I’m writing this entry in Internet Explorer 7. Let me back up—I’m not sure you heard me correctly. I’m not writing this in Internet Explorer 7 Beta or even in the Internet Explorer 7 Release Candidate. I’m writing this post using the official release of Internet Explorer 7. The official release announcement was made this afternoon on IEBlog.
You can download Internet Explorer 7 now if you’d like, or if you’re not anxious you can wait a few weeks, as the new browser will be released as a high-priority automatic Windows update.
I for one am impressed with the new product and can whole-heartedly recommend it to everyone. As far as web standards support is concerned, I don’t think IE7 hits the nail quite on the head, but it’s a far cry closer than IE6 ever was. I have to give credit where credit is due, and the Internet Explorer team has earned my praise for taking huge strides in the right direction.
And some news outlets have already picked up on that Secunia is already reporting on a Internet Explorer Arbitrary Content Disclosure Vulnerability. Though in the interest of full disclosure, IE6 has had that issue since April 2006.
I was going to write my opinion, but then I discovered that Walter S. Mossberg, a technology commentator with much more experience and authority than I have, already wrote my opinion for me. You can read it here for the next 90 days or so.
Briefly, I believe that since IE7 did not improve over Firefox or other browsers, but merely played “catch-up,” there is no reason to switch to IE if you currently use Firefox. However, those who currently use an earlier version of IE should certainly upgrade to IE7. Better yet, they should upgrade to Firefox.
Earlier this year, Walter Mossberg also compared Google and Ask.com. I can’t find a copy of Mr. Mossberg’s comments, but I found a discussion on the topic where he admits that Ask “might soon become [his] main/favorite search engine.”
I hope my comments weren’t misunderstood above. I would not recommend people switch from Firefox to IE7. I couldn’t agree more with Mossberg’s excellent synopsis of the situation. Clearly, people who are fans of IE should upgrade to IE7, but people who are already using Firefox or Opera should stick with what they have. Additionally, developers and those who appreciate having many browsers on their systems shouldn’t hesitate to download IE7. In short, everyone should download IE7, but not everyone will wish to use it extensively.