Web
Browsers
Introduction to Web Design
VICO 361
Brandon Flayler
What is the Technology?
 A web browser or Internet browser is a software
application for retrieving, presenting, and traversing
information resources on the World Wide Web. An
information resource is identified by a Uniform
Resource Identifier (URI) and may be a web page,
image, video, or other piece of content.[1] Hyperlinks
present in resources enable users to easily navigate
their browsers to related resources.
What is the Technology?
 Although browsers are primarily intended to
access the World Wide Web, they can also be
used to access information provided by Web
servers in private networks or files in file
systems. Some browsers can also be used to
save information resources to file systems.
Who Developed it? When? Why?
 Tim Berners-Lee developed it in December of
1990. It was released in March, 1991.
 Interview with Tim berners-lee: Why did you invent
the WWW?
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
 “Well, I found it frustrating that in those days, there was
different information on different computers, but you had
to log on to different computers to get at it. Also,
sometimes you had to learn a different program on each
computer.” said Tim Berners-Lee.
 People at CERN came from universities all over all types
of computers.
History and Milestones
 ･WorldWideWeb. Tim Berners-Lee Christmas
day, 1990.
 ･libwww. Berners-Lee and a student at CERN
named Jean-Francois Groff 1991 /1992,.
 ･Line-mode. Nicola Pellow,1991
 ･Erwise. After a visit from Robert Cailliau, a
group of students at Helsinki University of
Technology joined together to write a web
browser. April, 1992.
1990 Web Browser
History and Milestones
 ･ViolaWWW. Pei Wei, a student at the
University of California at Berkeley, released
the second browser for Unix, called
ViolaWWW, in May, 1992.
 ･Midas. Summer 1992, Tony Johnson at SLAC
developed a third browser for Unix systems.
 ･Samba. Robert Cailliau started development
of the first web browser for the Macintosh,
called Samba. Development was picked up by
Nicola Pellow, and the browser was functional
by the end of 1992.
History and Milestones
 Mosaic. Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina February, 1993.
 Arena. In 1993, Dave Raggett at Hewlett-Packard
 Lynx.. Lou Montulli released the web browser Lynx 2.0 in
March, 1993.
 Cello. Tom Bruce, cofounder of the Legal Information
Institute developed a web browser for that platform called
Cello, finished in the summer of 1993.
1993 Mosaic Browser
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
History and Milestones
 Opera. In 1994, the Opera browser was
developed by a team of researchers at a
telecommunication company called Telenor in
Oslo, Norway.
 Internet in a box. January, 1994, O'Reilly and
Associates
History and Milestones
 ･Navipress. In February, 1994, Navisoft released a
browser for the PC and Macintosh called Navipress.
 ･Mozilla. In October, 1994, Netscape released the the
first beta version of their browser, Mozilla 0.96b, over the
Internet.
 ･Internet Explorer. On August 23rd, 1995, Microsoft
released their Windows 95 operating system, including a
Web browser called Internet Explorer.
What Groups are Responsible for
Managing it?
The Information Technology group of the
company.
Developer of the software
What Groups are Responsible for
Managing it?
 Mozilla is a global community dedicated to building free, open
source products like Firefox web browser and Thunderbird email
software.
 Mozilla Firefox is a free and open source web browser
descended from the Mozilla Application Suite and managed by
Mozilla Corporation.
 Functions can be added through extensions, created by third-party
developers
 The Mozilla project was created in 1998 with the release of the
Netscape browser suite source code that was intended to
harness the creative power of thousands of programmers on the
Internet.
What Groups are Responsible for
Managing it?
 Instead of just working on Netscape's next browser, people
started creating a variety of browsers, development tools and a
range of other projects.
 In ten years the community has shown that commercial
companies can benefit by collaborating in open source projects
and that great end user products can be produced as open
source software.
 A sustainable organization has been created that uses market
mechanisms to support a public benefit mission and this model
has been reused by others to create open, transparent and
collaborative organizations in a broad range of areas.
What Groups are Responsible for
Managing it?
What Groups are Responsible for
Managing it?
 WebKit is a layout engine designed to allow web
browsers to render web pages.
 It powers Google Chrome and Safari.
 The WebKit engine provides a set of classes to
display web content in windows, and implements
browser features such as following links when clicked
by the user, managing a back-forward list, and
managing a history of pages recently visited.
Growth of the Web Browser
For years, the Web browser was a
technology that seemed frozen in time.
While the Web itself exploded with new
types of content and virtual communities,
the way users accessed that material
changed hardly at all from 1997 to 2004.
Growth of the Web Browser
Of course, new versions of the most
popular Web browsers come along
regularly. Microsoft released Internet
Explorer 9 on March 14; Mozilla
upgraded Firefox to version 4 on March
22
Growth of the Web Browser
Browster, for example, offers a free addon for Internet Explorer and the Mozilla
Foundation's open-source Firefox
browser that's a simpler alternative to
using the "Back" button.
Growth of the Web Browser
Growth of the Web Browser
A plugin for Internet Explorer and
Firefox, lets users preview other Web
pages without leaving the current one,
by moving a cursor over an icon
appearing above each link.
Growth of the Web Browser
 companies like Flock are developing entirely
new browsers to facilitate now-common social
activities, such as blogging, RSS-based news
reading, and photo sharing.
 Not only can you use it on the computer, but it
is now integrated into mobile devices, DVD
players, and video game counsels.
Related and Competing
Technologies
 Apps, social networks
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
Pros and Cons
FireFox
 Pros: Fast, very customizable, uses fewer
system resources than most
 Cons: So many options can be confusing,
crash on one tab crashes all, private
browsing requires add-in, many other
features require add-ins
Pros and Cons
Google
 Pros: Fast and simple, stable, private
browsing option, enables offline use of
Internet apps
 Cons: No ad blocking, minimal options,
skimpy bookmarking, uses a lot of system
resources
Pros and Cons
Opera
 Pros: Doesn’t bog down older computers,
excellent history of searching, synchronize
across computers
 Cons: No ad blocking, not the fastest, no
private browsing
Creation of Accessibility
Limitations and Improvements
The browser as operating system,
Functionally-limited mobile applications,
Web-enhanced devices,
Personalization.
Pushing the Limits
Flock 2.5
Firefox 5
Internet Explorer 9
Web Os
Chrome Os
Future Technology
Worldwide Market Shares
Influence of Google Chrome
Competition amongst Web Browsers
Live Examples
 http://www.google.com/chrome/index.html
 http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/
 http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/new/
 http://www.apple.com/safari/
 http://www.opera.com/
 http://www.collegehumor.com/article/5975407/
5-browsers-and-the-modes-of-transportationthey-resemble
Work Cited

Slides 2-9
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http://www.nndb.com/people/573/000023504/
http://www.livinginternet.com/w/wi_browse.htm
http://www.boutell.com/newfaq/history/fbrowser.html
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Slides 10-16
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
www.webkit.org

/www.mozilla.org/

www.technologyreview.com
Slides 17-21
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http://www.consumersearch.com/web-browser-reviews/compare
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/04/10/holistic-web-browsing-4-trends-of-the-future/
Slides 22-24
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http://www.pcworld.com/article/224133/can_microsoft_internet_explorer_9_win_the_browser_wars.html
http://www.pcworld.com/article/224795/watch_for_firefox_5_release_in_june.html
http://www.nytimes.com/external/venturebeat/2009/05/19/19venturebeat-flock-browser-beefs-up-twitter-facebook-supp12208.html
Web Browsers Group Project
Jessica Ghassemi
Janet Rittberger
Mattie Sprague
Annie Ward