Browsers and extensions

Category: Browsing

My Yahoo is a customizable start page that users can fill with a variety of personalized content feeds. Like some other single-page aggregators, My Yahoo centers around its directory, which is filled with all sorts of feeds--some from third-party sources, while others are in-house Yahoo content. Users can mix and match, move things around, and custom tailor their page however they please.

In addition to content, users can also pick from a wide variety of themes to decorate their page. Each of these themes can be customized, down to color and font as well.

Web site: My.Yahoo.com… Read more

Category: Browsing

Google Reader is a Web-based RSS feed reader. Users can subscribe to as many RSS feeds as they want, then browse them in a lean and simplistic two-pane story browser that feels a little bit like Gmail. RSS feeds give users a visually simplified version of Web content. In addition to photos and text, Google Reader will also display embedded video clips from several popular services.

In addition to reading stories yourself, you can also share them with others. Google Reader gives users the option to create sharable feeds of subscribed stories, including the ones they mark as … Read more

Category: Browsing

Internet Explorer is Microsoft's latest Web browser and the most dominant Internet browser on the market. In its newest iteration, Microsoft has added tabs and extensions, letting users add additional features and functionality. It's also been given a face-lift that brings it a little closer to the look and feel of Windows Vista.

Internet Explorer 7 is also the first version of Explorer to handle RSS feeds, the popular Web content syndication standard.

Internet Explorer comes as a the default browser on all PCs that ship with the Windows operating system and has been the target … Read more

Category: Browsing

Opera is one of the oldest browsers around. It's also made its way into all sorts of consumer electronics, including mobile phones, gaming portables, and even home video game consoles. Opera has combined many technological services into its desktop Web browser and is commonly regarded as the first to implement tabs for viewing multiple Web pages in the same window.

Interestingly enough, Opera has also built-in a BitTorrent client. Users who want to partake in the peer-to-peer file sharing technology can do so while continuing their other browsing habits.

One of Opera's latest offerings is called … Read more

Category: Browsing

Firefox is a free, multiplatform browser. Its popularity is second only to Microsoft's Internet Explorer among Web browsers, but unlike IE, it has open-source code. The result has been an avid development community, filled with people eager to squash bugs and create new functionality. Firefox also has the option to create and use extensions that can add new features or services right on top of the user experience. These add-ons have gotten so popular that Firefox creator Mozilla has created its own directory for users to search and sort through them. The latest release of Firefox has … Read more

Safari was an early hit with Windows users, who have downloaded 1 million copies of the browser since Monday, according to Apple.

CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the Windows version of the browser as a beta release Monday during his keynote speech at the Worldwide Developers Conference. Safari makes up around 5 percent of the browser market, trailing Internet Explorer and Firefox with its 18.6 million users, a figure Jobs used in his speech Monday.

Cynical colleagues at CNET wonder how many of those downloads were started by hackers and security professionals probing for weaknesses, which is probably a fair … Read more

SAN FRANCISCO--The Chinese government has begun blocking access to Yahoo's Flickr photo-sharing site, but co-founder and general manager Stewart Butterfield has a tip on how to get around it.

China is blocking only Flickr's images, Butterfield said in an interview here Tuesday during a party to celebrate the company's expansion beyond the English-speaking world and the launch of the 24 Hours of Flickr book. The way in which the country is doing so means that the Firefox Web browser, augmented with the Greasemonkey plug-in, can automatically bypass the block.

Specifically, Greasemonkey needs to run a script that … Read more

It only runs on Safari--and no one but Apple knows if it'll actually run on the iPhone, because JavaScript support is still a mystery--but the first third-party application built with the iPhone in mind is freely available.

OneTrip, a simple JavaScript shopping list builder that runs only on Safari, was created by designer Neven Mrgan. You can download Safari here to test out the application.

According to Mrgan's Twitter page, the app existed as early as May 31. That's either tremendous foresight by Mrgan, amazing luck that Apple announced Safari as the official iPhone app engine yesterday at WWDC, … Read more

For those of us interested in software, the lack of an iPhone developer's kit announcement at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference yesterday was a bit of a disappointment.

What we got instead was Safari for Windows, which is exactly what I don't need: another Web browser. When considered with the relaunch of Netscape Navigator last week, it's clear, however, that the battle for control of your browser is still a major front in the software wars.

Internet Explorer has reigned supreme since the dawn of the new century, while Mozilla Firefox continues to chip away at Microsoft'… Read more