« "me old flower" | Main | Steve Irwin: Crocoldile Hunter »
September 3, 2006
Browzar ? New or Wolf in Sheeps Clothing?
With Browzar you can search and surf the web without leaving any visible trace on the computer you are using.
Browzar is free, it only takes seconds to download and you don’t even need to install it, so you can download Browzar time and time again, whenever and wherever you need it to protect your privacy
Hmm... Sound too good to be true? Well not quite. From the F.A.Q pages on their site ( Browzar Web Site )
What are the system requirements for Browzar?
The minimum requirements for Browzar are: Windows 98 Second Edition (SE): and Internet Explorer (IE) 5.5.
At first glance it appears to have a very small footprint (about 250k) which makes it seem that its a very small application for browsing the internet. Although there is mention of it in the FAQ, it will not work without Internet Explorer on your PC, which probably explains why they are still working on the Mac OS and Linux versions of the tool.
What should be noted however is that sinced it relies upon IE technology, it will suffer from the same security problems as Windows IE and therefore you should always update your PC as and when updates become available.
Also, since it is a Beta version, there are still a few problems being reported and as such I wouldn't rely on it being totally secure until such time as the main release has been issued. There is one site that I know of that is documenting a few problems with it ( Computer Zen ) namely that it does not remove ALL traces of sites that you visited. (He tried it with Playboy.com)
Would I use it over something like Firefox? No.
I am an IE user foremost. I do have Firefox and Opera installed on this machine
(my main development box), but I've never really got into the habit of opening
Firefox or making it my default browser. I can't remember why but a while
back it had something to do with certain sites I used not fully supporting
Firefox and I've just never switched over proper. (But on my other PC's and
laptop, Firefox is my browser of choice and the system default).
So why would you use Browzar? What possible benefit could it give you?
Well I suppose when it is finished and it works as advertised, then maybe the
privacy option could be a motive.
But for now, the main reason for using it would be the lack of toolbars, addons
and all the other poop that gets loaded along with IE right now.
In that respect Browzar is an excellent choice. From my initial tests it appears
to load faster, run faster and I would say display pages faster. (The main
reason for the last statement is that I have so many plugins installed on my
development machine that it does hinder the display of web page content if
for example a plugin keeps dialing home to let them know what I am viewing
to have it guess what I am going to view next). So in this respect, Browzar
does have a benefit over IE.
But will I use it as my first choice browser in future? I don't think so.
Its IE with a 'skin' on.
Why use IE as its base?
Why not take the Open Source Firefox codebase and use that as a base for a
'secure browser' ?
Why open your application (Browzar) up to the same security issues as IE?
(Of course, not to say that Firefox is not open to any security issues of its
own).
I'll watch it for sure, since I want to see where it goes. But to launch it as a new browser is misleading and IMHO it should be labelled as a new Skin for IE.
Posted by Chris Wright at September 3, 2006 11:56 AM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.yaps4u.net/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/251
