most likely the main means of interaction between you and your computer and the greater internet.  Additionally, depending on your choice of browser, it may also be the single greatest threat to the security of your computer and all of the data on it as such.  So begins the discussion of the web browser.

I'll start this one bluntly.  If you're using Internet Explorer to view this post, read fast, because you need to get something else fast.  Go download one of the things mentioned below, and disconnect your internet connection until it is installed.  What gives me the foundation for such a strong statement?  Well, consider today's BBC article, "Microsoft warns on browser bugs".  Not only is there yet another bug in Internet Explorer causing security risks, but Microsoft actually bothered to release a warning to the public this time, so it's not just me making stuff up if any of you thought that.  Actually, it's three bugs, not one.  Granted, one of them is a fairly harmless little thing that just makes your browser crash on certain web sites.  No big deal, just annoying.  The other two, well, they let websites not only access but take control of your computer.  A bit worse than annoying.  In fact, security firm Secunia lists it as "Extremely Critical".  Microsoft's advice is to not visit any web site you can't trust, and not open attachments in e-mails.  Mine is get a different browser.  There should be a patch for the bug released on April 11th, they claim.  By the way, while you contemplate that date (that's two weeks from now), you should know that two separate studies by computer security firms found that all modern versions of Windows, if lacking patches, took between one and one and a half hours to be hacked.  Oh, and by the way, there are bugs currently in IE that Microsoft doesn't even intend to patch, preferring to just let consumers wait until the next release.  So, you have 60 minutes of internet time over the next two weeks; use it wisely - or get a better browser.

All right, so there's a bug right now - what's the big deal?  Well, you're right, if it were the first bug, it really wouldn't be.  The problem is it's not.  It's not uncommon for there to be multiple bugs found in a given week.  Over time, that adds up to a whole lot of things that have been wrong with it.  On top of that, any given problem is compounded by the fact that Internet Explorer is integrated into the operating system, and many other things use it in a very close relationship, meaning that once it's broken, lots of other things can get broken really fast.  This is also connected to the e-mail attachments issue, as they are more of a problem when an e-mail program such as Outlook Express is communicating directly with Internet Explorer.  That doesn't even begin to discuss the fact that it operates with utter disregard for web standards, such as those adopted by the W3C, causing web sites to show up differently than they should with proper coding.  Additionally, besides all the bad things about it, there's just not a whole lot of good things to balance them out.  For instance, it's out of date.  The latest update is a year and a half old.  The default shipped with XP in 2001.  That's a long time in the internet world.  It also has a distinct lack of features, most notably tabbed browsing, a serious productivity enhancer.  Maybe some of those reasons are why its market share has been declining since 2002.

Okay, enough about that.  Maybe you're convinced you should look elsewhere, but what else is there?  Well, there are actually quite a few web browsers available - I have a list of 15 - but I'm going to narrow it down to 2 for you.  The first you may have heard of, maybe brushing it off as techie-talk that wasn't really important, or maybe you've actually been one of the 150 million downloads it's already had since the first release.  I am of course talking about Mozilla Firefox, the new hot player on the web browser scene, rebuilt from the ground up starting with released code from Netscape (remember them - they're the ones who challenged IE seriously in the market last time).  The browser starts out light, but I love it largely because it is "extensible", meaning anybody who wants to can write a little mini program that you can install tacked on to Firefox to enhance its capabilities or add a cool feature.  If you want to know about some of those extensions, I've tried over a hundred, but that's another day's discussion.  It's had a small number of bugs, being a startup, but those have all been addressed quickly, and there are not any outstanding right now, and it is considered quite safe and stable.  If you want something fairly mainstream and like to play around and get lots of cool stuff, this is the one for you.  Even better, Firefox is open source, so you have an ideological perk there too.  Oh, and of course it doesn't cost a cent, obviously!

The other option is the Opera web browser.  This one is proprietary, not open source, but still completely free monetarily.  It also is not extensible, a big reason I don't use it for more of my work.  However, it definitely has its strong areas.  Opera is known for being extremely fast, rock-solid stable, and is one of the very elite few in the browser market that have passed the rigorous Acid2 test for standards compliance.  In all three of those areas, it is the unchallenged champion.  I still use Firefox a lot for my favorite extensions and keyboard shortcut layout that I prefer, but if I need fast, stable, and compliant browser, I go to Opera.

If you read this even without using Internet Explorer to start with, good for you.  Maybe it was because you don't run Windows, and IE is only release for that now.  Don't worry, both Firefox and Opera are "cross-platform", meaning that they'll work on Windows, Mac, Linux, and some other operating systems.  Mac users, yes, I realize I haven't mentioned Safari.  I'll give you that it's widely highly regarded; I just haven't used it much, so can't talk about it intelligently.  So, go ahead and give either or both Firefox and Opera a test drive, and see what you think after a few weeks.  Don't forget to check out the extensions for FF.

[Edit:]  Oh, I almost forgot to mention that Firefox was #1 on PC World's list of The 100 Best Products of 2005.  (Ubuntu 5.04 made #26.  Opera 8 also made the list at #88.)

Enjoy browsing the internet better.