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I've been a die hard Internet Explorer user since 1999, after jumping from Netscape, for what I thought would be a faster browser. Despite using the High setting for the Internet zone on IE's Security settings, there have been vulnerabilities that should not have existed, and the Microsoft Internet Explorer Modal Dialog Zone Bypass Vulnerability finally snapped things for me. I had to make a change.

Last year I started to use Firebird (which became Firefox) on and off, and since late June of this year, Firefox has been my main browser.

What I like:

• Tabbed Browsing
• The whole work process for me has changed using Tabbed Browsing. When working with IE, you must open a new window,window after window for each page or jocky through your history.
• View Page Info
• This is something I missed since using Netscape. When you use Properties under IE to learn about a page, about it's files, when it was last updated, you get, essentially, a property sheet telling you that , indeed it is an html file, and a display of the page title. In comparison, using Firefox, a wealth of info is offered.
• Bookmark Manager
• If you have a gazillion bookmarks, and like to manage them in subdirectories, add information about the links beyond the title description, and don't want a slow loading, cumbersome Favorites file, Firefox's Bookmark Manager alone will sell you on Firefox.
• Popup Blocking
• Speaks for itself
• Extensions
• The thing about extensions is that A.) they're free, and B.) the whole concept of an extensible browser to grow with changing content demands is alien to Internet Explore outside of ActiveX plugins. Firefox grows with the internet and changing needs of it's users, and for a small team, Mozilla is very responsive to it's userbase. IE on the otherhand says, if you don't like it, tough, there's the door.
  I particularly like the BB Code extension
• Lack of ActiveX
• Speaks for itself, and if it doesn't, it should

Here are two articles and a CERT alert that really persuaded me to consider permanently switiching:

Why You Should Switch to Firefox - by Ben Goodger/Mozilla
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/why/

Time to Dump Internet Explorer - By Scott Granneman / SecurityFocus
http://www.securityfocus.com/columnists/249

US CERT - Vulnerability Note VU#713878
http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/713878

Added: September 2nd 2004

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NOTE: Product reviews are independently written by our members and do not necessarily express the opinions or views of CastleCops.