Internet Explorer

Internet Explorer

Microsoft's Web browser, which comes with Windows starting with Windows 98. Commonly called "IE," versions for Mac and Unix are also available. Internet Explorer is the most widely used Web browser on the market. It has also been the browser engine in AOL's Internet access software.

The Browser Wars
In the mid-1990s, Netscape began to turn the computer world upside down with its Navigator browser, which was a purchased product. Recognizing the Internet's potential, Microsoft developed IE for Windows and gave it away. Netscape eventually made Navigator free, and for a while, IE and Navigator vied for top place by adding functions fast and furiously. Ultimately, IE won the lion's share of the market because it was part of the operating system.

Internet Explorer

Internet Explorer is the most popular Web browser because it comes with Windows. This Web page was obtained by typing in www.artistexpo.com in the Address box. (Web page example courtesy of Pyramid Studios, www.artistexpo.com)

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(World-Wide Web)

Internet Explorer - (IE, MSIE) Microsoft's free World-Wide Web browser for Microsoft Windows, Windows 95, Windows NT, and Macintosh. Internet Explorer is the main rival to Netscape Navigator (which runs on many more platforms). Both support the same core features and offer incompatible extensions. Microsoft combined later versions of IE with their file system browser, "Explorer" and bundled it with Windows 95 in an attempt to use their dominance of the desktop operating system market to force users to abandon Netscape's browser, which they perceived as a potential threat. This, and other dubious business moves, became the subject of a US Department of Justice antitrust trial in late 1998/early 1999. http://microsoft.com/ie/.