Which browser works best for you? Poll

[Woodenhead]

meh, I wouldn't call it excellent, but at least they've gotten a lot better. (by copying the other browsers) Definitely decent now. (for me, customization and memory footprint trumps all else; individual prefs will vary OFC)

[GordonH]

I've tried 3 others then Safari, none work as well for me so I went back to Safari.

Chrome
Firefox
Opera

[rekabis]

I'm surprised Internet Explorer made it past zero!

IE is an excellent browser now, this circlejerk needed to die some time ago.

It still represents an 8-lane superhighway straight into the core of Windows. Bypass the security features, and you’ve essentially rooted Windows. You can’t say the same about other web browsers, because once you’ve bypassed their security features you still have to break into Windows. IE takes care of that for you by essentially *being* a part Windows.

Besides, where are the plugins? Adblock Plus? HTTPS-Everywhere? Password wand/secure login? Beef Taco (targeted advertising opt-out)? Tab mix plus? Reddit Enhancement Suite? Facebook Purity? Firebug? It’s missing 90+% of the plugins and/or features that makes web surfing pleasurable, private and secure.

And no, IE does NOT have a good “private surfing” mode. As long as you can see ads, you are being tracked by advertisers and content distributors. Until it is feature-comparable with something other than a 10-year-old version of Firefox, I will still consider it the reetarded inbred second cousin of web browsers. It is a Cletus, plain and simple. To the point where any of the other four alternatives (Firefox, Chrome, Opera & Safari) is a better one to make (Maxthon and Deepnet still leverage IE and wrap a pretty interface around it, and so are IE at their core).

[Scadam]

It still represents an 8-lane superhighway straight into the core of Windows. Bypass the security features, and you’ve essentially rooted Windows. You can’t say the same about other web browsers, because once you’ve bypassed their security features you still have to break into Windows. IE takes care of that for you by essentially *being* a part Windows.

Besides, where are the plugins? Adblock Plus? HTTPS-Everywhere? Password wand/secure login? Beef Taco (targeted advertising opt-out)? Tab mix plus? Reddit Enhancement Suite? Facebook Purity? Firebug? It’s missing 90+% of the plugins and/or features that makes web surfing pleasurable, private and secure.

And no, IE does NOT have a good “private surfing” mode. As long as you can see ads, you are being tracked by advertisers and content distributors. Until it is feature-comparable with something other than a 10-year-old version of Firefox, I will still consider it the reetarded inbred second cousin of web browsers. It is a Cletus, plain and simple. To the point where any of the other four alternatives (Firefox, Chrome, Opera & Safari) is a better one to make (Maxthon and Deepnet still leverage IE and wrap a pretty interface around it, and so are IE at their core).

You seem to have pretty strong opinions.

I always find it odd that the more highly technical a person identifies themselves, the more they cling to misconceptions. In this line of work the ability to assess and evaluate new versions of software is important. Five years ago I was right there with you on the "rawr IE sucks" hate train, but I continued to test new versions and am up to date on current security. As of ie9 mainly, ie10 certainly, IE has been reasonable in comparison to FF and Chrome. Nobody is saying it's "the bestest" so relax.

You can always find one test or one article to back up a given position, but t say that IE still sucks overall, you're just plain wrong. For example, here's one that contradicts your private surfing claim:

http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/ ... vs-safari/

All browsers offer a privacy session option. Private sessions prevent the storage of history, temporary Internet files, and cookies. For example, Internet Explorer 11 features a security measure called Tracking Protection. Only Internet Explorer goes so far as to block trackers completely from communicating with your browser. What’s more, according to a 2013 NSS study, only Internet Explorer blocks trackers used on more than 90 percent of potentially hazardous sites.

https://www.nsslabs.com/reports/browser ... -edition-6

[36Drew]

Browser usage is really quite subjective and heavily regulated by one's target audience. Castanet should post some of their stats... (Troy???)

Here's a couple of mine - two high-profile gaming title sites. One is a PC-Only game, and the other is a PC and console game. The two have entirely different target markets. The first is a "life character simulation game" while the second is a quest-based first-person role-playing game. Both websites are responsive and degrade nicely for mobile. We don't support anything older than IE10 for our IE users. Both sites use angular. Site 2 is entirely a single-page angular site, while site 1 is a multi-page site with Angular components.

This is today's traffic and browser breakdown so far

[Troy]

Browser usage is really quite subjective and heavily regulated by one's target audience. Castanet should post some of their stats... (Troy???)

Here are our browser stats from Google Analytics for the last 7 days. I've included sessions and unique-visitors percentages:

Browser Stats - November 18 to 24, 2014

[36Drew]

Thanks Troy. I'm curious what your breakdown of IE version usage is. I know our IE numbers are skewed because we don't support last-gen IE (9 and below).

I'll pm you the two sites I posted. Neither is the corporate site, which itself actually gets so very little traffic in comparison.

[Troy]

Thanks for the pm!

Here's the IE version breakdown for those same 7 days:

We're seeing almost 20% of Internet Explorer users (or roughly 5% of all users) still running version 8 or older. Most of the Firefox, Chrome, and Safari users are running the latest versions.

[DANSPEED]

... but I continued to test new versions ...

Why? Sounds like a waste of time. What's so good about IE anyways? Even MS has suggested using another browser. Most people I've talked to using IE as their default browser are seniors or computer newbies, they have no clue about other browsers or even how to install a program. You say IE is excellent "now" ... you mean sandboxed right?

[Scadam]

We're seeing almost 20% of Internet Explorer users (or roughly 5% of all users) still running version 8 or older. Most of the Firefox, Chrome, and Safari users are running the latest versions.

The IE8's are probably a lot of work computers, where the user is forced to use an outdated browser simply because it is compatible with required software and it takes ages to roll out upgrades.

[36Drew]

Why? Sounds like a waste of time. What's so good about IE anyways? Even MS has suggested using another browser. Most people I've talked to using IE as their default browser are seniors or computer newbies, they have no clue about other browsers or even how to install a program. You say IE is excellent "now" ... you mean sandboxed right?

IE10 and IE11 have improved vastly over previous generations - IE11 in particular. If you're after a good touch-screen (Win8.x) fullscreen browser experience, IE11 actually provides the best experience for that. Nobody's knocking your own personal preference, but as real-world facts indicate - the number of people using IE is not statistically insignificant. The days of IE6 are dead. Anybody using it is on a now-unsupported version of windows. IE7 and IE8 will die off sooner rather than later. AngularJS and the like no longer support them - so those insisting on staying on last-gen browsers will have worse and worse browsing experiences. IE9 won't be far behind. Many

If you're running Win7 or Win8, you will have at least IE9 installed, and probably IE10. If you're running anything older than Win7 - well, you're running on a version of windows that's out of date and no longer updated... and even that's about to go end-of-life. IE9 is not longer supported by Google. Sure, search might work. Gmail might work. But they no longer perform validations against IE9 or earlier to verify that their webapps work.

As for actually supporting browsers - as you can see from Troy's stats - 30% of Castanet's users use IE. My own two sites I posted have significantly different stats because it's a significantly different demographic (to which Troy can attest - I've shared the actual site names with him). I can also tell you that folks in, say, Russia have vastly different browser preferences to folks in Europe and folks in North America.

What's interesting is CA's mention of using Opera and wondering if he's the only one. The answer is that he probably isn't the only one, but according to Troy's stats - he's statistically insignificant.

[Scadam]

... but I continued to test new versions ...

Why? Sounds like a waste of time. What's so good about IE anyways? Even MS has suggested using another browser. Most people I've talked to using IE as their default browser are seniors or computer newbies, they have no clue about other browsers or even how to install a program. You say IE is excellent "now" ... you mean sandboxed right?

Partly because my career is in computer software, but mainly because I'm not big on bandwagons. I stopped hating Vista when service packs resolved most of the core issues. I didn't blindly hate apple products before trying them for myself. And I don't continue bashing IE simply because it's fashionable to do so. Yes it was bad five years ago, but here's a decent summary to bring you up to speed:

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/32372/ht ... -explorer/

[ellington12]

google chrome is best of all. firefox is also good but chrome is best-est

[gmeikle]

Netscape navigator.......

[36Drew]

Netscape navigator.......

cURL - for the purest, rawest, most unadulterated browsing experience. It's also not susceptible to any drive-by attacks, but it's great for testing them.