HitChrome

While Microsoft spent the best part of 2008 releasing test versions of its IE8 browser - the first beta was in March - its competitors have been streaking ahead.

In fact, in the time that Microsoft has taken to iron out last-minute problems in IE8 and finish its testing, there are even more browser competitors in the market.

Google, for example, released its Chrome browser as a beta version in early September and just three months later released version 1.0 of the browser. Sure, Chrome doesn’t have half the features that IE8 does, or even Firefox 3, but that hasn’t harmed it. According to NetApplications, Chrome already had close to 1% share of the browser market by November and with version 1.0 being released in December that number is expected to climb even higher.

Firefox, in comparison, topped 20% market share for the first time in November 2008. That’s up from around 16% in January of 2008. Similarly, Apple’s Safari browser is up from 5% in January 2008 to more than 7% in November.

Internet Explorer’s market share has dropped from 75% at the start of 2008 to 69% on November. Which is not an encouraging trend for Microsoft.

When Internet Explorer 8 is finally released in early 2009, no doubt there will be a spike in users who, because they are prompted to update their versions, will switch to the newer browser. And most will be happy with what is essentially the best browser Microsoft has released to date.

But if the company delays the final release too much longer it could be looking at a completely different browser landscape in which it will have much more competition that ever before.

The Official Google Blog stated that the full release comes after 14 product updates and that Chrome 1.0 is more stable and much faster than former one.

Video plug-ins optimization is one of the biggest improvements users wanted from Google Chrome. The browser had always had glitches in playing videos, even from Google’s subsidiary, YouTube. The official blog states that these bugs were fixed in the final release. Furthermore, the blog states that the “V8 JavaScript engine runs 1.4 times faster” on Chrome 1.0 compared to its first beta release.

PC Magazine reviewed the browser yesterday and reported a 24 percent increase in speed, Chrome being much snappier than Internet Explorer and comparable with Mozilla Firefox 3.1 Beta 2. Yet, the reviewer reported that Google Chrome still uses the biggest amount of RAM, almost double than Firefox, when opening complex websites.

Google Chrome has been continuously updated since its initial release in September 2008. However, there are still issues that Chrome’s users have to cope with. Among the most important flaws of Google Chrome is the inability to access websites like Windows’ Hotmail because the browser is still not officially supported. Also, it is somehow surprising that even the company’s own Google Zeitgeist 2008 Website isn’t properly displayed in Google Chrome.

In the near future, it is expected that Google will release Linux and Mac version of Google Chrome, along with RSS support and an extensions platform.

Firefox surpassed a 20% share of the browser market last month, breaking its own records.

The figures, reported by web metrics firm Net Applications, reveal that for two weeks in October the company accounted for 20.6% of all monitored browser traffic.

Despite this, Firefox closed the month with an average traffic share of 19.97%, falling just short of the magic number.

The report will come as good news to Mozilla, which has seen its share bounce back following a half percentage point fall in September, due to the introduction of Google’s Chrome browser.

At the contrasting ending of the scale, dominant browser Internet Explorer has seen its share fall 71.52% to 71.27%. The fall marks it out as the browser with the fastest declining market share.

Chrome was also hit by Firefox’s gain, with the buzz surrounding its September launch fading, resulting in its share falling to 0.74% from 0.78%.

Indeed the only other browser to to gain during October was Opera, which jumped from 0.69% to 0.75%.

Mozilla has released the first public preview of its mobile browser and has offered it for download in different versions tailored for PC and Mac users.

Currently it has been pitched as an “early developer release” and the company aims to receive feedback from its users.

The new browser which has been code named as “Fennec” includes touch screen support along with tabbed browsing interface.

Incidentally the name “Fennec” traces its origin to the small Fennec fox which thrives in the Sahara desert and is characterised by its huge ears.

Some of its other notable features include an advanced pop up blocker, a password manager and it plans to include geolocation in its later versions.

Fennec retails many elements of the Firefox 3 such as its characteristic address bar; however a major improvement includes the address bar doubling up as search bar similar to what has been noticed in Google Chrome. Read the rest of this entry »