Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) continues its dominance of the Web browser market, despite recent releases from open-source challenger Mozilla and its commercial sibling, Netscape. According to a twice-yearly study from market researcher StatMarket, IE now controls 96 percent of the market--up from 87 percent a year ago. Netscape, meanwhile, has fallen off the charts, with just 3.4 percent of the market--down from 7 percent in March and 13 percent a year ago. And competent newcomer Mozilla, whose critical 1.0 release came after years in beta, has managed to attract less than 1 percent of the market. (The more recent Mozilla 1.1 release improves performance and adds a few new features.)

Yawn.

Now now Andrew, it must've taken ThatDude quite a while to type all those words in, normally he can't string two words together without having to type in a couple of commas,, So we should,, at the very,, least pay,, some attention,, to him,,,,
Nah, then again maybe not ;-)

yeah man!! IE rocks!!! but k-meleon is good too and is maturing fast. its the best Gecko browser on earth!

Yeah-yeah.
Whatever floats your boat.
Browser with 17 unpatched security holes just doesn't float for me.
I'm sticking with K-Meleon.

So then, we should consider ourselves in the elite 1%? What a lucky break the day I stumbled onto KM. I cut out NS and use IE only very occasionally.

Shame about NS though. I should admit that I still have NS 4.08 but only for integrated browsing in another software package -- believe it or not it is Microsoft Works! If I can figure out how to get KM in that, I will ditch NS.

"Shame about NS though. I should admit that I still have NS 4.08 but only for integrated browsing in another software package -- believe it or not it is Microsoft Works! If I can figure out how to get KM in that, I will ditch NS."

Isn't that just a "default browser" issue. If it is, then just use SetBrowser to switch the default browser status to K-Meleon.

"So then, we should consider ourselves in the elite 1%? What a lucky break the day I stumbled onto KM. I cut out NS and use IE only very occasionally."

Actually I believe the figures for IE usage are usually erroneous at best, especially considering that IE is bundled with every copy of Windows nowadays. Also, not to mention the fact that browsers like Opera identify themselves as IE 5.0 or thereabouts *by default*. Not many Opera users bother changing their browsers identification ID (there's not much point really).

btw ThatDude, just in case you're reading this (and I know you will be), the last version of IE came out August 27, 2001. That means it's been *over* twelve months since the last release. The current beta they still seem to be beta testing (after like six months) is just a plain old "Service Pack" release for IE 6.0, which means bug fixes, but NO NEW FEATURES. With the current beta of K-Meleon, there are bug fixes *plus* new features (like improved macro capabilities, bookmarking etc.). It's no wonder you keep coming back here to the K-Meleon webpages, as your glorified favorite browser IE6 is starting to look a little moth-eaten and security-hole prone, moreso than at any other time.

AL
"Now now Andrew, it must've taken ThatDude quite a while to type all those words in, normally he can't string two words together without having to type in a couple of commas,,,"

I did'nt,,,,Dummy,,,,,,I copied and ,,,,,,pasted,,,,,,I thought you were smarter than that.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,ROFL,,,

AL
"The current beta they still seem to be beta testing (after like six months) is just a plain old "Service Pack" release for IE 6.0, which means bug fixes, but NO NEW FEATURES."

Hey,,why should they worry about new features when the market is full of plugin type embedded software that software companies are making for them,with all kinds of nice features made especially for IE,,Tabs ah heck to many to mention.Some of them even try to act like its a browser but its just a embedded IE super de duper,,coma coma ,,I think when your as popular as IE (MS) with all the anti ms hackers out there (just jealous people) its probably quite a job or war for ms just to release service packs to combat the downgrading tirants,,coma coma,,sounds like your one of them,,hehe,,:p.coma,,coma,,.(AND AT LEAST THEY'RE RELEASING SOMETHING,,coma,,coma)
BTW,they release more than service packs and you know that,they have critical updates quite often on there site which is not in the form of a service pack,,coma,,coma,,.So they are constantly fighting the tirant ms hackers all the time.I my self have never ever had any kind of security breach happen to me using IE,,coma,,coma,,not in 7 yrs.I guess being one of the ELITE 1% has its advantages,,coma,,coma,,being you don't have to worry about security updates because the hackers don't know ya,,coma,,coma,,and the ones you do have the rest of the ELITE 1% don't have to know about and can't obviously find out about,,hehe,,coma,,coma,,.Enough said for now,,coma,,coma,,go build your browser and remember 2003 is in 4 months..Do you know where your browser is today?

Security?

With default IE install settings I can copy your clipboard, read your files, fake SSL certificates (that's a sweet one), fake ftp sites for you (you'd be downloading that 'latest patch' from me instead of your vendor) and execute arbitrary code in your windows box. Without you knowing.

But then again - such things only happen to stupid computer illiterate people, right? Not to you, never

Well then why don't ya do it then big boy,,talk is cheap and that seems to be what you do best,,I know the hell your not working on the browser thats for sure..
You rattle off so much,,why don't ya tell all these elite 1% of the k users reading here all the security vuneralbilities they are into when they fire up K.There is at least 20 major critical security problems with K.Go ahead and tell everybody what they are,,bet you won't and if you do you will lie !..And they have absolutely no way of knowing..
Smoke that.

Sure.

KM currently is vulnerable to ftp spoofing and perhaps certificate faking (haven't tested that one on latest build so I wouldn't bet my head on that). That's all I can come up with at the moment from the top of my head. Latest Mozilla builds which KM betas can be built upon are vulnerable to neither. If you know of any other, please do share with us. I'd really like to hear those remaining 18 or so.

IE is vulnerable even on HTML level (OBJECT tag contents and params are not parsed securely), not to mention windows component level (msxml & other libraries).

"Isn't that just a "default browser" issue. If it is, then just use SetBrowser to switch the default browser status to K-Meleon."

No, MS Works (4.5) doesn't use a default browser because it was never intended to have a browser : ) It is some sort of system configuration however, but I don't know what controls it. I have KM set as my default browser but Works doesn't use it. In case you are wondering why I have such old software on a newer computer, it is because it works efficiently without being overly bloated. Same reason I am a fan of KM. Fortunately, IE doesn't work with Works either.

I'm not touting Works so much as I am using it as an example of how MS once did not control everything on our computers. But this has nothing to do with this thread. What does have to do with this thread is that IE doesn't work with older software while a competing browser does -- so I wish I could figure out how to get KM to play with Works and other software as they arise (e.g. Quicken). Bit leary of security you know.

" Actually I believe the figures for IE usage are usually erroneous at best, especially considering that IE is bundled with every copy of Windows nowadays."

Don't forget the IE requirements of new versions of Microsoft software packages: Works, Office, Outlook and so on. Gotta be there for that stuff to work fully.

ThatDude,
" Hey,,why should they worry about new features when the market is full of plugin type embedded software that software companies are making for them,"
I had the distinct impression that you thought that MS had the best programmers around, that they were innovative and creative. So why would you rely on other software "companies" to improve IE, the masterpiece of MS?

" BTW,they release more than service packs and you know that,they have critical updates quite often on there site which is not in the form of a service pack,,coma,,coma,,.So they are constantly fighting the tirant ms hackers all the time."
Uh, this was intended to be in support of IE and MS????

"I my self have never ever had any kind of security breach happen to me using IE,,coma,,coma,,not in 7 yrs."
And what do you suppose the hackers would want from your computer? Extra commas? Misspellings? They could, however, use your computer to attack others very easily, but hey, would you then be responsible for that because you know how well designed and built IE is? It then couldn't possibly be MS's fault -- could it?

"I guess being one of the ELITE 1% has its advantages,,coma,,coma,,being you don't have to worry about security updates because the hackers don't know ya,,coma,,coma,,and the ones you do have the rest of the ELITE 1% don't have to know about and can't obviously find out about,,hehe,,coma,,coma,,."
Yup, I may be naive myself on that front, but so goes the logic : )

Anyway, thanks for your comments, ThatDude -- free speech is how society progresses, even if for a while it progresses backwards. We learn from our mistakes, and others'. So, then KM developers will learn from MS's mistakes with IE. Good luck with your choice of browsers and continued success with keeping your computer unhacked.

Not to worry.

And I have allready made my choice of browser (singular),did'nt know there was but one.All the rest are wantabe's.

Serve thy Master well, let not Him down for if you do, He surely will punish yee with more spyware.

Actually whilst on the subject of IE security holes, here's an interesting article on how IE doesn't support SSL properly, and of course the resulting security-hole which hackers can exploit. And no, there isn't a patch to fix it either.
http://www.thoughtcrime.org/ie-ssl-chain.txt
So being in the elite 1% yields yet another surprising result.

Actually I just realised that that's the fake SSL certificate exploit Sven mentioned earlier on :-)

Yawn,,,,

"Yawn,,,,"

As you would expect, ignorant as always. It's a pity that you are so ignorant ThatDude, as that's usually how people get caught out by these things. But then I also suppose you believe that your PC is untouchable, because it's being handled by an *ego* such as yours (no hackers would dare mess with ThatDude, unless they be besotted by a mess of spelling errors and an attack of the commas, and confusing dialogue to boot!).

yawn...

ThatDude, it doesn't surprise me since most browsers have to identify themselves as IE to even get a page to load. But just because they give IE's browser identification, it doesn't mean they're using IE.

"I my self have never ever had any kind of security breach happen to me using IE,,coma,,coma,,not in 7 yrs."

You don't surf the web that much. At least not to the far corners like any real developer should...

IE currently has a security hole that nobody has fixed. You'll find it one of these days if you browse enough foreign sites. It seems like the big thing right now. It's in one of the IE plugins and is bassically spyware, very destructive spyware.

We've seen it in German, Italian, French, Chinese and Korean.Norton and McAffee don't catch it, and it turns off Zone Alarm, and even the Cleaner and AdAware don't catch it but if you don't run MS crap you don't get it...

And you wanna tell me about the responsible programers at Microsoft...

Oh! And then there's the EULA chage that says MS can update it's software without your consent possably hosing your whole system and you've already agreed to their licence that it's not their fault if you loose everything!!!!

And then did you see the security flash about XP that let's any script kiddie delete your hardrive?

And you still want to cuddle up to snuggly old Microsoft?

Hey IE is a fun toy but I wouldn't use it on my business computer if I didn't have to do all the X broser testing for the website I create for mindless Microsoft lemmings like you to view and not complain about!!!

Get over her and move on!!! - If she's not gonna love ya, right?

Microsoft is history in my books! I've listed three real good reasons to delete the very name Microsoft from your computer system...

If the world wasn't in bed with Microsoft I'd do it in a minute...

Yours Truly,
~TheRodster

a.k.a. Rodney Giles
Chief Engineering Architect
Toydrum Web & Media