What is an embedded browser. What browsers do and how they work - in simple and understandable words

The first word that any newcomer hears when entering the Internet is a browser. What is a browser? What are they, how to choose the best? There are a lot of questions, but often there are no answers to them on the network or they have to be collected in parts. I am going to write a full article on this topic so that any beginner reading it will understand everything from A to Z. For example, you will need to explain the basics of surfing the Internet to your grandmother, who is far from a computer like the Earth is from Jupiter. It's not a problem! Just open my article to her and let her be enlightened! ;)

So, here is a small plan of our today's lesson - lectures - notes, as you like.

We will move according to this plan so as not to miss anything. After this lesson, you should not have blank spots in this topic. To begin with, I will give a couple of definitions and descriptions of the term "Browser", since everyone tends to give it its own interpretation, but it can often be erroneous or incomplete. If you give several explanations at once, you can get a complete picture. Then, I will tell a brief history of the development of browsers in order to understand how it all began and where it is going. Only knowing history, even if it is brief, can one understand the current state of affairs. This rule works everywhere: in the political sphere, in the computer sphere, in the legal sphere, and in whatever else. Next will be ALL modern browsers that have some weight in the market. After all, why do you need to know about some exotic program that a bunch of geeks use? I think that there is no need. All right, we're starting.

What is a browser

1) Browser, Web browser, is a special program designed to view websites. This happens with the help of http requests to the server and receiving data from it, which are processed according to special approved standards and thus a web page is formed.
2) In simpler language Browser- this is the program that you have open at the moment and with the help of which you have the opportunity to read my article now. That is, the browser is a conductor between the World Wide Web and the user. It is he who allows you to access the entire set of information available on the Internet.

Now it is clear. We turn on the computer, connect to the Internet, but get any data from it without special program it is forbidden. There must be software that can request information, receive it, process it and display it on the user's screen. This is exactly what the browser does.

A Brief History of Browsers

The very first browser with a graphical interface is Mosaic from NCSA. But despite being a pioneer in the browser field, Mosaic's development was discontinued in 1997 due to market loss. Now I will explain how it all happened. The fact is that some employees from the NCSA migrated to Netscape and began developing a new, more advanced browser - Netscape Navigator. It should have better standards support and be much more user-friendly. They succeeded and their product was a success.

The notorious Microsoft company drew attention to this. It is logical, because such a huge piece of the pie practically floated away from their hands. But the situation quickly changed, and in a completely opposite direction, when Microsoft, based on the open source code of the first graphical browser Mosaic, quickly assembled its own browser - Interner Explorer. They included it as a mandatory update for their Windows 95 operating system and it was all set. Now each user was practically deprived of the right to choose, including because of his illiteracy in this matter. That's the whole secret of the stunning success of IE - monopoly. The brainchild of Moykrosoft quickly captured the niche and had about 95% of the market. In this regard, Netscape was forced to close its project. But here they took a rather correct step, namely, they published the code under the MPL free license (which stands for Mozilla public License). It was a great contribution to the fight against monopoly.

It was on the basis of this code that a completely new Mozilla Firefox project subsequently appeared, which was forced to develop faster than IE in order to conquer the market. And the Microsoft project, meanwhile, was abandoned and practically not improved. They did not need it, because users had practically no choice, or rather, the vast majority did not know about the alternatives in the person of the same Mozilla. In the same 1995, another browser appeared - Opera, which, due to its free (until 2005, was distributed shareware) was gaining popularity in the CIS countries. IE continued its development only to the 7th version.
Thus, we smoothly approached the next point.

What are modern browsers

Google Chrome . This is a browser that is being developed by the giant Google based on their free Chromium browser. It uses the WebKit engine (Webkit) to display the resulting web pages. The first public beta version of Chromium for the Microsoft Windows operating system was released on September 2, 2008. A little later, on December 11, 2008, a stable version was released. According to StatCounter, the browser is currently in first place in terms of popularity in the world, and its market share in May 2012 was 32.43%. As for the RuNet, LiveInternet reports that in May 2012 Chrome takes the first place - its share is about 20.6%. As of January 2014 - 32%.

Distributed free of charge under a public license. It is part of the Mozilla Application Suite operated by Mozilla Corporation. According to Statcounter, Firefox is the third most popular in the world, but the second among free software, thus in May 2012 its market share was 25.55%. It is also worth noting that this browser has a particular success, for example, in Germany and Poland. There he occupies 55% and 47% of the market, respectively. As for Russia, here Firefox ranks third in popularity with a share of 23.73% of users by July 2012. And in January 2014 it was only 14%.

internet explorer. A series of browsers developed by Microsoft since 1995. It is included in the set of operating systems of the Windows family. IE, according to the LiveInternet service, in Russia by March 2012 is already in third place with 15.6% of users. As mentioned above, the first place in the browser Google Chrome. It is worth taking into account that internet explorer is installed in almost all large and medium-sized companies as the only browser for the purposes of the security policy of organizations. In fact, alternative browsers are no worse in this regard, it’s just that the stereotype “since IE is being developed by Microsoft, then this is a serious product” has firmly settled into the minds of management, which does not want to hear that the situation is actually completely different. Often on working computers, versions 5 and 6 of IE are installed, which has unpatched vulnerabilities three or four years ago.

Opera. Web browser and software package for working on the Internet. Produced by Opera Software. It was developed in 1994 by a group of enthusiasts from the small Norwegian company Telenor. Since 1995, it has been a product of Opera Software, which was founded by the authors of the first version. It is known that the total market share of Opera and Opera Mobile in April 2012 is about 2.3%. In Russia, the percentage of browser users is much higher than in the general world. So, as of March 2012, Opera, together with the mobile version of Opera Mini, ranked first in Russia with 32.1% of users. But by 2013 everything had changed. Quality mobile version the browser fell, and the appearance of the desktop version of Opera 18, where bookmarks turned into something very inconvenient, Opera began to lose its fans dramatically. As of January 2014 - 9%.

Apple Safari. A browser developed by Apple Corporation. Included in the operating systems Mac OS X and iOS, of course. It is also distributed absolutely free for Windows operating systems. It ranks 4th in terms of the number of users (share as of November 2011 - 6.66%). In the Russian-speaking segment of the Internet, its share is 8% as of January 2014.

The general graph of the popularity of browsers on the global Internet:

As you can see, the graph confirms everything I wrote. IE from the very beginning was almost a monopoly in this area. But gradually its share was reduced due to the low quality of work. It crashed constantly, didn't support tabs for a very long time (each page opened in a new window, but freezing 1 window caused everyone to crash). FireFox has been beloved by active users since its inception, who saw this browser as the main competitor to Internet Explorer. But with the advent of Chrome, everything began to change dramatically and at the moment the browser from Google completely dominates this market.
That's all, other browsers, in my purely personal opinion, are not worthy of attention. I'm not the ultimate truth, I'm just expressing my thoughts.

Outcome. Today I told you about all the popular browsers, now you know what a browser is, as well as their history. I hope this article was useful for you!

Imagine a huge library that contains millions of books. The library is the Internet, and each book is a web page written in a special programming language. The Wikipedia page looks like this:

Among all these signs it is difficult to make out information. Therefore, the browser serves as a special tool for reading these characters and displaying information in a form convenient for us.

What browsers exist: the most popular types

There are a lot of Internet browsers and they all have their own characteristics. Let's talk about the most accessible of them in more detail.

Google Chrome

One of the leading internet browsers. Its advantage is a simple interface. Google Chrome is fast and secure, it has its own constantly updated database of unsafe sites. In its settings, you can set the page view mode. Data in this mode is not saved either in cookies or in history. In the Chrome settings there are already installed plugins and an online store for extensions. If desired, you can speed up the software through the task manager. The profile in Chrome is synchronized with other devices, so it is also very popular as a mobile browser.

internet explorer

The oldest Internet browser that once had immense popularity. It is known to many users, as it is part of the operating Windows system and is considered a "browser download browser". Internet Explorer, despite all the improvements and additions, cannot compete with modern and fast software. It does not support the main html and css languages, which are used for most of the pages. Therefore, the elements are displayed incorrectly, and the layout designers have to adjust the code.

Microsoft Edge

It is the latest replacement for Internet Explorer. It installs with Windows 10. Edge is built on a completely new foundation to keep it fast, secure, and stable. It has a Cortana voice assistant function, but it is somewhat inferior to voice assistants from other systems. Edge has also added InPrivate mode, which is similar to Chrome's incognito mode.

Opera

This web browser is one of the top best browsers for personal computers and mobile devices. Opera has its own special features, which not all competitors have analogues. You can not ignore the Opera Turbo function, which allows you to speed up the loading of sites. When you turn on the turbo mode in congested and slow networks, pages open much faster. Other than that, Opera works great on slow devices. It is ideal for users with limited traffic. By speeding up page loading, it greatly reduces the amount of traffic. A very convenient solution is a built-in ad blocker without third-party plugins and extensions. Thanks to this, the speed of work increases by 3 times. This feature can be disabled in the settings if desired. But, probably, the main advantage is the built-in free server.

Other advantages of the Opera:

There is a possibility of control through "hot" keys.
The power saving mode saves up to 50% of the device's charge.
Opera has a wide range of extensions and themes for design.

Yandex browser

This is a young web browser designed search engine Yandex. Created on the same base as Google Chrome. For some features, Yandex Browser is in many ways similar to Chrome, only associated with Yandex services. Of the features, control through mouse gestures can be noted: hold down the right button and make the necessary gesture.

Mozilla Firefox

A convenient and high-quality browser that has won the trust of users. It has a simple and intuitive interface. The toolkit of the program can be unlimitedly increased by other extensions and adjusted to suit you. However, when installing a certain number of add-ons, it becomes slower.

safari

Provided with MacOS, but there are modifications for Windows. It has an elegant and simple design, the ability to add extensions and is endowed with all the other necessary functions.

Why do users need a browser

The main function of a web surfer is to display website pages.

Most users use it not only to search the Internet, but also to:

watching movies, series, cartoons in good quality;
games;
learning;
text translation;
listening to music;
downloading any files;
online shopping, bank transfers;
reading.

Some features are provided by the pages themselves: in the case of games, the browser plays the role of an intermediary. Other features, such as support for various document formats, saving bookmarks, are related to the functionality of the web browser itself.

Extensions

These are additional tools that perform specific functions and tasks. There are special plugins for ad protection, for saving articles and videos to certain sites. Thanks to extensions, users have new opportunities, the functionality of programs for viewing hypertext documents on the Internet changes.

Why developers need a browser

Looks at the page differently from the user. It needs special tools and plugins to work properly.

A developer needs a browser for:

testing your site on all types of web browsers;
viewing the DOM tree, CSS styles;
using the JavaScript console for code review and debugging.

Cross-browser compatibility: what is it, why is it needed, how is it achieved

Different web browsers may display the same site differently. - this is the correct display of your page on different programs.

The cause of problems with unequal display of the site lies in the history of the development of systems for viewing pages on the Internet. In essence, the reason is that different software interprets the same code differently. Such differences are a real headache for the creators of the site.

Cross-browser compatibility is achieved by the usual means of CSS. If this is not too effective, then hacks will come to the rescue. And for Internet Explorer, conditional comments are used, they only work in IE, other browsers simply ignore them.

Technically, a web browser is a client. A program that uses the HTTP (or HTTPS) protocols to send requests to web servers over the Internet. Most browsers support email and FTP (file transfer), although a web browser is not required to use them. There are separate programs for working with mail and file transfer.

The very first browser, whose name was WorldWideWeb, was created in 1990. The name has been changed to Nexus to avoid future confusion. The first web browser with a graphical user interface was Mosaic, which appeared in 1993. Much of the Mosaic user interface has been ported to the Netscape Nsvigator web browser. Microsoft later introduced Internet Explorer (IE), which until 2006 was one of the most popular web browsers. Then I had to choose between IE and Netscape. Today, the user has more choice. And IE has already ceased to be wildly popular, first of all, users install other web browsers for themselves.

The most common browsers

There are quite a lot of web browsers, although most are based on the most common ones. The most popular browsers today are:

Firefox. Developed by Mozilla, an open source version of Netscape.
Google Chrome. Browser from Google, one of the most popular today, both for desktop and mobile devices.
safari. Browser for Apple devices. The third most popular, works only with operating systems from Apple.
Opera. Fast, stable browser compatible with most operating systems.
Lynx. Text browser for UNIX and VMS users.
Internet Explorer. The browser from Microsoft is still actively updated, maintained and optimized, despite the impressive competition.
Flock. A browser based on Firefox with Web 2.0 support for blogging and social bookmarking.
Tor. Browser for absolutely anonymous access to the network. It is usually used to bypass a territorial ban on displaying certain pages and access to the darknet.

Modern browsers are constantly updated and provide users with more and more opportunities to visit the worldwide web. So don't forget to update when a new version comes out. Updates to such client software are completely free.

Basic functions and browser management

The main functionality of all web browsers is the same. They are designed to communicate with web servers and provide user access to websites. You can download them from the official websites of the developers, they are completely free. Each browser has its own toolbar with which you can access your favorite sites. Including ours.

The set of tools and buttons for browsers is usually similar. There is an address bar, forward and backward buttons, a refresh button, and a button to stop loading the page. All have their own menu where you can set custom settings if necessary. Also in the browser you can see the history of the pages that you visited recently. And you can clear it so that no one else gets access to this information. Browsers differ in speed, extensions and user interface.

If the vast majority of older people are only superficially familiar with the Internet, for the younger generation, daily "web surfing" is as essential as brushing your teeth or eating food. However, even among those who access the network every day, few know what it is and what opportunities it has. Therefore, let's figure it out.

What is a browser and what is it for

A browser is software that allows you to query and display the content of websites, manage virtual applications, download files from your computer, and perform many other tasks. The functionality of web browsers is constantly growing, which is facilitated by healthy competition between developers and the active introduction of information systems and technologies in various fields of activity. Browsers are distributed for the most part for free, but some of them regularly offer the user to make a voluntary donation for their development.

The history of browsers and a brief overview of modern products

The first web browser was released in 1990 and was called WorldWideWeb (later renamed Nexus). The author of the project was the famous London inventor Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee, whose contribution to the development of information technology is difficult to overestimate. The basis for the world's first browser was the NeXTSTEP platform, which is also used in the development of Mac OS X.

However, due to the fact that the browser code remained closed for a long time (until 1993), NCSA Mosaic is considered to be the first browser released to the masses. It was he who served as the basis for Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer, it was with him that the legendary “browser war” began.

Unlike Netscape, Microsoft almost initially distributed its product for free, which allowed it to monopolize the market by 1999, occupying more than 95% of its volume. For users, this turned out to be that many sites and web documents were optimized for one specific browser (IE) and did not open in others. The developer himself, feeling the advantage, stopped paying due attention to the development of his product. This is what Netscape took advantage of. Leaving the market, she released the source code of her web browser under the MLP license, thereby inflicting a "stab in the back" on Microsoft and laying the foundation for many modern projects, including:

Google Chrome

Today, Chrome is used by over 300 million daily users, which automatically makes it the most popular browser in the world. Based on Chromium and Blink, it suits both the casual and advanced PC user. The strengths of the browser include:

Security, which is expressed in the presence of a blacklist of phishing sites and resources containing malware, a personal task manager, etc.
Speed. Thanks to DNS prefetching and a powerful V8 JavaScript engine, Chrome has one of the best page loading speeds.
Stability. Chrome works on the principles of multiprocessing, so that the problem in the work of one tab does not affect the functioning of the others.

Of the minuses of the project, users highlight a large number of options for collecting information about the client's web surfing and an artificially limited choice of parameters during installation. Also, they are not satisfied with the fact that the current version of the browser can be installed on mobile device only if the latter has access to the Internet. Chrome has offline downloaders, but they are not presented on the main page of the project.

Mozilla Firefox

This browser runs on the Gecko engine (which since version 57.0 is being gradually replaced by the next-generation Quantum engine) and is the second most popular free software in the world. Officially released for Windows, Android, macOS, and GNU. In Linux distributions, it is included among the pre-installed files. The web browser is being developed by Mozilla Corporation, which originally named its project Phoenix, but then (due to trademark conflicts) was forced to rename it first to Firebird, and then to Firefox.

Although at one time the project was positioned as a legacy of Netscape, this is not entirely true. After the company's defeat in the "browser war", its code was written from scratch. This allowed developers to make the product more flexible and responsive to user needs, as well as provide functionality that is not available to other web browsers.

Firefox benefits include:

Regular updates.
Prompt elimination of discovered vulnerabilities.
Ability to manage cookies.
Relevant features for an advanced user (including the "Incognito" mode and a flexible system for loading graphics).
Support for W3C standards.
Large selection of extensions and add-ons.
Pop-up blocker.

Among the shortcomings, users highlight Firefox's close cooperation with Google and Adobe corporations. For them, a "live" Google search in the address bar and support for DRM plugins looks like an imposition of services, which is unacceptable for open source software.

Opera

Opera is one of the few browsers that has been ported to many operating systems. It is compatible with various builds of Windows, OS X, Linux, as well as mobile operating systems: Android, Windows Mobile, iOS, Symbian OS and MeeGo. One of the strengths of Opera is its work with JavaScript. Its download speed is about 2 times higher than that of other browsers.

Developers pay special attention to network security. Thus, SSL 3 and TLS protocols, known for their high reliability, are used to encrypt when a user visits secure pages. The database of saved passwords is encrypted using the 3DES algorithm, cutting off access to those who do not have the encryption key. Also, in recent releases, mechanisms were presented to combat hidden mining, which is especially important against the backdrop of growing interest in cryptocurrencies.

Among the disadvantages of Opera, users distinguish:

Cumbersome, not particularly user-friendly interface.
Closed code that prevents third-party developers from finding vulnerabilities in the product and quickly fixing them.
The transition to the WebKit engine, which increases its developer's market share and may well contribute to the start of a new "browser war".

In addition to the browser installed on the device, Opera offers its customers the so-called [email protected]- a program that works directly from removable media. In fact, this allows you to have all your settings, bookmarks, chat logs and other data at hand, wherever you are.

safari

This web browser is a kind of alternative to Internet Explorer for all Apple electronic products. Developed on the basis of the freely distributed code of the WebKit engine, it has been part of iOS and macOS for many years. Starting with version 3.0, Windows support was introduced. However, it ended with version 5.1.7. For other operating systems, Safari has never been officially released.

The strengths of the browser include:

Recognition of non-standard fonts used by sites and their loading.
Support for various encryption protocols.
Private browsing is an alternative to incognito mode.
Integration of multimedia technologies QuickTime.

In Europe, Apple products occupies an increasing market share every year, in connection with which the number of Safari users is steadily growing. In the second half of 2017, the browser ranked second in popularity. In Russia, however, he has not yet been able to achieve such success. Here, the browser has so far been able to climb only 4 lines.

Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge

Speaking of web browsers, it would be a mistake not to mention Internet Explorer (for Windows 10 - Microsoft Edge), which today has become a stable provider of local memes for the Internet community. Having once won the "browser war", the developers were superficial in their approach to updating and protecting their product, which is why a couple of years later the progressive community practically abandoned it, preferring the more convenient and functional Firefox and Google Chrome.

Faced with harsh reality, Microsoft was forced to rethink its priorities, and starting with the ninth version, the browser began to fully support the SVG and CSS3 standards. Moreover, today the company's developers work closely with the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and actively participate in the creation of its standards. The number of implemented developments includes Pointer events, which allows you to determine the type of user interaction with the device.

However, none of these steps, nor the rebranding and name change from Internet Explorer to Microsoft Edge, helped restore the browser's reputation completely. For the most part, users still consider IE to be slow and poorly protected. This is confirmed by the fact that the browser is mainly used by employees of state institutions, on whom it is imposed despite the available alternatives.

How are browsers evaluated?

The software market offers dozens of free or shareware web browsers, the abundance of which makes an inexperienced user dizzy. It is not easy to choose the best among them, because. some are not secure enough, others drag any software “garbage” into the system, others are not optimized and often “hardly hang” the system. Therefore, if you cannot boast of knowledge of modern standards, we suggest that you be guided by the following criteria when choosing a browser:

Standards support

Almost all modern browsers position themselves as an independent innovative product. However, in reality, most of them are just another variation based on the now popular Chromium. There is nothing criminal in this, since the program code of the engine is open. Here are just some web browsers, allegedly being at the stage of active development, for some reason use solutions from 2015 or even 2012 (which are now hopelessly outdated). Why this indicator is critical, the user will learn from personal experience when he tries to install some application, and in the end he will see the following message:

And if the browser is also not friendly with modern standards (for example, with the HTTP / 2 network protocol), you can forget about fast page loading, prioritizing requests, supporting push notifications, and many other functions and features.

Want to check your web browser for up-to-dateness? To do this, it is enough to find out its version and the string user agent. Information on the first item is located in the "Help" - "About" section, on the second - with the help of numerous online services.

Safety

Almost every program has a vulnerability. However, not every developer can eliminate it, and even do it quickly. Therefore, to assess the security of a web browser, several indicators should be taken into account at once, such as:

Exposure to vulnerabilities.
The frequency of security updates.
The number of vulnerabilities fixed since the release of this version.

Obviously, the most popular browsers, such as Chrome or Mozilla, will have an order of magnitude more problems than the same Safari or Yandex Browser. This is due precisely to their popularity, because the actions of hackers are most often aimed at a mass audience. It is simply not interesting or profitable for "evil geniuses" to look for vulnerabilities in unclaimed software.

Functionality

For the largest web browsers, this item is not particularly relevant. As soon as one developer introduces some new function into his browser, another almost immediately presents the same or similar analogue. A striking example of this is the "Incognito" mode, which first appeared in Google Chrome, and then was implemented in Firefox.

However, if you are using a lesser-known product, its functionality may be greatly reduced or modified compared to the "giants" of the industry. For example, some add-ons (blocking ads, allowing you to bypass blocking, etc.) are simply not installed on them. Somewhere video calls, live search or synchronization mode are not supported. However, users are most concerned about the national search engine Sputnik, for which a unique search engine is being developed that provides information from only a limited number of sites.

User friendliness

This indicator is one of the key arguments in the ongoing debate about “the best browser”. Evaluation criteria here are different for everyone. For some, it’s enough for the browser to just work, for others the ability to adapt the interface for themselves is critical, and still others put download speed and RAM consumption above all else. However, several generalized parameters can be distinguished. So, a good browser:

It does not drag unnecessary “garbage” into the system in the form of applications and extensions that the user will not use. A good example of this is "Amigo" from mail.ru, which, as soon as the user loses vigilance, installs "Mail.ru Agent" on the computer.
It does not “freeze” the system, taking the lion's share of RAM with 1-2 open tabs, which Google and Firefox have been “sinning” lately.
It has an intuitive interface and gives the user maximum freedom in terms of settings, which definitely does not apply to Opera and IE.

Browser Basics

However, for successful web surfing, the "best" browser alone will not be enough. Advanced features and handy add-ons don't make any sense if you don't know how to use them the right way. Therefore, we will consider the main features of browsers that everyone should be able to use.

Navigation

Although the interface of different browsers looks different, all of them have common elements, including:

The address bar is the place where the site address is written, and a quick search is also performed (if the browser saves the browsing history).
Search - a rectangular window with a magnifying glass icon that allows you to quickly use the search for Google, Yandex and other search engines without going directly to their pages.
Buttons "Forward", "Back" - help you navigate between several pages viewed in one tab.
"Refresh" - by pressing this button you reload the page if it takes a long time to load or suddenly stops working.

Tabs and windows

Navigating between pages (especially if there are more than 2) using the "Forward" and "Back" buttons is not always convenient. Therefore, more often users prefer to open new pages in new tabs. All tabs are placed within the same window, and therefore switching between them occurs with one click of the mouse.

Good to know:

To add a new tab, just click on the "+" icon in the tab bar,
To close the extra ones, use the mouse wheel on the tab itself.
If you accidentally closed the tab you were looking for, right-click on the tab bar and select "Restore Closed Tab" from the drop-down menu.
If you need to compare two pages, open them in different windows. To do this, select "New Window" from the browser menu.

Downloading files and photos

Downloading multimedia, software, text and other files to a computer is one of the most requested functions. modern browsers. To save the image, just right-click on it, select "Save As" and in the window that appears, specify the desired file name and save path. For files, this process is often more simplified. After you click on "Download", "Upload" or another button with a similar name, the file will be added to the downloads folder on your computer. To find out its location, go to your browser settings and find the item "File saving path" or a similar wording.

However, do not forget that files saved from the Internet often contain malicious codes and other dangers. Therefore, never settle for a jump if:

Not sure about the reliability of the resource.
To download, you are offered to send SMS to a number.
To start downloading, you need to install a third-party plugin or program.

Plugins and extensions

Working with any program, the user always seeks to customize it "for himself". And browsers are no exception. In an effort to make web surfing more comfortable, browser developers have created their own online stores where anyone can submit their application. Here you can find browser themes, ad blockers, block bypass services, systems for downloading from YouTube, VKontakte and other media resources in one click, and much more. The product will be distributed for free or paid, depends only on its author.

Where to look for a list of plugins available for installation depends on which browsers you use. So, in Firefox, just hold down the key combination "Ctrl + Shift + A" (which corresponds to the transition: "Tools" - "Add-ons"). And in Google, you will need to open the menu bar (a vertical row of three dots), select the “Additional tools” item in the drop-down table, and then “Extensions”. Or open a shop google apps, alternately going to: "Settings" - "Additional" - "Accessibility".

Browsing history

Found an interesting resource a few days ago, but forgot to bookmark it? It doesn't matter, the browser (unless the settings provide otherwise) stores the entire history of your web surfing for the last few months. It also has a convenient search system, which means that if you remember the approximate date of viewing or (at least partially) the name of the page, it will not be difficult to find it. In different browsers, this service may be called differently, but the essence is always reduced to "history" or "browsing log".

Bookmarks

There is more and more information on the web every day. When there are only 2 or 3 sites of interest to you, it can be convenient to store their addresses in memory or on paper. But what to do when the number of important pages exceeds a hundred? That's right, bookmark them. This feature is now implemented in all popular browsers.

Click on the special icon (most often resembling an asterisk), which is located either in the address bar itself or directly next to it. The browser will prompt you to add the page to your bookmark list and give it a name that will make it easy to find it later. If the list is too large, group sites into sites in folders that you also create yourself.

Why you need to update your browser

To an advanced user, such a question will seem strange. However, many beginners in all seriousness do not understand why update it.

Complain about content

Nowadays, no one is surprised by the statement about the importance of the Internet for both entertainment and serious work. It should be noted that the productivity of the workflow largely depends not so much on the speed of the connection, but on the convenience and reasonableness of the browser used.

If you do not know what browsers are and how they differ from each other - this article is especially for you. So let's get started! What kind of browsers exist? The list can be very long, but let's list the main "players" in this market:

Internet Explorer.
Opera.
Firefox.
Google Chrome and all its derivatives.

We will talk about all these "characters" now in more detail.

internet explorer

This is a real legend. Deservedly or not - everyone decides for himself, but no one will dispute the fact that the vast majority of experienced users started with him. In 2001, when the Internet in our country was almost in its infancy, and even in large cities Dial Up dominated, the sixth "donkey" was the only association with the word "browser".

Of course, someone knew about the Opera project, very rare geeks in the vastness of our country used Netscape, but the palm clearly belonged to IE, since there were simply no worthy alternatives at that time. For information - the history of Firefox began only in 2004, and the word "chromium" was perceived only as the name of a chemical element until 2008! Yes, the Google Chrome browser has appeared relatively recently!

It must be admitted that Internet Explorer was good for those years, and many of its features were completely unique. So, IE 6 became the first browser in the world that had "on board" the means of the P3P platform, which provided an advanced (in those years) level of user security when working on the network.

It is not surprising that due to its wide distribution and its presence by default in the Windows family of operating systems, it is the “donkey” that has become the de facto standard for almost all government agencies in our country. To this day, normal work with the websites of state institutions, Sberbank, as well as all similar structures is possible only from under this browser. In many ways, this is also due to the use of ActiveX structures in it, which greatly simplify the creation of software components for such resources.

Disadvantages of a "living legend"

It is no coincidence that we constantly used the phrase "at that time." In 2001, IE was rightfully the leader, but ... Its creators completely forgot that the browser should be updated from time to time. Up until 2006, when Vista and IE7 arrived on the scene, there were no updates at all.

Competitors did not doze off, by that time they had already appeared: the legendary Opera 9, which is still revered by many as the best browser, Firefox 2, as well as several add-on browsers that used the IE engine (Maxthon, Avant Browser). All of them were more convenient, more functional and much safer than the hopelessly outdated Internet Explorer. The appearance of the seventh version of the situation did not save, since IE7 was in many ways the same sixth "donkey". Of the visible changes, one could only notice a slightly "refreshed" interface, and support for tabs, which in the same "Opera" were already in the seventh version (2005).

Add to this the terrible compatibility with HTML standards, the terrible rendering of pages and the terribly slow page loading speed. Not surprisingly, only IE 9 finally "became like a browser," as many publications wrote about it. Currently, the latest is the eleventh version, which is really not bad.

The problem is that there are a huge number of old releases (IE6 somehow got rid of), bugs (!) Of which had to be ported to the new Explorer. This was done in order to ensure that the old versions of sites created specifically for the “donkey” are adequately displayed in Internet Explorer 11. This approach does not add either popularity or trust to the Microsoft product.

Alas, when working with state and municipal sites, you will not have special alternatives. However, there are exceptions: a few years ago, the German government officially urged municipal employees to use Firefox, as IE "does not meet modern security requirements." So what other browsers are out there?

Opera

Since we have mentioned this product several times, we will continue the story about it. It all started in Norway in 1994. Until 2005, versions were produced that did not have much popularity. Everything changed in 2006, when Opera 9 was released. At that time, it was the ideal. Judge for yourself:

great work with tabs;
built-in mail client;
bit-torrent client, also built into the browser;
work with most HTML standards;
support for mouse gestures;
the widest possibilities of customization;
the ability to block ads without the use of third-party utilities.

And all this in a 2006 browser! In addition, we forgot to mention one more “killer feature” of Opera. This is the Turbo mode. What is the purpose of this option? Everything is simple. When it was activated, all traffic to the user's computer passed through the servers of Opera Software and was compressed several times along the way. In some cases, it was possible to save up to 80% of all traffic!

Considering that in those years of normal high-speed and unlimited internet was not even in large cities, this technology was a royal gift for users of our country and the entire former CIS. It is not surprising that in some regions the real market share of this browser was confidently approaching 50%, while in the world this figure rarely exceeded 3-4%.

In addition, Opera Mini appeared in 2009, which made normal Internet surfing possible even for owners of older phones. By the way, the phrase “free browsers” for modern users can only cause a smile, while “Opera” for smartphones has been paid for a long time, and for desktops (up to Opera 5) this browser was distributed on a reimbursable basis.

Sunset

After the release of version 10.6, strange things began to happen to the company: constant reorganizations forced most of the old developers to leave, and users began to complain about the poor performance of their favorite browser. In 2013, a rather ridiculous event happened. The new management of the company announced a complete transition to the Blink engine, which is a development product of Google Corporation, as well as linking Opera to the Chromium project.

It is not difficult to guess what emotions all this aroused among users. They said that almost all new browsers are already Chrome clones, so the appearance of another player from the same series did not inspire anyone. In addition, the enormous dissatisfaction of both ordinary users and professionals was caused by the simple fact that, in fact, only the name remained from the old Opera.

No mouse gestures, no usual customization options ... and even bookmarks in new version did not have! The developers swear that everything will be fixed “in the near future”, but this has been going on for the second year, and there is no particular progress. The company lost a huge number of users who partly went to Chrome, and someone started using Firefox.

Almost everyone agrees that the Opera project no longer exists: even if the developers return some of the old functionality to the browser (it will not be possible to “fasten” everything due to the features of the new engine), the entire program creation cycle will be tied to Chromium and Google itself. By the way, what are the browsers based on the Google product? We will talk about this below.

Google Chrome and its derivatives

The history of this browser, as we already mentioned, began in 2008. The very news that Google is going to create its own browser has caused a lot of controversy on the Internet. Someone rejoiced, some experts were more cautious in their forecasts, but the fact remains that the event was clearly outstanding. To date, the Chrome browser claims to be the "No. 1 browser", displacing not only IE, but even Firefox in this post. How did it happen?

When the new Internet browser just came out, everyone liked its tremendous speed. Many liked the ascetic and simple interface, which did not distract from work. However, the “first approximation” was not very successful, since almost all experienced users noted the complete absence of useful plug-ins, due to which the browser could not resist ads in any way, and poor integration with third-party applications (antiviruses, download managers, and others).

The beginning of success

For someone else, this could be a failure, but not for Google! The company's incredible capabilities and aggressive marketing policy have done their job: at first, when using a proprietary search engine, an offer was issued to “try a new browser”, and today Chrome checkboxes are available in almost every second shareware application (in the installation kit).

Soon, this particular browser was on the computer of almost every second user, and professionals increasingly began to use it. Again, the punchy policy of Google played its role, which very soon achieved full integration of its product. In addition, using a Google account, users gained access to Google projects such as Drive, Mail, Docs, and more.

To be fair, Google (the browser) is a very safe product: the process separation policy is paying off. It is difficult for malicious code to penetrate the virtual sandbox into the production system. Among other things, Chrome has plugins for blocking ads and Flash content, integration systems with the most popular downloaders, and more. In 2014, the official x64 version appeared, which became even safer and faster.

Flaws

Alas, there are not enough of them. Firstly, the same fans of the old Opera really lack the ability to change the browser “for themselves”. The maximum that the WebKit engine gives is to apply a color scheme. All. More than a simple user is not supposed to do anything. Of course, you can use the Flag argument and “scrub” the browser from the inside, but you can’t do anything special even from there.

Secondly, there are serious claims to the confidentiality of user information. In general, Google has never hidden that all your data can be viewed for the presence of child pornography and information that can be classified as a “terrorist threat”, but this does not make it easier for suspicious individuals. The browser abundantly collects information about your search preferences and frequently visited pages, forming targeted advertising based on this data. However, all modern free browsers often sin with this.

It is shown not only on the pages themselves, but even in GMail mail. The latter, by the way, is extremely disliked in large companies, sometimes they directly prohibit employees from using it. Of course, there is not a single proven fact of leakage of any corporate data, but this measure is not superfluous ...

As for the "transcendental" speed, today it is no longer possible to call the Google Chrome browser fast. With plugins installed and connected account user application (especially on older machines) does not start quickly.

Chromium

After the Chromium license agreement scandal, in which the developers allowed themselves rather frivolous clauses about user privacy (they were later removed or changed), the Chromium project appeared. Unlike its "big brother", this browser is based on open source code, which anyone can change at their discretion. In terms of features, it is not much different from the parent application, except for the ease of creating your own plug-ins.

It was on its basis that a huge mass of “chromium-like” programs appeared, which we will now talk about. In general, almost all new browsers that appear recently are exactly that in 90% of cases. This is due to the ease of adapting the code to your needs, and you don’t have to worry about updating “your” product, since all the work will lie on the shoulders of Google programmers.

"Yandex browser)

To date, it is the most successful fork (branch). The creator is the "domestic-Dutch" Yandex search engine. The first versions of Yandex (browser) differed from Chrome only in a different search engine and a slightly modified design, but today the situation has changed radically. So, there were: support for mouse gestures, intelligent search menus and other "buns", which gave rise to many users to call this browser "the successor to the old Opera". This fact in itself is surprising, especially given the biased attitude of professionals towards any fork of Chrome. Thus, the free Yandex browser has very good prospects.

"Amigo"

This is the complete opposite of the above project. Also a product of a domestic company, but this time the authorship belongs to the Mail.ru corporation. Alas, there are no "breakthrough" opportunities. Of the features - only close integration with all existing social networks, but it is rather difficult to consider this circumstance as a special advantage. In addition, "Amigo" (browser) also collects a bunch of advertising information, which is then shown to the user in abundance.

There is nothing more special about him. In addition, there are also such varieties of "Chrome":

"Internet" (from the same Mail.ru, somewhat similar to "Yandex").
"Uranus" (from Ucoz).
Dragon (by Comodo).
"Nichrom" (from "Rambler").
Iron (German development, originally created to profit from the developers blog).

And many, many similar products. And what browsers are there besides this "variegated" family?

Firefox

Appeared in 2004 (as already mentioned above). It was developed on the basis of the mortal "ashes" of Netscape. The first versions were simply terrible, constantly hung and terribly slowed down. Of course, the collapse of the program was the most common occurrence. Time passed. In 2006, there was already Firefox 2, which was distinguished by good qualities, and the third version was included in the Guinness record holders at all (several million people downloaded it in the first day).

Why is this browser so liked by users from all over the world? First of all, its "omnivorous". While some developers relied on functionality (Opera), others on beauty (Safari), and Microsoft did nothing at all, the Mozilla Foundation team collected all the HTML standards, at least theoretically found on the Internet. As a result, their browser is a kind of "reference". If the site does not open normally in Fox, then it is unlikely to open somewhere else.

In addition, numerous plug-ins have become the reason for success. With the help of them, you can turn the browser into a multifunctional "combine", in terms of capabilities, almost surpassing operating system! In particular, the Tor browser, created on its basis, largely uses the capabilities of various extensions designed to improve the level of user anonymity on the Internet.

In addition, even with a dozen or two extensions, Mozilla starts very quickly even on older machines, which you can’t wait for from the same Chrome.

Finally, this browser, unlike almost all solutions on the market, can be flexibly customized to your needs, and the available themes will help you bring the interface even closer to old versions of Opera, Chrome, or even old IE6. It is because of the latter circumstance that experienced users often seek to install the Firefox browser.

Flaws

These include not too high security of the native (without installed extensions) application. However, without extensions installed, Firefox is generally a very average browser without any special features. Beginners do not always know which plugin and for what purposes they need to install. In addition, such add-ons are not always good programmatically, and therefore often cause memory leaks and even crashes of the browser itself.

These are the main browsers. This list is far from complete, but in the article we have given the most common varieties of such programs. Of course, we didn't talk about Safari (which is used in Apple's OS), as well as many other browsers, many of which are leaders in Asian markets, but these products are quite specific. In any case, they are used quite rarely, in our country you are unlikely to find a user on whose computer they would be installed.