The release of Internet Explorer 8 hasn’t been sufficient to halt the decline of Microsoft’s mighty and once near-unchallenged browser. Figures released by the browser-watching boffins at Net Applications show that as of April Internet Explorer dropped to an all-time low of 66.1% of the world’s browser market, down just over two points from six months ago.

The steady fall in Internet Explorer’s popularity has been mirrored by the climb in Firefox, Safari and Chrome, which in the past six months have all hit new milestones.

November 2008 saw Firefox finally nudge its way over 20% share, with the current figures pegging the open-source browser at 22.48% and trending to hit 25% before the year is out.

In the following month Chrome broke into single digits – a figure that might tempt one to dismiss Google’s shiny new browser but for the fact that it’s now sitting at 1.42%, more than twice the share of the longer-lived Opera.

Safari seems to be enjoying even better fortunes, rocketing from 6.57% in October 2008 to 7.93% in December and then bursting to the current 8.21%.

On a per version basis Internet Explorer 7.0 tops the chart at 44.51%, well ahead of Firefox 3 at 20.25%, Internet Explorer 6 at 17.52%, Safari 3.2 at 4.29% and Internet Explorer 8 at 3.99%.

The Internet Explorer tide is turning in favour of 8.0, of course, with the two previous editions show a definite dropping off — although some users appear to be moving to a competing browser instead of following Microsoft’s preferred upgrade path, which now includes IE8.0 being pushed to users through the automated Windows Update service.

In an interview with US publication Computerworld, a Net Applications spokesman said that if Internet Explorer’s downwards trajectory continues the browser would dip below a 50% market share by mid-2011.

“Is there an end to IE’s decline?” ponders Vince Vizzaccaro, Net Applications’ executive vice president of marketing. “I don’t know. I never thought they would drop this far. IE had such a huge market advantage, and Firefox, in a competitive environment, continues to gain share. We’ve seen some seasonal flux [to Firefox’s share], but now it’s just continuing to go on an upward trend.”

It is currently available for download in 25 languages on the Microsoft website and can be downloaded to Windows XP, Vista, and Server in either 32-bit or 64-bit editions.

This launch follows behind the release of Silverlight Beta, and the preview of Expression Blend 3 web design and prototyping tool.

It would seem that Microsoft is finally delivering for the people.”Customers have made clear what they want in a Web browser — safety, speed and greater ease of use,” Steve Ballmer, chief executive of Microsoft said in a statement (conveniently managing to avoid mentioning anything about standards compliance, even though that is a greatly improved area in IE8.) “With Internet Explorer 8, we are delivering a browser that gets people to the information they need, fast, and provides protection that no other browser can match.”

The browser leaves much to be desired when it comes to JavaScript and extensions however Microsoft claims it packs a little more punch than Mozilla’s Firefox in its initial no add-ons state in terms of browsing capabilities. For example it is equipped with Accelerators, tab assistance, search improvements and WebSlices. InPrivate browsing also known as “porn mode” which leaves no evidence that a browsing session ever existed to those who use the PC after you, additionally it prevents the monitoring of your browsing activities by third parties. Microsoft now has a Smart Address bar which is similar to Firefox’s “Awesome Bar.”

Microsoft really needs to pat itself on the back this time for launching its first standards compliant browser. This means that it fully supports Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) 2.1. Older versions of IE required backward compatibility on Microsoft’s thoroughly broken interpretation of web standards. IE8 comes equipped with a standards mode and an IE7 mode, which allows users to render sites which have been built to previous IE specifications. IE8 comes with an “auto render” mode that uses a Web site list which has determined which sites are known to have trouble rendering correctly in IE8. If someone happens to stumble upon one of those sites while browsing then it will automatically render in IE7 by default.

You can download IE8 here, though as usual if you work in a large organisation there’s a high chance you have a lazy IT manager clinging to IE6 because it is compatible with all the lazily written apps produced or commissioned by the IT department. In that case you’ll need to find a way to break the download and installation restrictions on your work PC and simultaneously lobby the IT manager’s boss to understand why tying the company to a five year old web browser is going to be bad for the company in the long term.

Source: APCMag.com

The company claims that under its own test suite, IE8 is capable of loading web pages three times faster than Firefox, and one third quicker than Chrome.

Microsoft has hit some rough spots since the release of Vista, and its once unassailable browser market share has been on a perpetual downward trajectory. In an attempt to win back both developers and users who have begun to stop focusing their development efforts on Internet Explorer users, the company has even produced a 14-page report and video to prove their claim.

Lab tests are great, however typically their results are very difficult to reproduce in real life. In this particular test, conducted in January 2008, Microsoft loaded the 25 largest websites, at faster rates than other browsers.

The company also kept add-ons to a minimum: by running tests with no browser plugins, add-ons or third party toolbars, and a minimum of three in some instances, the browser was able to load faster. Under normal, everyday use this would be next to impossible.

The page load times were measured using “visual cues” or a combination of visual cues and the page interaction to be sure the page had actually loaded. The company felt relying on the done notification would have provided results that were inconsistent on some sites, such as those which contain AJAX.

Under normal circumstances this information really wouldn’t be news unless you were a developer, however in this instance the use of the browser has tanked dramatically, and Microsoft is grappling in effort to get the attention of both the industry and its customers.

Source :APCMag.com

Word surfaced Monday of a Web “comic book” introducing Google Chrome, the search giant’s long-rumored open-source browser project. While the illustrations, created by cartoonist Scott McCloud, were not announced by Google, they do contain the quotes and likenesses of 19 Google developers.

A Web comic, reposted on Google Blogoscoped, introduces Google Chrome.

(Credit: Google Blogoscoped)

The detailed, 38-page comic appeared on Google Blogoscoped, an unofficial Google blog. Update: The comic is now available on Google Book Search. The book is broken down into five main sections covering stability; speed; search and the user experience, security, and standards. Here are the key features, according to the book:

Browser tabs will be detachable.

(Credit: Google Blogoscoped)

Stability
Each tab will run in its own process. These processes will be completely isolated from each other, will be killable from the operating system’s process manager, and will be sandboxed to prevent them from accessing information on the user’s computer. This architecture should lead to a more stable and more consistent browsing experience–performance of the browser should not degrade over time.

Google is using its search index to prioritize testing of the browser–the pages that are linked to the most from Google Search are getting the most automated hits to make sure Chrome is behaving correctly on them.

Speed
The browser is being written with WebKit, the open-source engine at the core of Apple’s Safari and Google’s Android. The browser is also getting a new Javascript virtual machine, V8. It’s said to be a better solution for complex and rich Web applications–it should yield better performance as well as “smoother drag and drops” in interactive applications.

Search and user experience
In Chrome, browser tabs will take over the interface, becoming the primary navigational element. Each tab will get its own window controls. Users will be able to tear off tabs into standalone windows. (Related: developers will be able to control which window controls appear in a tab, creating, if they wish, Web applications that are embedded in a browser but that appear to be more like traditional desktop apps.)

Chrome’s URL entry field will be called the “Omnibox,” and, like Mozilla’s “Awesome bar,” will feed you suggestions based on your browsing history and live search results. It will be respectful of users, the comic says: “Inline completions will never flicker, never flash. It’s perfect, aesthetically non-distracting.”

Chrome will integrate URL entry and search queries into the Omnibox.

(Credit: Google Blogoscoped)

The browser’s default start page will show thumbnails of the user’s most frequently visited pages and a list of their top searches. There will also be a private browsing mode, as IE 8 has.

Security
Chrome’s architecture lends itself to secure browsing. Each Web page, or tab, runs in its own process, and is blocked from accessing other processes on the computer. “We’ve taking the existing process boundary,” the comic says, “and made it into a jail.” Different and more flexible permissions are being developed for plug-ins, however.

A database and API to access phishing and scam sites will be used in Chrome (and made public), which will hopefully reduce “zero-day” scam exploits. The browser will be constantly updated with this information.

Standards
The browser will be released as an open-source project. Also, Google will build the open-source local runtime Gears into the browser, and is hoping that it is taking up widely to “improve the base functionality of all browsers.”

Yes, this is big
CNET News.com Editor in Chief Dan Farber’s analysis of Google Chrome Monday was this: “It would be in line with other Google open-source projects, such as OpenSocial and Google Gears. Creating a competitor to Firefox, as well as Internet Explorer and Opera, could spur more innovation.”

“Open sourcing the code is a smart way to avoid the ‘Google wants to take over the world’ fear, but it seems that Google has ambitions to create a comprehensive Internet operating system, including a browser, applications, middleware and cloud infrastructure.”

The browser’s start page will show thumbnails or previews of the user’s most visited sites.

(Credit: Google Blogoscoped)

No official confirmation from Google yet, although Kara Swisher of All Things D cites sources who say that Google will make a Chrome download available to users by as early as tomorrow.

Source : CNET-News.com