Not a lot people may know this, but Microsoft made a major change to Windows Explorer in Vista. Have you noticed?
It is no longer integrated with Internet Explorer!
A few may remember that this whole thing was the subject of a series of
civil actions filed against Microsoft by the United States Department
of Justice and 20 U.S. states back in 1998. Despite this, Windows
Explorer and Internet Explorer have remained married to each other ever
since-until recently that is.
Personally, I have always found the history of these two applications a little confusing. Back in the days of Windows 95, Windows Explorer was the file manager application that came with Windows. Then with the explosion of the Internet, along came Internet Explorer,
which was Microsoft's web browser. Apart from the unfortunately similar
names, that was OK as far as it went. But things got really messy when
Microsoft unleashed the Windows Desktop Update for Windows 95
and NT4. Suddenly Windows Explorer was given an address bar and became
integrated with Internet Explorer, so that both applications where, in
effect, file and web browsers. Confused? I sure was.
This approach of mashing together file and web browsing into a single
application was, unfortunately to my mind, adopted by others, notably Konqueror for the Linux KDE desktop. I was pleasently surprised, therefore, to discover recently that KDE's new file manager, Dolphin,
is in fact a dedicated file manager and doesn't compromise itself by
trying to be a web browser at the same time. How refreshing, I thought,
that KDE is no longer emulating what Microsoft does and has returned to
common sense!
It quickly it occured to me to take a closer look at Windows Explorer
in Vista also, just to see if any changes had been going on there as
well. Sure enough, when I typed a web page URL into it's address bar,
it launched Internet Explorer as a separate application rather than
rendering the page itself.
Wikipedia, as usual, has some information on the subject, notably that the two applications also become separated on XP when IE7 is installed...
"Also, with the release of Windows Vista & Server 2008 and
Windows Internet Explorer 7 for Windows XP, Internet Explorer is no
longer integrated with Windows Explorer. Unlike older versions, Windows
Explorer does not host Internet Explorer controls in its own process,
rather it launches a new process when necessary. In Windows Vista and
Server 2008 (and in Windows XP as well if IE7 is installed), Windows
Explorer no longer displays web pages, and IE7 does not support use as
a file manager, although one will separately launch the other as
necessary."
Whatever the reason, I applaud the fact that common sense has been restored. Less is certainly more in this case.
Andy is the CEO, CTO and GDB (General Dogsbody) of Big Angry Dog Ltd, an independent company which produces the odd bit of software and occasionally does stuff.
He has over 20 years experience in software development and particular
expertise in mobile telecommunications technology. He also has
interests in science, mathematics, space technology, machine
intelligence, and falling off motorbikes. He quite likes Siouxsie and
the Banshees as well. He holds a degree in Physics, Space Physics &
Technology from Leicester University.
Andy maintains a software & technology blog called the Big Angry Blog.
Very interesting article Andy. Welcome to Searchwarp and looking forward to reading more of your articles. Thanks for sharing this. Best to you, ~Nenita~
Welcome to SearchWarp! I appreciate your article...I really despite using Windows explorer in vista....I think is not reliable and it is really slow so I stick to Firefox...but thanks for the artice :)
Welcome to SearchWarp! I appreciate your article...I really despite using Windows explorer in vista....I think is not reliable and it is really slow so I stick to Firefox...but thanks for the artice :)
Thank you for this article. It clarified a lot for me. I, too, always wondered what the difference was between Windows explorer and IE. Now I understand!
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