How Firefox Works

Chances are, you're reading this article on Internet Explorer. It's the browser that comes already installed on Windows operating systems ; most people use Windows, and most Windows users don't give a second thought to which browser they're using. In fact, many people aren't aware that they have an option at all.

Options are out there, however -- some people call them "alternative browsers," and one of them has been steadily chipping away at Internet Explorer's dominance. It's called Firefox. From its origins as an offshoot of the once popular Netscape browser, Firefox is building a growing legion of dedicated users who spread their enthusiasm by word of mouth (or blog).

In this article, we'll find out what makes Firefox different, what it can do and what effect an open-source browser might have on the Internet landscape.

Firefox Features and Extensions

Firefox comes with a few useful features that set it apart from Internet Explorer. One of the most noticeable is tabbed browsing . If you are browsing in Internet Explorer, and you want to visit a new Web site while keeping your current one open, you have to open a completely new browser window. Intensive Web surfing can result in browser windows cluttering up your taskbar and dragging on system resources. Firefox solves that by allowing sites to open in separate tabs within the same browser window. Instead of switching between browser windows, a user can change between two or more different sites by clicking on the tabs that appear just below the toolbar in Firefox.

You can open a new, blank tab from a menu or by clicking on the "New Tab" button that you can add to the toolbar.

Firefox also has a built-in pop-up blocker . This prevents annoying ads from popping up in front of the browser window. You can configure it to let you know when pop-ups are blocked and to allow certain pop-ups from certain sites. This lets you enable pop-ups that are useful windows as opposed to unwanted ads. Although Internet Explorer also has built-in pop-up blocking, it was actually the development of this feature in early versions of Firefox that forced Microsoft to include it in Internet Explorer.

One feature of Firefox that is vital to some users is that it is a cross-platform application . That means that Firefox works under several different operating systems, not just Windows. For now, all versions of Windows from 98 and up are supported (as well as Windows 95, though it's a bit more difficult), along with Mac OS X and Linux.

There's another notable Firefox feature that might be the coolest. It's like when someone asks you what you'd wish for if you could only have one wish, and you say, "I'd wish for unlimited wishes." Firefox extensions mean the browser has an almost unlimited number of features, with new ones being created every day. Still, the program remains fairly small, because users only add the extensions they want to use.

Junior high school students probably don't need stock market tickers, while people doing serious research don't necessarily need an MP3 player built into their browser. If there's a feature from another browser that you really like, chances are someone has made an extension so that it can be included in Firefox.

Where do all these extensions come from? They're a product of Firefox's open source nature. Not only is the code to Firefox available for examination and use, but Firefox provides developer tools for free to anyone who wants to create an extension.

Up next, we'll check out some of the best extensions available for Firefox as of February 2005.