Internet Explorer 7.0

http://www.microsoft-watch.com/article2/0,1995,1776290,00.asp

Microsoft has released the brand new Internet Explorer 7.0 for Windows XP users. This update to Internet Explorer is a milestone in Microsoft history. After almost two and a half years of development, Microsoft has finally released this new version, which is full of changes, including many related to security.

At first glance, it doesn't really look that different if you use another alternative browser, such as Mozilla Firefox. However, loyal Internet Explorer 6.0 users will notice a different in the layout of the interface. You will now notice that IE7 features "tabbed browsing," which is the ability to have multiple Web pages open at once. This has been a long-time feature of many alternative Internet browsers. Now a built-in search box, which is just like what Mozilla's Firefox and Opera have. It automatically is set to use Microsoft's Live.com to search, but you can customize it to any search engine you want.

Microsoft also overhauled IE7's printing abilities, which like Firefox, now shrinks the page contents to fit the paper size. This in general is a really nice feature as it saves paper, however, it can sometimes results in really small font to be used, so always make sure to use the Print Preview to make sure your Web page will be readable.
Like we said earlier, Internet Explorer 7 includes a lot of new security features in an attempt to make it as secure as other popular alternative browsers on the Web. Microsoft has now included complete ActiveX protection, new certificate authentication, an anti-phishing filter, and malware protection


Internet Explorer 7 may not be up to par with other alternative browsers, but Microsoft is certainly making an attempt. They still need to add many features that will be included in the upcoming Firefox 2.0. We would have thought with 1.5 years of development, Microsoft would have been able to produce a browser that would make it comparable to Firefox and Opera, but they have not done that with IE7. Current users of IE6 will want to upgrade for the many cosmetic changes.