On 14th March, a new chapter in the never-ending browser war began. In the blue, Microsoft corner, the long-awaited Internet Explorer 9 finally made its official appearance. After several months of open testing of beta versions, we got the finished product, promising high performance and a simple interface, ready to ease your work and entertainment on the web.
Interface
If Internet Explorer 8 was looking after the then-current versions of Firefox in terms of user interface, IE9 is based on the minimalistic philosophy put forward by Google Chrome. All tool and menu bars are gone, replaced with a single bar that contains the address field, tabs and three icons to access all of IE9’s tools and settings. Of course, if you need all the bars, or are just feeling retro, it’s simple enough right-clicking the window surface and restoring a desired bar in its usual place. This graphics interface solution shows that Microsoft has also embraced the viewpoint that the Internet browser is just that - a tool to display web content, and that the browser’s interface must never get in the way of the webpage’s actual content, or even seem dominant; furthermore, users don’t even need the hidden controls most of the time.
Besides the visual ones, IE9 also offers many other improvements and tools for quicker and easier web browsing. “Download Manager” is one such tool, and one noticeably lacking in previous versions of Internet Explorer. This download browser is most akin to the Firefox solution - a simple window to enable you to see the list of current and previous downloads, the original location of the file and where it’s been saved on the hard drive etc., as well as to run, stop and delete downloads. Another novelty is the “New Tab” page - a generic page that will welcome you each time when you open a new tab, and just like a similar page in Chrome, offer the list of most commonly visited websites, as well as the ability to reopen recently closed tabs and windows. One more new feature is the possibility of turning on website tracking, in order for the browser to be able to make recommendations to the user as to other popular websites that may be of interest. This option uses your website history to generate a list of propositions that may be of interest to you, but that you’ve been unaware of (haven’t visited) thus far. “One Box” is a unified dropdown box which displays search recommendations based on your previous searches, but also the particular search engine’s recommendations. Finally, there’s the logical evolution of many browsers’ search homepage, entitled “Pinned Sites” here - you’re now able to drag & drop a particular website onto Windows 7’s taskbar, creating an icon that will enable you to run IE9 and open the desired webpage quickly and easily. Furthermore, using this feature and the integration with Windows 7, websites are now allowed to customise these links with specific commands and shortcuts applicable to the website.
Security
The belief that Microsoft’s browsers are insecure and that problems contained within them are found and amended on a daily basis is still widespread. Of course, all those who’ve been following and testing browser safety are familiar with the fact that this just isn’t true anymore and that IE8 redefined Internet Explorer safety standards to the point where other browsers took to some of them. IE9, just like its predecessor, separates different tabs into different processes, while pinned sites are run as entirely independent applications. This provides maximum browser stability and ensures that one tab crashing won’t affect the functionality of others. What’s more, the “sandbox” model that’s used by these processes ensures that the process can’t take over your PC even if hijacked by malicious software. Like its predecessor, IE9 is actively using the SmartScreen base for recognising malicious sites, but also adds an additional security layer, by scanning every downloaded file in search for malicious code. IE9 also has the ability to filter and shut down all ActiveX controls on various websites, activating only those that you really need.
Besides the already familiar InPrivate Browsing option, habitually called “incognito mode”, after the term introduced by Google Chrome, IE9 also contains the Tracking Protection option, which provides even more detailed and secure settings concerning the information about you and your PC that will be made available to the websites you’re visiting and their partners.
