There has been a lot of talk over the months about FireFox and Internet Explorer and a resurgence of the “browser wars”. In the original “browser wars” of the late 90’s, Netscape and Internet Explorer were duking it out for market share. In the end, Microsoft won out and has enjoyed about 95% market share.

Microsoft released Internet Explorer 6 about the time they released Windows XP, which was in 2001. Since then, they ceased development on their Internet Explorer browser and didn’t release any major updates to it since then. As far as the web is concerned, 4 years is an ETERNITY to not update features and capabilities.

As a web developer, I have to follow as many of the latest technologies and techniques as I can. There have been major strides in improving standards and defining coding practices that ensure compatibility across the board. You might notice the little icons right side of my site: the “XHTML 1.0″ and “CSS” icons. These icons tell you that my site is coded properly to meet the most recently-adopted web standards. This is a good thing, because it ensures my website will look and work the same across almost any browser.

You might be wondering, “why won’t it be perfect in every browser?” Well, it will work in the following browsers without any issues: Firefox, Mozilla Suite, Netscape, Camino, Safari, Konquerer, and Opera just as I intended. But, there may be some issues when trying to use the site in Internet Explorer.

So why don’t I just code the site so it will work perfectly in Internet Explorer? Well then that would mean giving in and continuing to support a browser that has laid stagnant for the last 4 years, and aid in the lack of progression of web technologies. IE uses technology that is strictly Microsoft-only, and they used their market dominance to their advantage to spread their own tools that only work in their programs. This hinders them from bringing new versions of IE up to meet standards because now they have to support the technologies they created and helped spread.

With Firefox gaining market share rather quickly (and most of that market share coming directly from Internet Explorer), Microsoft decided that maybe they needed to update Internet Explorer and implement features already out on the market, and bring Internet Explorer to support more of the new standards (gee thanks guys, took you long enough). However, early reports are that it still won’t be good enough. Paul Thurrott recently wrote an article about the upcoming IE 7.0 browser. In it, he pointed out many of the problems Microsoft is having with IE today and I agree 100% with his comments:

Microsoft blames backward-compatibility problems for the stalemate over true Web standards compatibility. Put succinctly, the company has gone its own way for so long and now has to support so many developers who use nonstandard Web technologies that it will be impossible to make IE Web-standards-compliant without breaking half the commercial Web sites on the planet. Furthermore, by halting all IE development for several years before reconstituting the IE team to create IE 7.0, Microsoft has set back Web development by an immeasurable amount of time.

My advice is simple: Boycott IE. It’s a cancer on the Web that must be stopped. IE isn’t secure and isn’t standards-compliant, which makes it unworkable both for end users and Web content creators. Because of their user bases, however, Web developers are hamstrung into developing for IE at the expense of established standards that work well in all other browsers. You can turn the tide by demanding more from Microsoft and by using a better alternative Web browser. I recommend and use Mozilla Firefox, but Apple Safari (Macintosh only) and Opera 8 are both worth considering as well.

The part in bold echoes my feelings COMPLETELY. IE is entirely too insecure and it’s lack of support for standards that have been defined for years is utterly unimaginable. I have become so tired of all the spyware, adware, viruses, and just flat out lazy web developers that I refuse to use IE unless I’m forced to. I’ve set up most my friends and family with Mozilla Firefox, and for the most part, their computers run much smoother, faster, and with fewer problems than when they were browsing with IE. There are so many more features in Firefox than there are in IE, it’s amazing we were ever able to live without them. Tabbed browsing is a key feature, as is the Extensions feature which allows me to add things like “Adblock” to my browser which will filter out and remove most ads from websites.

Some people that use FireFox might complain that “FireFox broke this site” or it “broke that site”, which isn’t true at all. The fact of the matter is web developers had built and tested their site in only Internet Explorer and left it at that. Then, when a new browser comes along and doesn’t fully support the proprietary coding that only Internet Explorer can understand, the site appears broken. FireFox isn’t the problem in that case, it’s the lazy web developer who designed and built a website that would only work in one browser. The mantra of the FireFox team is that websites should be designed to “work in any browser”. They don’t want people to design sites for just one browser, they want a uniform web; they want you to be able to open a website in Internet Explorer or FireFox or Opera or Safari and that site will work and look the same across the board. They’ve managed to accomplish a large portion of that goal by adopting the accepted standards for the web. Microsoft is the one lagging behind in coming to the party.

There are so many reasons people should just abandon Internet Explorer and see the web in a new light by using a browser such as FireFox. Microsoft may be updating IE, but it just doesn’t seem to be good enough.

So I tell you, if you haven’t already, ditch Internet Explorer and make your life a little easier by downloading FireFox and start using it as your default browser; you’ll be glad you did.