Internet Explorer

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IE 7 To Adopt Firefox RSS Icon

January 3, 2006
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About three months ago, the Microsoft RSS Team posted a request for feedback on various proposed RSS icons.

About two months later, Microsoft announced that they would be using the same RSS icon as Firefox.

I’m excited to announce that we’re adopting the icon used in Firefox. John and Chris were very enthusiastic about allowing us (and anyone in the community) to use their icon. This isn’t the first time that we’ve worked with the Mozilla team to exchange ideas and encourage consistency between browsers, and we’re sure it won’t be the last.

Actually, the icons aren’t identical, but they are very close:

Firefox 1.5: Firefox's RSS Icon
Internet Explorer 7: Internet Explorer's RSS Icon

Shortly after the Internet Explorer announcement, the Outlook team announced that they’ll be using the same icon in the next version of Outlook (currently known as Outlook 12).

I find it surprising that Microsoft would be willing to work together with its biggest competitor in the browser market — and vice versa. The only possible explanation for such cooperation that I can think of is a genuine attention to the needs of the end-user on the part of Microsoft and Mozilla. Which is really good; it means a further step towards XML feed identification consistency, something sorely lacking as evidenced by the array of XML buttons available today.

Former IE Developer Switches to Firefox

September 15, 2005
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I found an interesting blog post by a former Microsoft employee who has recently switched to the Mozilla Firefox browser. He talks about the good things about Firefox as well as ways he thinks the browser can be improved. What makes the switch (and review) especially interesting is the fact that he had worked on developing Internet Explorer (mostly in interface design) from versions 1.0 to 5.0.

Microsoft Reveals More Windows Vista and IE 7 Features

July 27, 2005
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I read this article at the Microsoft Watch website, and it seems Microsoft revealed some features on privacy notices intended for beta testers. This list and the many other lists of features are making my jaw drop… it looks like Windows is finally going to be a real competitor to Mac OS X and Linux.

Some of the Windows Vista features mentioned are:

  • An audit feature allowing administrators to monitor the system and create security logs.
  • Microsoft Rights Management Services (RMS), which is a Digital Rights Management (DRM) client for applications.
  • “Speech Recognizer” speech recognition system that will be available to any application choosing to use it. The Speech Recognizer will adjust to the speaking and grammatical style of the user.
  • Driver Protection that will prevent drivers from loading that are listed on a Microsoft database of drivers known to cause problems. This will result in less blue screens of death.
  • A “Games Explorer” that will list games installed on the user’s computer, keep track of information (such as the last time each game was played), and receive metadata from Microsoft.
  • Peer Name Resolution Service that will allow on-the-fly P2P collaboration.

Some Internet Explorer 7 features:

  • Tab support (finally!).
  • Phishing Filter.
  • Add-on management, which will allow you to manage add-ons such as ActiveX controls, toolbars, etc.
  • Add-on crash detection, which will determine which add-on, if any, caused an Internet Explorer crash.
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