Internet Explorer 7

[Mycanid]

Hey ... I have been a firefox fan since its inception ... and a mozilla fan before that. Dunno. Just like the interface and have gotten used to it.

IE7 does have a quirky interface, as PlaneSailing mentioned. But I do have to use it every now and again, like when I need to update Office products and such.

Still prefer Firefox, though.

 

[Ranger REG]

I'm not following something, here. Isn't that what the task bar does?

The taskbar doesn't allow us to rearrange windows in the order that we like. The only feature you can enable is grouping similar windows. But it won't allow me to put the Acrobat taskbar tab to the left of a MSWord tab, if you open it after MSWord.

It would be nice if MSWord also have tabbed browsing so I can open multiple documents without flooding the taskbar.

 

[Simplicity]

The taskbar currently has a similar feature, with the "Group similar taskbar buttons". All your Word docs, for example, appear as one button on the taskbar and, when you click on it, you get a list of open docs to choose from. Pretty much the same idea you're talking about, just vertical instead of horizontal.

I currently use that feature as opposed to tabbed browsing. It requires two clicks, and that's essentially what makes it inferior to tabbed browsing (that plus the organizational ability).

There's a lot of things that can be done that would work better. The thumbnails in Vista would help. Fisheye lens the task bar. Creating a small-footprint active process desktop, essentially.

The current method is a square-windows-and-text kludge that was easy to program 10 years ago, and that's why it got done.

 

[babomb]

If only it were attractive enough to draw everyone away from the web developer's nightmare that is IE6. They finally implemented code to recognize the alpha transparency of .png images. There were ways around this problem before, but none of them were ideal, and IME, all of those that fixed the issue for IE created problems in Firefox and Netscape... Microsoft... *sigh*...

Edit: P.S.--If anyone has ever found a blanket fix for the above problem, please let me know.

Check this out: http://dean.edwards.name/IE7/

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Wound up with IE7 on my laptop after a hard drive crash and reload. When DL'ing all the MS updates I probably would have scotched IE7 had I been at all aware that it was there. I did not know or even suspect something like that would be there. If I had I would have definitely skipped it. On my desktop machine at home I don't much care, but the laptop gets used for work, interfacing with modems, routers, switches and satellite equipment of all kinds and what goes onto it CAN make a big difference. IE7 may well be superior to IE6 in all kinds of ways but technical support is familiar with how IE6 interacts with this equipment. IE7 is an unknown quantity and I don't trust it. Not yet anyway.

One of the first things I wound up doing for work after reloading my laptop was setting up some DSL modems. For various reasons these installs were annoying and highly problematic but I suspect that IE7 may have been as much of a hindrance to accessing things as any programming from Verizon's end in that process. I was IMMEDIATELY given reason to question it because it was a notable change to MY equipment. It may have had nothing to do with things but there it is. I have suspicions but no proof or even real evidence.

I DO blame the MS update process. Certainly I'm going to be even more attentive of those damnable MS update downloads than I already am. Security updates is one thing - but something like a full, new browser version is something they should ASK if you REALLY, REALLY want to do this before shoveling it down the line as if THEY always know best what it is that you want and need.

Besides, everything is moved around forcing you to relearn and rediscover where things are and how to make it do again what you used to do without thinking. Oh, and one more thing - what the hell is the point of having tabs in the browser if you STILL keep getting multiple windows popping up when following links instead of additional tabs?

 

[ssampier]

I don't care for the interface. As a former customer support person I can imagine the head-aches trying to deal with people over IE7 layout change.

I still use Firefox 2.0.

The taskbar currently has a similar feature, with the "Group similar taskbar buttons". All your Word docs, for example, appear as one button on the taskbar and, when you click on it, you get a list of open docs to choose from. Pretty much the same idea you're talking about, just vertical instead of horizontal.

[threadjack]
I hate that. I routinely have 15 or so apps open and the group just drives me insane; I turn it off.
[/threadjack]

 

[Scotley]

I like IE7 overall, but the changes in the interface were a little frustrating until I discovered that I could get the old File, Edit etc. menus by tapping the alt key. How am I supposed to print to something other than the default printer without the file menu? I guess I'm missing something, but I couldn't figure out how to do that or change the text size without the old menus. I don't want to think about using Office without those menus!

 

[Thad Enouf]

I DO blame the MS update process. Certainly I'm going to be even more attentive of those damnable MS update downloads than I already am. Security updates is one thing - but something like a full, new browser version is something they should ASK if you REALLY, REALLY want to do this before shoveling it down the line as if THEY always know best what it is that you want and need.

I had a choice on installing IE7. On three machines, I did so. On three other, older machines, I told it no. Of course, I have it set up to ask before installing any updates so it worked fine for me. Must be different on an OS reinstall.

 

[Thad Enouf]

I like IE7 overall, but the changes in the interface were a little frustrating until I discovered that I could get the old File, Edit etc. menus by tapping the alt key. How am I supposed to print to something other than the default printer without the file menu? I guess I'm missing something, but I couldn't figure out how to do that or change the text size without the old menus. I don't want to think about using Office without those menus!

To print without the file menu, click on the little arrow next to the printer icon and you'll get the "Print..." option, then choose your printer.

To increase/decrease fonts, click on the little arrow next to the Page icon and choose text size.

I did not know, however, about the Alt key bringing up the file menu. Nice touch.

 

[Scotley]

To print without the file menu, click on the little arrow next to the printer icon and you'll get the "Print..." option, then choose your printer.

To increase/decrease fonts, click on the little arrow next to the Page icon and choose text size.

I did not know, however, about the Alt key bringing up the file menu. Nice touch.

Thanks Thad, I guess I should have seen those little arrows. It seems obvious now. I'm getting old, maybe it is time to lower the resolution on the screen a notch.