Taskbar previews, the thumbnails of a running application that pop-up as your mouse over the application window in the task bar, aren’t new to Windows 7 – they were introduced in Vista actually – but their behavior have changed slightly. In Windows 7, task bar applications are grouped together if more than one iteration of the application is running. Meaning, rather than multiple browser windows showing in your task bar, they are all consolidated under a single large icon. Mouse-over that icon and you are presented thumbnails of the currently opened web sites within each.

You may like it, you may not. For me, it’s unnecessary as I just want to get into the running browser session quickly and rarely any of the particularly opened tabs. Thankfully, all three of the major browsers have the capability to disable this feature – though it’s easier to accomplish in some more than others.

Firefox

As you may expect, disabling of the previews requires diving into Firefox’s about:config – just type it into the location bar within the browser.

Filter for the key browser.taskbar.previews.enable and double click on the returned line to change the Value from true to false. This key will toggle the functionality on and off so it’s pretty simple to revert the change in the future!

Chrome

Google Chrome was the last of the three major browsers to obtain the taskbar previews functionality. Unfortunately, Google has a ways to go on their usability when it comes to making preferences tweaking – simply it’s not possible for many things! The only way I’ve found to disable the previews at the time of this article and version of Chrome is to leverage a clever hack centering around Windows Compatibility Mode of all things!

In Explorer, browse to C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\Application\ and right-click on chrome.exe, selecting Properties.

Under the Compatibility tab check the box that reads Run this program in compatibility mode for: then in the drop-down choose Windows Vista (Service Pack 2). Chrome will now run as if it were under Vista – that is to say, without the taskbar previews.

Internet Explorer 8

For completeness sake, the feature can also be disabled in IE even though I suspect most users interested in such a tweak won’t be in this browser much. Ironically, it’s probably the easiest one to change of the three!

Within IE8 access Tools->Internet Options. Off the General tab locate and click the Settings button in the Tab section.

From the Tab Browsing Settings dialog look for the check box that reads Show previews for individual windows in the taskbar and un-check.

While many Firefox users are rather reliant on their vast collection of installed extensions, few of them actively look at the list of installed add-ons through the browser interface. Users install the add-on they need to provide the functionality they desire; sometimes they get an update notification when a new version is available, but otherwise it’s a decent example of out of sight out of mind.

The mindset is perfectly acceptable until the situation Microsoft created in June’s monthly patch Tuesday. As part of their Windows updates released, one such patch included a Search Helper extension for your browser. Diligent users who skim over what each patch or update provides would still likely miss something like this – which calls into question why Microsoft would go this route as transparency is greatly craved by users. Chances are, this extension is registered within your Firefox browser and you didn’t even know it! What’s rather annoying is the add-on does absolutely nothing unless you have the Bing Toolbar installed. Worse, the extension cannot be uninstalled like the traditional Firefox add-on!

While this screen shot is from Firefox 4, Firefox 3 also has the Remove button .. removed. While it is possible to Disable the add-on, good security practice would not leave software installed that wasn’t needed. So what are your options?

Thankfully it’s actually pretty simple to remove the Search Helper Extension – it’s actually located on your file system under C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Search Enhancement Pack\Search Helper

Navigate to that folder location in Windows Explorer and delete the folder firefoxextension. Actually, while you are here you might as well delete it from Internet Explorer by removing the dll file SEPsearchhelperie.dll.

Those of you that are web designers have likely grown a great disdain for Internet Explorer. IE is given, and rightly so, a ton of grief in this area because of Microsoft’s attitude towards following web standards. When a web browser is programmed to obey and render accurately to standards, a web designer can be reasonably sure that their layout and programming will function correctly. Internet Explorer, however, has always ventured slightly off the agreed upon path which often means web developers must typically work around the differences and provide logic exclusively for IE based browsers. Sounds pretty tedious and painful doesn’t it? It gets worse – with each version of Internet Explorer the path continues to diverge. Therefor, it is not uncommon for a web application to have multiple blocks of code to handle each iteration of Internet Explorer!

Ensuring your application works across all the browsers logically requires a good amount of testing. It’s a straightforward testing methodology to support Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Opera – they all can be installed on the same system without interfering with one another. Likewise, Internet Explorer plays along nicely with the alternative browsers but unfortunately is not overly kind to it’s brethren – that is to say, only one version of Internet Explorer can be installed and maintained in Windows. Testing IE7 vs IE8 metrics typically requires two computers or a somewhat complicated virtualization platform.

IETester is an amazingly free application that aims to simplify testing across different versions of Internet Explorer – all on the same computer without any complicated setup. IETester is able to render and display your design/application in IE5.5-8 simultaneously, without requiring installations of each version.

IETester is a breeze to use; if you are familiar with the Office 2007 ribbon you will be right at home. While it is considered beta-level software I had minimal stability issues on Windows 7. The lone requirement is your installed browser must at least be IE7. If you must deal with the existence of Internet Explorer you owe it to yourself to check out IETester.

Download IETester

I’m not one that you classify as an Internet Explorer user but I do have a few sites that I frequent that just work better with IE, even after all these years of positive press on Mozilla Firefox. Not surprisingly, one of the sites I typically end up in IE for is our local Sharepoint server, a Microsoft product. Internet Explorer just works better for this web application. I’m not actually an anti-Microsoft zealot; I’m going to use the best tool for the job and be done with it. Recently I noticed a new feature in IE8 that wasn’t present in previous iterations – the ability to start new sessions of the browser.

In Internet Explorer 7 the user is not able to log into the same website twice, but using a different account each time. Many people have multiple Gmail accounts and because of the way browsers handle cookies and session information, it’s impossible to be logged into two Gmail accounts at the same time in the same browser. One overwrites the others session or cookie information – which effectively logs you out of the first account. IE8 introduces the notion of multiple browser windows using different session stores, but they sure don’t make it simple to discover this feature.

The default visual style of IE8, and introduced in IE7, is the hiding of the Menu bar in the browser window – the File Edit View across the top. It’s from the File menu that uncovers the ability to start a new window with a new session.

1. Un-hide the Menu bar in IE8 by right-clicking anywhere in the toolbar and choosing Menu.



2. From the newly revealed File menu choose New session.

There are many reasons why this may be beneficial to you and it’s actually a feature unique to Internet Explorer, as far as I know. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see other browsers copy this feature however.

While it’s technically not possible to rip Internet Explorer out of Windows, it’s been an integral part of Windows Explorer (amongst other components) for a decade, it is possible to disable the browser in Windows 7 so that it isn’t accessible in the traditional sense. If you use Firefox, Chrome, or another 3rd party browser it may not make sense to keep Internet Explorer around, cluttering your system and work flow. Microsoft, perhaps by fear of legal repercussions, provides an easy way to remove IE from your Windows 7 install – and it’s rather simple to boot!

1. From Control Panel select Uninstall a program. Down the left side panel choose Turn Windows features on or off.



2. The Windows Features dialog launches. Browse through the list of check boxes and un-check the box next to Internet Explorer 8. You may take the opportunity to peruse the rest of the software and decide if it’s worth purging.



3. Click through the dialog box that warns you that Windows may catch fire without IE. I promise you will be fine.



4. Back on the Windows Features screen finally click OK to initiate the disabling routine. You’ll be prompted to reboot upon completion.

As stated above, this won’t completely remove Internet Explorer but it will disable it’s functionality as a traditional browser which will go a long way in keeping your system secure – sometimes web links have a habit of opening IE even though it is not your default browser.

If, on down the road, you decide you made a mistake by removing IE8 simply repeat the steps above and check rather than un-check the box next to Internet Explorer. It’s all pretty painless.

The loading speed of Internet Explorer 8 can be extremely frustrating at times. If IE8 is your browser of choice, you likely always have it launched and running, so the slow start-up speed isn’t overwhelming. For me, and many others, IE8 is only used when a particular site doesn’t display or otherwise function correctly in our alternative browser of choice. It’s at this point that the sluggish launching of IE8 gets a bit silly. Not exactly sure what I mean? Open IE8 and in the tab bar you will notice the text Connecting… – it will stay like that for a few seconds even though the browser appears loading. Eventually, your default home page will load and in my particular set up, that delay is about 5 seconds. Trivial? Maybe.

So what exactly is IE8 doing while the home page tab sits at Connecting… ? The browser is loading any add-ons or plugins currently installed and enabled, as it relates to Internet Explorer. Have Skype installed? You’ve got an IE add-on hooked in that must load. A Google product? Same thing! If you are curious what all is loading Microsoft has provided an interface through IE8 that not only identifies the add-ons but displays the actual loading time in seconds.

To take a peak, in IE8 goto Tools->Manage Add-ons.

From the dialog you can quickly see that Google Toolbar takes 1.5 seconds to load. It may seem like splitting hairs, but a few tenths of a second for each add-on does add up and while you probably need at least a few of the add-ons, you should ask yourself if you need all of them – especially if IE8′s launch speed drives you nuts.

I disabled Skype and Google Toolbar and shaved a good 3 seconds – something that is definitely noticeable.

For many, the browser wars are all but over. If you are still an Internet Explorer user, you have your reasons and aren’t likely to switch. Firefox has most of the momentum and traction as the alternative browser to IE but Google’s Chrome has garnered it’s fair share of converts. At the end of it all, most spend 99% of their time in one browser and that’s that.

However, there are also users like myself that dabble across most of the browsers – every browser has it’s strengths and weakness so why not use the best tool for the job? One reason might be because your bookmarks are not identical between the browsers. You may have a solid core in Firefox but lacking substance in Chrome. Every browser has the import/export functionality to migrate bookmarks around but it quickly breaks down with duplicates and the like. That’s where a utility like Transmute comes in handy.

Transmute is the ultimate bookmark conversion and synchronization software. The application is cross platform, working in Windows as well as Linux and OS X, and requires Microsoft’s .NET Framework (or the Mono package). The software is dead simple to use, just provide the source and destination browser and click start. Transmute is fantastic in that it supports every major browser I can think of, including: Firefox, Chrome, IE, Safari, Opera, Konqueror. Not bad for a free piece of software!

Most Internet users are aware that their web browsers are tracking and recording every visit to every website. It’s trivial to follow the browsing session breadcrumb of a user if you have access to their computer. Both Firefox and Internet Explorer will display the browsing history by using the keyboard shortcut CTRL+H inside the browser. Users that are aware of the recordings are generally also aware how to cover their tracks by flushing the history cache at the end of their web session. Personal privacy has become so publicized now that all modern browsers feature a privacy mode that records nothing about the browsing session. Either of these options are fantastic to use for hiding your tracks, that is if you remember to utilize either of them.

But what if you are attacking this situation from the other direction – you’d like to prevent a user from cleaning up their tracks. This might apply if you wish to monitor what your child, spouse, employee, etc are visiting.  This functionality is possible in Internet Explorer using Group Policy under Windows Vista.

Before we begin I wanted to lay out one caveat – if the computer user in question has an administrative level account on the computer it is possible for them to revert our changes. That being said, it is still somewhat a tech-head task that the majority would not be aware of.

1. In Vista, click the Start orb and type gpedit.msc in the Start Search box. Launch Group Policy Editor from the search results.



2. On the left hand side you are present two parent level folders: Computer or User Configuration. If you want these changes applied to every user on the computer you want to complete step 3 using the Computer branch. To affect just the currently logged in user, select the User branch.
3. Traverse from the appropriate branch to Administrative Templates -> Windows Components -> Internet Explorer -> Delete Browsing History.



4. In the right hand panel you are presented with a number of options all relating to Internet Explorer’s browsing history.
5. You will want to Enable the following options: Disable “Configuring History”, Prevent Deleting Cookies/Favorites Site Data/Form Data/Passwords/Temporary Internet Files, Turn off “Delete Browsing History” functionality. These can be toggled by double clicking on each line and changing the state in the resulting dialog window.



6. Finally, reboot the computer to apply the Group Policy settings upon next login.

Web privacy is quite a hot topic as of late. The idea that most everything we do on the Internet is tracked and then used against us – not necessarily meant to be a negative – is understood by a greater percentage of users, not just the web savvy folks of even a year ago. The momentum behind privacy has become so strong that now all modern browsers ship with a feature called Private browsing (Firefox), Icognito mode (Chrome),  or InPrivate browsing (IE) - and unofficially titled porn mode. Private browsing prevents the browser and websites it loads from storing or tacking information between browsing sessions. When you shutdown your browser, all your activity, browser cache, and cookies are removed – leaving no tracks to later be followed. Nice feature in certain situations but none of the major browsers make it easy to enable the functionality automatically for every session. If this interests you, here’s how to go about it.

Firefox 3.1 Private Mode

1. From the AwesomeBar type about:config and hit enter.
2. In the Filter box type browser.privatebrowsing.autostart.
3. In the main Firefox window one result should be returned, titled as above. Double  click on it to change the value to true.

Internet Explorer 8 InPrivate Browsing

1. Internet Explorer requires you to modify the shortcut used to launch the browser. Locate the shortcut item either on your desktop or in your Start Menu.
2. Right-click on the icon and select Properties.
3. Append -private in the target box after the final quotation mark.

Google Chrome Incognito Mode

1. In a similar fashion to IE8 above, modify the Target box of the shortcut appending –icognito. Note that this is a double dash, where as IE was just the single dash.

Last week Microsoft released their latest iteration of their web browser, Internet Explorer 8. Microsoft’s release slogan for this version is making your web even better,.. Faster, Easier, Safer. So, is it? Well, I am firm believer that security and safety can only be evaluated with respect to time. Benchmarks support the notion that 8 is faster than 7, but what does that mean in day to day use – not much if my brief usage is any indication. So that leaves us with easier, an admittedly objective quality but something I feel is worth talking about.

When you first open Internet Explorer 8 you may be shocked to see that the refresh and stop buttons have been relocated, now to the right of the address bar. Previous versions of IE, and every other browser worth mentioning, have the buttons located to the left of the address bar. I’m sure Microsoft has spent millions of dollars on usability tests whose results confirm that right is wrong and left is where it’s at, but to me, this reeks of the desire to change just for the sake of change – something you see throughout Windows Vista. Changing fundamental things seems to clash with the ideology of making something easier no?

It is possible to revert to the old button layout however. Furthermore, it is evident that Microsoft expected resistance because the option to change it back is blatant. You may be familiar of how you can add and remove buttons from the IE interface by right-clicking anywhere in the menubar and choosing Customize. Previously, this would take you to a dialog window that allowed you to add/remove buttons as well as organize the ordering. As you’d expect, the customize option is still available in IE8 but rather than having to navigate deep into the dialog, the option to revert is as simple a selecting Show Stop and Refresh Buttons before Address Bar.

Ah .. much better!