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Web Browsing (Internet Explorer vs Safari)
From Mac vs. Windows
Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) includes Safari 3. Windows Vista comes with Internet Explorer 7. Both Safari 3 and Internet Explorer 7 offer bookmark management, tabbed browsing, and built-in RSS feed readers.
Contents |
Bookmark Management
Mac OS X:
Users can access their bookmarks in Safari through Bookmarks > Show All Bookmarks from the menu bar or clicking the open book shaped icon located on the far left of the toolbar. Safari's bookmark window uses a layout similar to other library-centric applications on Mac OS X such as Address Book or Font Book.
The left column lists collections a user has created to group their bookmarks into as well as those collections Safari includes by default. "History" (previous web pages visited) and "All RSS Feeds" (RSS feeds the user is subscribed to) are special collections created by Safari and are unable to be deleted. User created collections appear under the subheading "BOOKMARKS". New collections can be created by clicking the "+" buttton underneath the column.
Bookmarks for a selected collection are displayed in the column on the right. Both a bookmark's title and URL address are displayed. Clicking the "+" button underneath the bookmarks column will create folders within a collection and lets users organize their bookmarks even further.
Any bookmarks added to the "Bookmarks Bar" collection will appear directly on Safari's toolbar. Folders of bookmarks can also be moved into this collection and will act as drop down menus in the toolbar when clicked displaying all the bookmarks inside.
In addition to creating folders on the bookmark bar or in the Bookmark Bar collection view, Safari users can also put folders on the bar by dragging them from the Bookmarks collection directly to the bar. Further, in Safari you can not only drag a bookmark folder (or an individual bookmark) to a different location on the bar, you can delete the folder or bookmark simply by dragging it a short distance off the bar.
A search box located at the top right of the bookmarks window (below the standard Safari search box) allows users to quickly search through bookmarks. Results appear as the user begins typing. Users can filter search results by returning bookmarks from all collections (including history and rss feeds) or only the ones from the collection currently selected.
Safari 3 allows multiple open tabs in a window to all be bookmarked at once by choosing "Add Bookmarks For These n Tabs..." (n being the number of current open in the window). A dialog box will appear asking what to name the special bookmark. Safari 3 uses a special kind of bookmark in this instance that opens multiple saved links when clicked. These multi-link bookmarks appear as folders in Safari's bookmarks management window allowing links within to be modified, added, or deleted.
In addition to saving multiple bookmarks from tabs, there is also the feature to open multiple bookmarks in tabs.
In Safari's bookmarks management window, on the righthand side to every folder, there is a checkbox for activation and deactivation of the "Auto-Click" function.
After a folder has been marked to open as Auto-Click a small square-icon will appear appended at the end of the foldersname/button in the Bookmarks Bar.
From now on, all it takes is a single click on that button to open all your bookmarks in that folder in tabs. This is ideal for websites you visit on a daily base. Or for websties you usually check at the same time, or shorty after each other.
If an Auto-Click enabled folder is wished to be opened as a normal folder, meaning one likes to choose a bookmark in that folder, without first opening all of them in tabs. This is possible by either Command+Click-ing on the folder, or holding the mouse button a second or two on the button.
Windows Vista:
Bookmarks in Internet Explorer are called favorites and can be accessed from the Favorites Center by clicking the stared Favorites button in the toolbar.
Favorites are actually saved outside Internet Explorer in the user's favorites folder within the file system. This means that favorites can be easily backed up and imported into 3rd party browsers. On the other hand, it also means favorites are subject to the same file naming restrictions as other files. Internet Explorer will convert forbidden characters in a favorites' title for compatibility.
The Favorites Center is divided up into three categories: Favorites (web pages bookmarked by the user), Feeds (RSS feeds the user has subscribed to), and History (previous web pages visited). Users can create folders within "Favorites" and "RSS Feeds" to organize their contents by doing one of the following:
- Right-click an existing favorite or folder and select "Create new folder" from the popup menu. For some reason, right-clicking empty space inside the category will not display a popup menu.
- Click the "Add to Favorites" button from the toolbar and select "Organize Favorites" from the drop down menu. The From the Organize Favorites dialog, click the "New Folder" button.
- Click the "New Folder" button in the dialog that appears when adding a favorite.
- Browse to the Favorites folder located in the file system (Windows >Users > Favorites and create a new subfolder using Explorer. Internet Explorer mirrors the contents of the Favorites folder and will display any subfolders inside. This only works for favorites, not RSS feeds as these are stored elsewhere.
Favorites added to the "Favorites Bar" folder under the Favorites category will appear on Internet Explorer's favorites bar. Folders of favorites can also be added.
inside the "Favorites Bar" folder will appear on the toolbar as well. Clicking a folder in the Links toolbar will display a drop down menu listing all the favorites inside.
Currently there is no way to search through favorites inside Internet Explorer. However, users can use Windows built-in search since favorites are actually individual files saved in the file system. Again, this only works for favorites and not RSS feeds.
Tabbed Browsing
Tabbed browsing is the ability for a user to open multiple web pages at the same time inside the same window. Tabs reduce the amount of open windows on the screen and make moving between open web pages much simpler.
Both Internet Explorer 7 and Safari 3 support tabbed browsing.
Mac OS X:
There are multiple ways to open a web page in Safari in a new tab:
- Hold down the ⌘ key and click a link. This works with bookmarks in the bookmarks window as well, but one has to double-click instead of single-click.
- Right-click a link or bookmark and choose "Open Link in New Tab" from the popup menu.
- Drag a link from a web page to the tab bar. Works also with bookmarks from the bookmarks window.
- Create an empty new tab (⌘+T) and type the URL address of the web page.
- Right-click on folder of bookmarks in the bookmark window or bookmarks bar and choose "Open in tabs" from the popup menu. All the bookmarks in this folder will open at the same time in seperate tabs.
- Right-click the tab bar and select New Tab.
- Double click inside the tab bar.
- Users can open search results in a new tab by hold the ⌘ key while submitting their query. This works with any search form on the web.
Each open tab displays a "⨂" widget on its left edge. Clicking the "⨂" widget will close the web page and remove its tab from the toolbar. Pressing ⌘+{ moves one tab to the left, and pressing ⌘+} moves one to the right.
Safari 3 opens new tabs at the right hand end of the tab bar and includes a number of ways to rearrange tabs:
- Any open tabs in Safari 3 can be dragged and arranged into a different order.
- Any tab may be moved onto it's own window either by simply dragging off the tab bar or by right clicking on a tab and selecting "Move Tab To New Window" (also accessible via the "Window" menu.).
- When a user has multiple windows with one or more tabs open, they can merge all the tabs into one window by using "Window ➞ Merge All Windows" command.
- In addition to dragging a tab to create a new window, users can drag individual tabs from one browser window to another.
When a Safari window containing more than one tab is closed, a sheet is presented confirming the action:
This behavior can be disabled in Safari preferences in the "Tabs" section:
Windows Vista:
There are multiple ways in Internet Explorer 8 to open a web page inside a new tab:
- Hold down the CTRL key and click a link on a web page or favorite from the Favorites Center. This will open a new tab but the focus will still remain be on the current page. Hold down CTRL SHIFT while clicking a link or bookmark to open up a new tab and have focus shifted to the new tab.
- Right-click a link and choose "Open Link in New Tab" from the popup menu.
- Create an empty new tab (CTRL+T or the new tab button) and type the URL address of the web page.
- Click the new tab button located in Internet Explorer's tab bar.
- Double click any empty space in the tab bar
- Middle-click a link
- Hover over a folder in the favorites center and wait for an arrow to appear to its right. Clicking the arrow opens all the favorites in the folder at the same time in separate tabs.
Internet Explorer 8 opens tabs in a group with the originating tabs. i.e. The first page opened in a new tab appears directly to the right of the tab; the next one, to the right of that. Open tabs are not fixed in the order they were originally opened. The user can drag and arrange them in any sequence they wish.
Tabs are also color coded to show what tabs are related. Following a link off a page into a new tab will cause that tab to be the same color as the previous tab. Opening another tab and navigating to a web site by different means (entering a URL for example) will cause that tab to become a different color. For example I opened two tabs from this website, to tabs from microsoft.com, and two tabs from apple.com:
Besides the tab bar, Internet Explorer offers multiple ways for users to switch between web pages open in tabs inside a window:
1. List - Displays the titles of all open web pages in tabs as a drop down list to select from. List also respects the color coded related tabs by sepearting each group of tabs in the drop down list
2. Quick tabs - View all web pages open in tabs as thumbnails on one page. Also respects color coded grouped tabs by showing an outline of the same color as the tab
3. Keyboard - CTRL+TAB will switch between tabs. Likewise, CTRL+SHIFT+TAB will switch between tabs in the opposite order. Additionally, pressing CTRL plus a number (1-8) will choose any of the first 8 tabs. This is limted to only the first eight tabs. Pressing CTRL+9 will switch to the very last tab.
Hovering over the tab of the web page currently being viewed will display an "X" button. Click the "X" to close the web page and remove its tab from the tab bar. The keyboard shortcut CTRL-W works, too. If a user wants to close another tab using either of these two methods, they will first have to switch to it.
A quicker way to close tabs would be to switch to right-click on a tab and select "Close tab" or switch to the quick tabs view where a close button appears on every thumbnail.
Closing a window that has multiple tabs still open will cause Internet Explorer to display a warning message. The warning dialog offers an additional option to remember what web pages are currently open in tabs and load them the next time an Internet Explorer window is opened. This can be useful if a user accidentally clicked the close button and had lots of web pages in tabs open.
Viewing RSS Feeds
The number of websites offering RSS feeds is growing each year. RSS stands for "Really Simple Syndication" and makes it really simple for owners of websites or blogs to announce new content and updates to their site. Visitors subscribe to RSS feeds (which are like e-mail newsletters, except the user doesn't have to submit any personal information) using an RSS feed reader (or "RSS Aggregator"), and these subscribers are then notified of these content changes by their RSS reader.
Both Internet Explorer 7 and Safari 3 come with built-in RSS feed readers.
Mac OS X:
When Safari detects an RSS feed on a website, it displays an "RSS" icon in the window's address bar. Clicking the icon opens Safari's built-in RSS reader. Safari users do not have to subscribe to a feed in order to view the contents of an RSS feed. Subscribing, however, offers the benefit of future notification when new content is published, along with the archiving of a feed's previous entries.
To subscribe and start receiving future notifications of new content, a user simply needs to click the "Add Bookmark" link in the at the bottom of the sidebar, on the right under "Actions". Safari treats RSS feeds as bookmarks and allows them to be saved anywhere in the bookmarks library. Users can have both regular bookmarks and RSS feeds mixed together in a bookmark collection or folder.
When an aggregated RSS feed has new content available, Safari will display the number of unread entries next to the bookmark. If the RSS feed is located within a folder with other bookmarks or feeds, the number of unread feed entries will also appear in the folder's name.
Safari offers a special bookmarks collection called "All RSS Feeds". This collection displays all of the RSS feeds a user has subscribed to, no matter where they are located within their bookmarks library. It is updated automatically as the user subscribes/unsubscribes to RSS feeds.
Safari's RSS reader includes basic options for sorting entries within a feed. Users can sort entries in an RSS feed by title, date, or unread status. Additionally, users can filter entries in a feed by the date an entry was published (today, yesterday, this week, etc).
An "Article Length" slider controls how much of an entry's content is displayed. Sliding the button all the way to left only shows the title, while sliding all the way to the right displays its full contents. This makes skimming through a feed with a lot of entries much easier.
Right-clicking on a folder in the bookmarks window that contains multiple RSS feeds will display the option "View All RSS Articles" in the popup menu. This option merges the entries for all of the feeds within that folder into one view. Extra options will appear in Safari's RSS reader when viewing multiple feeds at once, which allows the user to filter entries by source.
Users can also search through their RSS feeds for specific keywords from the search box in the upper corner of the reader's sidebar. Searches can be be saved as a new RSS feed, where the user is only notified of new entries that match their search criteria.
Safari users can set preferences as to how Safari will handle RSS feeds. They can choose the default RSS reader via a drop-down menu button (either Safari's own internal RSS reader or a thrid-party reader). Other options available to be customized by the user are when all feeds are checked for updates (every 5 minutes, hour, or day), how long archived entries are stored, how Safari marks articles in an RSS feed read, and when to remove RSS articles.
Safari's RSS feeds are also integrated into Apple Mail, which can be used as the default RSS reader. Users can add RSS subscriptions in either Safari or Mail and view them in either.
Windows Vista:
When Internet Explorer detects an RSS feed on a website, the feed icon in the command bar turns from an inactive gray, to orange. Clicking the icon opens Internet Explorer's built-in RSS reader. A nice touch with Internet Explorer's RSS feed reader is that it lets the user know right upfront they aren't subscribed to a feed and provides instructions on how the user might do so. Internet Explorer 8 users don't have to subscribe to a feed in order to view its contents. Subscribing, though, offers the benefit of future notification of new content, whenever it is published--along with archiving a feed's previous entries.
Internet Explorer's method of notifying users of new content in their subscribed RSS feeds is subtle. Internet Explorer will only embolden the RSS feed's title, when new content is available--in order to know how many new unread entries are available, users will have to hover over each feed individually.
Internet Explorer's RSS reader includes options for sorting entries within a feed. Users can sort entries in an RSS feed by title or by date, and it features an option to display a feed only when new entries have been made. Extra sorting and filtering options will appear if the RSS feed contains additional metadata, such as the author or category.
A search box in the upper right-hand side of the reader's sidebar gives users the option of searching through an RSS feed, and only show entries that contain certain keywords.
Internet Explorer users have fine-grained control over the RSS feeds that they are subscribed to. Each feed can have customized settings that determine when the feed is checked for updates, and how many entries will be archived by the reader (2500 entry maximum).
Searching the Internet
Mac OS X:
Safari users can search the Internet directly from their toolbar, which includes a search box in the upper right hand corner of the screen. This search box is powered by Google's search engine. Unfortunately, there is no way to customize Safari's web search behavior, or use another search engine such as Yahoo! or AskJeeves--without resorting to third party modifications, at least.
In Safari, users can also execute a Google search on any word or phrase on any web page by selecting it, right-clicking, and selecting "Search in Google." Alternatively, they can select the word or phrase and use the Menu option Edit/Find/Google Search.
Windows Vista:
Internet Explorer 7 users can also search the Internet from their toolbar. While Microsoft's Live search is used as the default search engine, users are free to change it to use another that they have installed a plug-in for.
Microsoft offers a selection of search engine plug-ins for users to choose from--these range from search engines such as Google to websites like Wikipedia. In addition, any site which has a search box can be turned into a search provider by following the instructions in the yellow box on the "Find More Providers..." page. In addition, any site which has a search box can be turned into a search provider by following the instructions in the yellow box on the "Find More Providers..." page.
Internet Explorer supports the OpenSearch standard, which allows it to use search plugins from other OpenSearch-compatible browsers (like Firefox), and also gives it the ability to autodetect search fields on pages. If a website owner has embedded a search field directly into their website (like this website), Internet Explorer 7 will automatically discover it and highlight the web search button in orange. Users will be offered the option to search the website from their toolbar or add the website to their list of custom places to search later.
When a search term is entered, Internet Explorer displays a drop down list of previous search terms that match your current term, suggestions on what to search from teh search provider (if the search proicder supports that feature), and pages in your history that match that search term
There's also a feature called visual search. If the search provider supports it, the search drop down menu can also contain other useful data about the search. For example using the ebay visual search provider will display a list of item that match your term along with pictures and current bid price. Typing in "MSFT" while using the windows live search provider will give you a stock chart of how well MSFT is doing
Downloading
Mac OS X:
All files being downloaded appear in the downloads window. Downloads can even be paused, if the server hosting the file supports it. The download window keeps a history of completed downloads even after Safari has quit (this behavior can be changed in Safari's preferences). Safari 3 (under Leopard) by default stores downloads to a default downloads folder in the user's home folder. The the default download folder can be changed via preferences. Users can also right click on a file link on a web page, select "Download linked file as..." and select an alternate location to download that individual file.
Safari offers a basic level of protection against running malicious software that a user has downloaded. If an application is detected inside a download, Safari will prompt the user with a warning and will ask if they wish to continue. Safari detects not only applications for Mac OS X, but also Windows executables. It also prevents downloaded applications being run automatically. Each application is tagged and a warning is shown when it is opened.
Enabling "open safe files" sets the computer to automatically handle certain types of downloads. Compressed files are decompressed, disk images are mounted and opened in the Finder, Dashboard widgets are opened in "safe" mode, etc.
Windows Vista:
If a web page tries to download files to the user's computer, Internet Explorer's privacy bar will immediately appear and block the download. This prevents files from being downloaded without the user's permission. To continue downloading the file, users have to manually select the "Download File" option from the privacy bar's drop down menu.
Downloads in Internet Explorer appear in their own individual windows. When a download is complete, its window will remain open until the user closes it. There is an option to automatically close a download window after it completes. There is no history of completed downloads maintained, so once a download window is closed record of it having been downloaded is gone. There is also no obvious ability to pause or resume a download that has been started. A download that has been interrupted, either intentionally or unintentionally and hasn't been cleared from the temp directory can be resumed.
A folder named "Downloads" is provided for each user on Windows Vista, and downloaded files are added to this folder by default. The Downloads folder can be relocated by accessing its properties (right-click on the file and select "Properties"). If the user selects a different download target folder in Internet Explorer, that same folder will be the default the next time a file is downloaded.
Despite "Downloads" being the default directory, IE downloads all files to a temporary directory first (regardless of whether the file is being saved or opened directly). This is a serious design flaw as it prevents downloading files that would end up overfilling the C partition. For users with large enough C partitions, it's still inconvenient for the file to be copied to the destination directory after it has been downloaded as it can impact performance on some systems.
Security
Mac OS X:
In addition to being able to block cookies and Javascript, Safari offers some additional security features to protect users while they are connected to the Internet.
- Private Browsing: "Safari ➞ Private Browsing" will temporarily stop caching any websites that are being viewed, all personal information that is entered into forms, and other such personal information. This is good for computers that are used in public places.
- Reset Safari: "Safari ➞ Reset Safari" purges all personal browsing data. This command clears the browser cache, history, downloads window, cookies, auto-fill text (including previous Google searches) and more. It's up to the user to tick the checkboxes of what to and what not to clear.
- Saved Passwords: Passwords are saved in Mac OS X's keychain, which uses 128-bit AES encryption.
- Parental Controls: Parental controls can be setup to allow the loading of only approved websites.
- Safari users can also search and sort their stored cookies within Safari's Security Preferences pane, and they can delete any or a range of cookies from that panel.
- Private Browsing: When enabled webpages are not added to History, cookies are not stored, download are automaticly removed from the Downloads window, information isn't saved in AutoFill (includes names, passwords and information filled in forms), and searches are not added to the search-bar memory. Although history is not saved in anyway, until you close the window, you will be still able to use the Back and Forward buttons to return to previous visited webpages.
Windows Vista:
Internet Explorer offers many security features that help to keep users safe while browsing the Internet.
- Disable Add-ons: "Tools" -> "Manage Add-ons" -> "Toolbars and Extensions" lets users easily enable/disable add-ons and ActiveX controls that have been downloaded and installed. Users can even delete items that they don't wish to have on their system anymore.
- Smartscreen Filter: The smartscreen filter automatically scans websites as they load and checks them for potential phishing scams. The address bar will turn red, display a red stop sign icon to the left of the address bar, and the browser will refuse to display the page unless the user clicks a link to accept the site. The address bar will turn yellow if it is a suspected phishing site and show a yellow stop sign icon to the left of the address bar. Clicking on either sign will show more information about that site, as well as why the warning came up. Also, Internet Exploere 8 will dim the current URL except for the top level domain.
- Site-Specific Security Zones: Users can setup different security zones for specific websites, which allows the specified sites to run with non-standard privileges.
- Reset IE: Users have the ability to reset IE in the event that it becomes unstable (this deletes all browser add-ons, and resets all changed settings)
- Content Advisor: The Content Advisor can block websites with certain ratings (depiction of alchohol/drug use, gambling, etc.). Users can even be forced to type in a supervisor password (setup when content advisor is enabled) in order to view web pages with no rating. Content Advisor can also be setup to always allow access to certain websites, and to block others.
- Delete Browsing History: "Tools" -> "Delete Browsing History" lets the user clear temporary internet files, cookies, browsing history, saved form data, inprivate filtering data, and passwords.
- Protected Mode: Protected Mode allows Internet Explorer to modify files only in the "Temporary Internet Files" folder, which means that malware is unable to make changes to the user's system. This is the default mode for IE7 on Windows Vista.
- Parental Controls: Whitelists can be setup that restrict access to certain sites for specific users. There are also options to use various online rating systems--ISCA, for example.
- InPrivate Browsing: inPrivate browsing is a special mode where Interent Explorer doesn't store cookies, temporary files, history, or any sort of data on your computer. Using InPrivate browsing also disables all addons for that browsing session, since such things could possibly store information
Odds & Ends
Mac OS X:
- Dragging and dropping highlighted text from another window (either from Safari or another application) onto the Safari icon, in the dock, will open a new Safari window and perform a search on Google for that text string.
- Safari sports a feature called "Snapback". A web page is marked for snapback when loaded in a new window, its URL is manually entered into the address bar, or loaded from the user's bookmarks/history. Web pages can manually be marked for snapback by going to "History" -> "Mark Page for Snapback" or with the keyboard shortcut Shift-Command-K. An orange circle with an arrow will appear in the address bar next to the URL to indicate that the web page has been marked for snapback. So, if a user navigates to another website and wants to return to the web page they had previously marked, they just have to click on the snapback icon.
- Users can natively open and view PDF files from within Safari without the need to install any additional plug-ins.
- Safari uses Mac OS X's built-in spell checker to check for misspellings made by the user in the text boxes of web pages. This is especially useful if you are unsure of a word's spelling while writing: If you select the word and right-click, Safari will offer a list of possible words you're trying to spell right in the contextual menu. Selecting one will implement the spelling correction.
- Like most other Mac programs, Safari also uses Mac OS X's built-in Dictionary program, so users can get definition and thesaurus information without leaving the browser. Select a word or phrase and right-click to select "Look Up in Dictionary."
- Safari's address bar doubles as a progress bar.
- Just like Command-Clicking the proxy icon in the title bar of an open file, Command-Clicking a web page's title in an open Safari window will reveal the web page's location and allows the user to easily move backwards into the root domain.
- Safari includes an effective popup blocker (Select "Safari" -> "Block Popup Windows" to toggle it on/off). Generally, it will block popups that attempt to open as soon as a user visit a web page (since they are most likely to be ads), but will allow popups that are invoked by clicking a link on a page (since it then assumes that the popup is one that the user wants to see). However, this feature is not very flexible as one can only set it to "on" or "off". There is no ability to customize its settings such that it will always allow popups from certain sites.
- Safari has full support for CSS 1.0 and 2.1 and partial support for the upcoming CSS 3.0 specification
- Safari 3's find-on-page search feature, activated by pressing Command-F, presents a search bar just above the top of the web page in which to enter terms to search for on a web page. As users enter text in the search box, the browser dims the page, shows matches with a bright white background, and highlights matches on the page in an orange background.
- In Safari 3, text boxes on a web page can be resized by clicking on the lower right corner of a text box and dragging it. This is one of the many CSS 3.0 features that Safari has now implemented.
- When a user attempts to close a Safari window or quit safari with multiple tabs open, a warning dialog box appears waning the user that multiple tabs are still open and asking if the user would like to quit anyway.
- Users can reopen windows that where open in their last Safari session, by selecting "history"->"Reopen All Windows From Last Season", useful if Safari crashes.
- Safari 3 warns users if they attempt to close a tab or window when user entered text is present in a text box on a page. They can then either cancel or close the tab or window anyway, discarding the text.
- Users can turn parts of web pages in widgets using Safari 3's Web Clip feature. After clicking on the Web Clip button (scissor icon to right of address bar), the user is asked to select what part of the page should be used for the web clip widget after which they click they Save button (upper tight corner of window) to create the widget. The widget is then automatically added to the user's currently running widgets.
- Safari keeps form data you've typed in cache while you're on a given website. This is useful if you need to go back to a form and correct information. Safari will retain the form information when you use the back button to navigate rather than wiping it out.
- Safari offers excellent drag-drop support of web pages to applications such as Mail, TextEdit (Apple's Rich-Text editor), or Word.
- Safari's Print dialogue window shows user a preview of the page without having to open a separate Print Preview window. From this dialogue, users can customize margins, color, paper, etc. with a minimum of fuss.
Windows Vista:
- The zoom feature on Internet Explorer 8 does more than just increase the size of text on a web page. Images and other HTML elements zoom to stay in proportion. The only drawback to this functionality is that most images appear increasingly pixelated (rough-edged) as the zoom factor is increased. This does not necessary translate into better visibility of images, but simply larger images.
- The Print Preview window for Internet Explorer offers total control over how a web page should be printed. Users can customize margins, size of page, and even how many pages are displayed on a sheet at one time.
- Users can set up home page sets. When opening a new browser window, each home page will load under a different tab.
- RSS feeds are system wide and can be accessed by other programs. Outlook 2007 and Windows Live Mail are two examples of programs that can plug into and access RSS feed subscriptions set by users in Internet Explorer 8.
- Internet Explorer 8 has the abilty to use "web slices". these are spcial RSS feeds that update part of a webpage. Add a web slice will add a button to your favorites bar that will display the information in a drop down window
- Internet Explorer 8 doesn't display a menu bar with menus such as "File" or "Edit" by default. The majority of the commands in these menus have been relocated to the command bar and grouped into categories based on their function: home, feeds, print, page, tools, and help. While the majority of the commands can be accessed from the command bar, some can only be found in the traditional menu bar. The traditional menu bar can be displayed temporarily by pressing the ALT key or permanently by right-clicking on the toolbar and selecting "Menu bar" from the bars that can be displayed. This major user-interface change may confuse Windows users who are accustomed to the traditional menu bar placement.
- Ctrl-F brings up the find bar. You can use that to find all instances of a word on a page
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