New versions of both Internet Explorer and Firefox out (IE 7 and FF 2) came out last month. I installed them both the same week, and have been using them each to pick up the court decisions that the MSBA sends to members.
If you use a browser much in your practice, upgrading is probably worthwhile. This is especially true if you're using IE6. I see three main reasons for a lawyer to move from IE6 to 7.
First, IE7 can help you be safer than with IE 6. It warns more clearly about potential security certificate issues, for example, and tries to warn you of phishing sites. IE7's protections here help in any Microsoft program that renders HTML (provides clickable links). With IE6, you'd have to "view source" in an Outlook message to see a blatant phish like the following:
Your statement is available. Please log in to <a href="http://sd-2556.dedibox.fr/cap/lindex.html" target="_blank">www.capitalone.com</a> for Online Account Services and click the My Statement tab there.
With IE 7, Outlook 2003 displayed a tooltip to me saying "blocked" when the mouse hovered over the link above.
Second, IE7 finally will let you print without cutting off the right-hand edge of a page (or jumping through hoops in printer settings). I often had to add the last two words of a statute or court decision to a critical paragraph's lines by pen when IE6 cut them off.
Third, IE7 now provides tabbed browsing, as Firefox and Opera have long done. If you value your time, tabbed browsing is the only way to go. With multiple tabs, you no longer need backtrack constantly to check new leads for the information you need. Each page of your research results stays ready.
Firefox 1.5 already provided benefits 2 and 3 in the short list above, and Firefox 2 adds phishing protection, making it at least equal on all three points. In addition, Firefox 2 will run on Windows 2000. IE7 will not install on anything less than Windows XP SP2, not even Service Pack 1.
Which one should you choose? If you aren't on the very latest Windows, you don't have a choice. As noted, IE7's improvements are available only if you bought into XP. But as a browser, Firefox 2 has everything IE7 does, and works on Windows 2000.
If you have a choice, I suggest you install each, though for different purposes: IE7 to fix IE 6's problems and give better security in Microsoft Office; and Firefox for most web research. My preference is for FF because IE7 failed to display two of Microsoft's own pages correctly for me, and IE 7 "stopped responding" a couple of times, requiring re-starts; Firefox didn't.
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