Ok, I have been comparing Firefox to Internet Explorer for about the last week.

Internet Explorer Pros:

Compatable with *Most* Sites

Installed on default

utilizes the cool Start Bar thing, where I can use the lists to see all of them

Internet Explorer Cons:

Ignores certain HTML codes

Stupid Download/ActiveX/Popup blocking makes it so you refresh the page when you disable it.

Errors out commonly on Java

Firefox Pros:

The Tabs thing is kind of cool.....

Doesn't ignore any(at least ones that I have found) HTML codes

Plugins - Espically DownloadThemAll

Firefox Cons:

FTP Sucks in Firefox

Doesn't work with my dual-monitor utilizing sofware for some reason, but I suspect that problem is not with Firefox.

That seems like more of a con to me than a pro. FF is compatible with pretty much all sites. I don't think there are any sites that render properly in IE that render incorrectly in FF.

Actually, there are some sites that require IE, espically on Microsoft.com

The only site I ever couldn't use firefox for was an AOL subprofile site, and every linux distro I've used had firefox installed.

I meant other than those. Obviously M$ is going to require that you use their product, but there's no real reason why FF couldn't handle those sites.

OK, here's my opinion about this (which may go/be slightly off topic).

I personally dislike how Internet Explorer doesn't accept W3C's standards, but insteads chooses to make their own, which just gives web coders grief.

Also, I'm not saying that it's right, but many people code their websites for Internet Explorer, but not according to W3C's standards. Why? It's widely used. Some people think why go through the trouble to code my website according to these standards, if they aren't used by everybody, and Internet Explorer, a very popular web browser, doesn't abide by these standards.

People also shouldn't just code according to W3C's standards, because if they did, then Internet Explorer would mess a lot of things up. People should make websites work on all common browsers, whether they have the bend the rules or use a few deprecated elements in order to make the website compatible with Internet Explorer.

Yes, Firefox is good and all (I use Firefox), and is more compliant with W3C's standards, but that doesn't mean that people should ignore Internet Explorer users and code their web page exactly towards W3C's standards.

*bfr gets a fire hydrant*

I think just the opposite needs to be done. If everyone would code to W3C's standards, than IE would have to comply. Why should we continue to poorly code our websites so that a non-compliant browser can read them properly? Even if it is the most popular browser, their near monopoly shouldn't force us to use crappy standards. Just remember, there are reasons for why we have W3C's standards in the first place.

You can get a number of FTP plugins for firefox. I use FireFTP.
And what software do you use for multiple monitors?

It is called UltraMon, and somehow Firefox got on the ignore list.

It has a list of programs that it doesn't interface with because of glitches..

Yeah, but you can get those sites to open up in Firefox (well, it really opens up IE in a new tab...but it gets the job done)

http://ietab.mozdev.org/

That is just stupid. Why not just open up IE?

so you dont have to switch browser and deal with IEs sheistiness the rest of the time...

true, say I open a site or click a link, and it isn't right in FF. I just click a little button in the lower right hand corner, and next thing you know, it is rendered in all of IE's lack of glory. Score another for FF. Now too bad there is no Opera tab for it, but ah well.

Or you can just use a useragent switcher to have FF report itself as IE, and BAM, it'll work fine w/ no errors (except for the authentication via activeX for things like autoupdates, obviously, but for everything else its fine)



That is quite possibly the stupidest pro ever. You DO know thats a WindowsXP thing and NOT an IE thing? You DO know that you can have firefox open pages in new WINDOWS as well? You DO know that you don't HAVE to use tabs in firefox?



Yeah, the default FTP in firefox is pretty minimal, but FireFTP is much better (Oh, and the IE default is horribly slow. Get a 'real' FTP client and it will be much faster)

...Which is why I didn't post a link for the useragent switcher

I was more suggesting it as an alternative for non-MS and/or non-ActiveX sites

I wasn't trying to say to deliberately ignore W3C's standards. They are good, people should code according to them, and yes, they are there for a reason. But, if coding to W3C's standards somehow conflicts with making the page render correctly in Internet Explorer, then the code should be modified to work on both Firefox, and Internet Explorer.

You guys are forgetting that MS is a part of the committee that helps create those standards, so there is no excuse for IE However, browser incompatibilities vs the W3C are relatively few, and are mostly limited to more advanced things. There is no reason for the HTML soup that populates 75% of the web pages out there >.<

uh... wtf?