I’m afraid I do not use IE (which probably leaves you to wonder why I’m commenting on an IE based blog, but fear not)

I’d like to answer your question - Tabs, I love them, this is only because I personally use many windows and also websites at the same time, having many things running, I also don’t really like my task bar getting cluttered (specially on a laptops smaller screen) therefore tabs are brilliant (in Firefox for me :)) as they allow me to keep the taskbar uncluttered and keep all internet based tasks separated away from other applications running. I can however appreciate that they arent suitable for people who view websites one at a time or don’t have many open at once.

Ah, but I do view lots of websites at the same time. With multiple IE’s (let’s say browsers!) I can view them AT THE SAME TIME, with tabs I can only view one at a time. Tabs are a cut down form of the old Multiple Document Interface that apps used to use before MS decided to drop it. Yeah, I sympathise re the task bar on a small display. I’ve tried “Group similar taskbar buttons” on my laptop but it requires extra clicks!!! Being lazy I prefer to just make it taller and auto hide it.

On my nice 24″ + 17″ screen desktop I can have several browsers, on my crappy 14″ laptop I don’t want to waste space with a tab bar!

I personally stay aware from IE due to the one-monthly patching cycle and the frequent bugs that can lead to system compromise (IE 7 on vista is better in this regard but still not perfect). If you don’t apply the monthly security patches, my personal belief is IE is useless as a browser and quickly will be compromised.. though obviously bugs are found and disclosed pre-patching, which can lead to compromise also.

The above is why I use Firefox, as vulnerabilitys and the fixes are rolled out normally in days.

The amount of machines that I have seen in my day to day that have been hijacked with spyware, keyloggers, or worms that have all got in via a IE vulnerabiltity rather than a user-issue is quite numerable (though it obviously varies on what bugs remain unfixed in a month). This is in an enterprise that does apply the patches every month using a patch deployment tool that has a good level of coverage).

Tabs are also useful to me, I use a combination of tabs and windows, keeping related tabs in the same window - but such thigns are personal preference, IE7 or firefox don’t force either upon you.

I had some thoght they did (force tabs) by just openning another tab when you start a second instance. I just ran up my firefox and sure enough it doen’t do that. I’m obviously just paranoid!

Firefox does take ages to start - is that applying the fixes you refer to?