Internet Explorer fights back

In a previous post I wrote about how Mozilla Firefox during the last 4 years slowly grew in popularity among Internet users, until it finally became a threat to Microsoft, who finally decided to refresh good old Internet Explorer by releasing version 7 in late 2006.

Internet Explorer 7 was a “catch-up” release, which finally included many of the usability features that had made Firefox so popular, like tab browsing, support for RSS feeds, stronger security and better compliance with web standards. However Microsoft wasn’t clearly aiming at the stars with IE7, since Firefox was still far superior in terms of page rendering and JavaScript performance, as well as remaining the browser of choice for web designers to check their site’s compatibility with W3C standards.

Obviously Firefox wasn’t that much of a threat after all, since Internet Explorer managed to maintain the biggest slice of the browser market share to date. Most likely for the same reasons that put Microsoft in trouble with the antitrust case against the US Justice Department in 1998: bundling with the world’s most popular operative system.

However, when Google releases a browser, it’s a completely different story. Google’s solid position on the Internet market combined with its business model of free services give the company a great marketing potential. This potential can be used as a highway to mass-distribute software, much in the same way Windows served to put Internet Explorer on the majority of PCs in the world during the 90′s. And Microsoft must have sensed that threat.

It doesn’t come as a surprise then, that yet a new version Internet Explorer is about to hit the market, this time quicker than ever. In fact, if it took Microsoft roughly 5 years put Internet Explorer 7 out the doors (from late 2001 to late 2006) , the first public release of Windows Internet Explorer 8 was made available a mere 1,5 years later. The browser is currently in its beta 2 phase and is available for download here. Microsoft says that with this release it has focused on increasing JavaScript performance and provide full compliance with web standards, especially CSS.

I am currently giving IE8 a spin, and I will soon post my impressions. In the meantime, have someone already tried it? What’s your opinion? I’m curious to hear.

/Enrico

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Enrico Campidoglio

Hi, I'm Enrico Campidoglio. I'm a freelance programmer, trainer and mentor focusing on helping teams develop software better. I write this blog because I love sharing stories about the things I know. You can read more about me here, if you like.