Jump to content

Firefox or Internet Explorer


Recommended Posts

I'm a Firefox user - the scripts available make it essential! I was curious to see how many people use Firefox and how many still use IE or indeed another browser. How many people are slaves to Microsoft and use Windows?

So I ran some stats on my resource website (Geocaching Resources for UK and Ireland www.follow-the-arrow.co.uk/resources) which has had nearly 3000 unique visits in the 8 months or so it has been running. Here are the results.

It seems IE is still the most popular!

 

Chris (MrB)

 

stats.jpg

Link to comment

Firefox all the way - but then I use a mixture of Linux and Windows at home (mainly Linux, windows for CV's and GSAK).

 

I've had a dabble with Safari, but Firefox still has the edge for me.

 

I suspect most people are lazy - Windows comes with IE, so that's what they use.

 

Lins

Link to comment

XP and Firefox

 

We had used Opera for many years but Firefox is the fave now.

IE? Only ever use it as a last resort when web pages won't display properly in FF. This is due to lazy web developers only catering for IE rather than any any fault in the part of other browsers....

 

 

 

 

Mark (Mr D)

Link to comment
It's scary that so many people still use Internet Exploder.

 

Scary that people are also still using Firefox, as both IE & Firefox were both successfully hacked at the recent at CanSecWest, I now solely use Google Chrome. See link here

Zero-days happen to all software. You could also say it's scary people still use MacBooks after last year's Pwn2Own.

 

But seriously, www.getfirefox.com or Chrome for any matter.

Link to comment
It's scary that so many people still use Internet Exploder.

 

Scary that people are also still using Firefox, as both IE & Firefox were both successfully hacked at the recent at CanSecWest, I now solely use Google Chrome. See link here

Zero-days happen to all software. You could also say it's scary people still use MacBooks after last year's Pwn2Own.

 

But seriously, www.getfirefox.com or Chrome for any matter.

To be honest I tend to use OpenSolaris on my laptop OS, but still have a Windows disk to slot in as GSAK runs better under Windows.
Link to comment

XP and Firefox

 

We had used Opera for many years but Firefox is the fave now.

IE? Only ever use it as a last resort when web pages won't display properly in FF. This is due to lazy web developers only catering for IE rather than any any fault in the part of other browsers....

 

 

 

 

Mark (Mr D)

Link to comment

I use Vista and FF...

 

Was dead scared of moving to FF and so when I got my laptop, Father Jack showed me what it could do - especially with the Greasemonkey additions, and now I can't believe people still use IE!!!

 

Trying to convince my technophobe parents and sister on the otherhand..... lol

Link to comment

I used to like Oprea but recently few sites seem to display properly with it. Mind you it was and still seems supper quick.

 

Mozila I also like hence why I do like fire fox and I normaly have it running on my system as well as IE but I seem to use IE most of the time, things work diffrently in firefox menues for example and I think pepole tend to stick with what they know - human nature and all that.

 

Having said that my systems a mess at the mo and realy needs sorting out so currently I have IE8 on both my win 7 and Vista partions and iE8 on the laptop with IE6/7 on the 2nd PC which is just running as a test/ back up system

 

Edit: to add to first sentence.

Edited by Hampshire_Hog
Link to comment

Same here with Firefox and Greasemonkey. I would be lost without GM scripts. I use IE to check browser compatibility when I do changes to my web sites.

 

Back in the days of IE5 and when there were fewrer browsers arround (inc Netscape) I used to test browser compatability with every browser I could get to run on 98SE inc: IE3, Opera, Mozila, Apples version (can't remember what it was called,) Netscape 2.

 

I created a text only version and HTNL 3 version in addition to the HTML 4 version I was running as the main output - just didn't want anyone left out.

 

I found not using IE specific extentions and having your code validated by the W3C tended to work well but it would have to strict codeing and even then 1 or the other browser would interpret it diffently and as such would display it in a diffrent way.

 

I did however learn XHTML but never implimented beyond a bit here and there and now I have even forgotten most of my HTML and have to look it up in my Que? book

Link to comment

I'm a Firefox user - the scripts available make it essential! I was curious to see how many people use Firefox and how many still use IE or indeed another browser. How many people are slaves to Microsoft and use Windows?

So I ran some stats on my resource website (Geocaching Resources for UK and Ireland www.follow-the-arrow.co.uk/resources) which has had nearly 3000 unique visits in the 8 months or so it has been running. Here are the results.

It seems IE is still the most popular!

 

Chris (MrB)

 

Out of intrest Mr B why do you ask? are you thinking of refining you exelent website - I thought you had only updated it recently?

 

Edit: to take out umessercery image.

Edited by Hampshire_Hog
Link to comment

I never used IE. When I got my first internet connection (1995) I installed Netscape 0.96beta from a floppy disk on a win 3.1 computer. This was upgraded time after time until Mozilla came along and later FF. I used Opera as a 2nd browser for a while.

Chrome is off limits for now as they install googleupdate®. This wants to have internetaccess every few minutes (why?? is a daily check for updates not good enough?) The updater is also a PITA to get rid of.

Link to comment

Out of intrest Mr B why do you ask? are you thinking of refining you exelent website - I thought you had only updated it recently?

It was purely out of curiosity when I saw that IE was still the most popular browser. FF has so many GM scripts which enhance the caching experience I wondered how many people didn't actually know it could do it. I've not tried Chrome (Google are not friend at the moment after screwing up how I use Google Search with Google Earth).

 

Chris (MrB)

Link to comment

I use both IE and FF (NOT Chrome as it seems to be unuseable on some sites!). They're both OK; although IE8 seems to be a bit faster than Firefox, and it seems to have maximum compatibility, the latter has a few handy scripts. However, as it's slower to load up (and tends to force you to wait for various updates all the time), IE8 gets the most use.

 

I'm not sure what's "scary" about using either, but then again I don't really care as they seem to work well enough (bearing in mind that they do so little).

Link to comment

 

It was purely out of curiosity when I saw that IE was still the most popular browser.

 

Chris (MrB)

 

I wonder how many of your IE hits are people running Firefox with a User Agent switcher (to fool those sites which will only allow IE in)?

 

Anyway, in order of most frequent use:

 

Firefox and occasionally Opera on my Linux lappy;

Firefox on XP at work;

Opera Mini on my Blackberry;

Firefox + XP at home on the PC in t'other room, which I only use for GSAK;

Link to comment

Just spent an afternoon looking at this and with some heavy Googling I have found 84 FF hacks 7 of which were high risk and 52 medium risk, which presently affect FF; managed 3 fully test 2 of the FF hacks and I was very surprised by the result; Also found reference to lots more IE hacks, too many to mention.

 

To be honest the 7 FF hacks are serious enough to stop me using FF on my Linux and OpenSolaris machines also; and I now think that FF is only as secure as IE, and Greasemonkey can actually increase your chances of an attack, as it only takes a few lines in a GM script to do various things behind your back whilst browsing. I think the lesson here is not all that is golden is gold.

 

Now using only Chrome and Konqueror depending on what platform I'm on. For Mac users Safari is also not very secure; Opera users, I saw nothing about Opera, but that is probably because I was not looking specifically for Opera.

Link to comment

I use FF exclusively at home, and i am forced to use IE at work...

 

With Windows 7 just about to pop up on the horizon, and the fact that it will not ship with IE in Europe, just how will you connect to the interweb to download a different browser? :)

Link to comment

I use FF exclusively at home, and i am forced to use IE at work...

 

With Windows 7 just about to pop up on the horizon, and the fact that it will not ship with IE in Europe, just how will you connect to the interweb to download a different browser? :)

 

Now that is an interesting question! Presumably you have to load the rubbish software you get on the CD from your chosen ISP - that is after you've phoned them up to send you the CD.

 

Chris (MrB)

Link to comment

Just spent an afternoon looking at this and with some heavy Googling I have found 84 FF hacks 7 of which were high risk and 52 medium risk, which presently affect FF; managed 3 fully test 2 of the FF hacks and I was very surprised by the result; Also found reference to lots more IE hacks, too many to mention.

 

To be honest the 7 FF hacks are serious enough to stop me using FF on my Linux and OpenSolaris machines also; and I now think that FF is only as secure as IE, and Greasemonkey can actually increase your chances of an attack, as it only takes a few lines in a GM script to do various things behind your back whilst browsing. I think the lesson here is not all that is golden is gold.

 

Now using only Chrome and Konqueror depending on what platform I'm on. For Mac users Safari is also not very secure; Opera users, I saw nothing about Opera, but that is probably because I was not looking specifically for Opera.

And once they become widely-used enough for hackers to bother, they'll be hacked too. Just like linux & MacOS would get hacked if it was worth the while of hackers to bother. But when they are out just to get attention (bit like kids causing trouble), it makes sense to hit the most widely-used stuff with the least knowledgable user base. Micro$oft's attitude to competition probably doesn't help matters, as it becomes a cause to 'justify' the hacking.

Isn't Konqueror based on the same Mozilla Gecko engine as firefox anyway? So wouldn't it be just as vulnerable?

 

:) The original draft of this was a bit of a rant against the hype about stability/security etc of niche software. But I toned it down! :)

 

Anyway, to stay on-topic... :D

Firefox+Greasemonkey scripts with XP, Win2K & Ubuntu (Obviously not all at once).

Sometimes I'm forced to use IE by some websites (Banks mostly! :o ), but that seems to be reducing. Tried Chrome & Opera and just don't get on with them - Its that natural human instinct to not like change. I also have a cynical suspicion of Google - once they've got us all hooked on their search, browser & apps, what will happen? I admit to using Earth & picasa, as they are genuinely useful. But I'd not want to use a web-based word processor just yet.

Link to comment

I use FF exclusively at home, and i am forced to use IE at work...

 

With Windows 7 just about to pop up on the horizon, and the fact that it will not ship with IE in Europe, just how will you connect to the interweb to download a different browser? :)

All it'll be is they won't put the icon for it on the desktop & start menu by default but it'll pester you endlessly until you make it visible.

Link to comment

I use FF exclusively at home, and i am forced to use IE at work...

 

With Windows 7 just about to pop up on the horizon, and the fact that it will not ship with IE in Europe, just how will you connect to the interweb to download a different browser? :)

All it'll be is they won't put the icon for it on the desktop & start menu by default but it'll pester you endlessly until you make it visible.

 

I read somewhere (cant find the link :o ) that there will be a link on the windows 7 desktop that allows you access to the internet to download the browser of your choice , oh and that windows update will start immediately and IE will be an "optional" download :)

Link to comment

I'm a Firefox user - the scripts available make it essential! I was curious to see how many people use Firefox and how many still use IE or indeed another browser. How many people are slaves to Microsoft and use Windows?

I use IE and FireFox about equally. If I had to choose one or the other I'd probably go for IE. This is nothing to do with being a slave to MS, I just like the FireFox UI slightly less than the IE one. I do use one GM script, but I wouldn't lose any sleep if it wasn't there.

 

As far as security goes, I find the best security is to not visit any dodgy websites :)

 

Rgds, Andy

Link to comment

Greasemonkey keep away, I've just amended a GM script which harvested my logon details and then emailed me the details, this was just a standard one used on GC.com but the code I could add to any site. I have deleted this as if it ever reached the outside world it could be used for anything, and how many of you actually look at what a script is actually doing?

Link to comment

I use FF exclusively at home, and i am forced to use IE at work...

 

With Windows 7 just about to pop up on the horizon, and the fact that it will not ship with IE in Europe, just how will you connect to the interweb to download a different browser? ;)

All it'll be is they won't put the icon for it on the desktop & start menu by default but it'll pester you endlessly until you make it visible.

 

I read somewhere (cant find the link ;) ) that there will be a link on the windows 7 desktop that allows you access to the internet to download the browser of your choice , oh and that windows update will start immediately and IE will be an "optional" download <_<

 

I didn't here that bit but it looks like OEM' will be provided with a free IE CD or they can choose to install a diffrent one if they s choose.

 

Mind you what about the retai version and will the upgrade option upgrage IE.

 

Softpeadia

Link to comment

Greasemonkey keep away, I've just amended a GM script which harvested my logon details and then emailed me the details, this was just a standard one used on GC.com but the code I could add to any site. I have deleted this as if it ever reached the outside world it could be used for anything, and how many of you actually look at what a script is actually doing?

Or understand, if its deliberately badly written. ? <_<

Can Open. Worms? Everywhere...

 

With all due respect , if its as easy to do as you say, then your experiment will already have been done by someone else and already is 'in the wild'

 

On the other hand, GM scripts can't install by themselves, so there has to be some user complicity. Much like installing any other program. For example, it'd be easy for you to write a program to harvest exactly the same details and email them to you. And probably easier for you to get it onto someone's PC. With greasemonkey scripts, I suspect most users have an above-average IT knowledge and word would VERY soon get round to avoid such & such a script.

I currently only use the Geocaching Greasemonkey scripts. Would I be right in thinking these are all benign? I think the GCVote script uses my Geocaching NAME (not password) to link to their database.

Edited by Guanajuato
Link to comment

I use Firefox on my notebook, I had a major system crash on my desktop and a friend gave me a hard drive with linux preinstalled. Problem was a lot of my software wouldn't run on Linux, so a week ago I swallowed my pride and reinstalled XP. I'm not happy about this but I have some expensive music editing software that I use.

Link to comment

XP and Firefox on the lappy and desktop. IE at work because we're not allowed anything other than what IT give us.

 

Vista (ugh!) and IE on t'other half's machine because it's hers and I'm not allowed to mess with it!

 

Oh, and a couple of caching related GM scripts. I'd use FF even without the GMs...simply because it isn't IE! For me it isn't about security or the measured quality of one over the other (although security is of course important)...it's a purely subjective "FF seems a better user experience to me"

Edited by Paul G0TLG
Link to comment
I use FF exclusively at home, and i am forced to use IE at work...

 

With Windows 7 just about to pop up on the horizon, and the fact that it will not ship with IE in Europe, just how will you connect to the interweb to download a different browser? ;)

 

Just use the built in FTP client

Link to comment

It's scary that so many people still use Internet Exploder.

 

Why do you find it scary that folks use IE. The alternative appears to be FF which is slow to load and has a tendency to hang your broadband connection.

 

Why do the FF junkies keep on bringing this absurd discussion up, is it really so hard for them to accept that others have made a different choice ;(

Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...