This month, we’re going to introduce you to a strange new creature that may have recently taken up residence on your computer.  If you use Microsoft Internet Explorer as your browser program (we defined a browser and compared different types of browsers in this past Info Bytes article), Microsoft has recently released a new version and made it available on both new computers as a standard option and on used computers as an automatic update.  The new version of Internet Explorer is version 7, and we’re going to take a look at what differences you can expect to see with it and what new features are now available in the program.

The main difference you’ll see when you first open IE is in the look and feel of your main browser window.  You can find a screen shot online here to see how it will look.  We’ll describe several of the commands on this window and what they do.

First of all, the menus that formerly were at the top of the IE window have been broken up into several smaller options scattered to different locations.  Notice over to the right side of the screen you have an option labeled Page.  Clicking on that will give you several of the options that used to fall under the File, Edit, and View options in previous versions of IE.  In addition, you should see an option labeled Tools just to the right of the Page option.  That option is similar to the Tools option in the previous version (and is still the place to go to empty temporary Internet files, clean your history, and set several other program options), while also containing some options from the former View menu.

The address bar (showing you the address of the Web site you’re currently viewing) now sits at the top of the window rather than several rows down.  The Back and Forward buttons now consist of just circles containing arrows, and are positioned at the left of the address bar.  The Refresh and Stop buttons now sit at the right.

The Favorites buttons now sit just below the Back and Forward buttons at left.  The button with a star will open your favorites in a separate window.  The button with a plus sign superimposed over the star will add the current site you are visiting to your favorites.

The Home and Print buttons are on the same row to the right (just left of the Page and Tools buttons).  They have the same functionality as before, with one addition:  the Home button now also contains a feature that lets you designate the current page you are using as your home page (without having to open the Tools menu as you used to do).

In addition to all those new locations for the standard menu features, IE also has several new features:  we’ll discuss those now.

-Pop-up blocker.  You now have access to a pop-up blocker that will allow you to block pop-ups (smaller windows that open when you go to particular sites, usually containing an advertisement for a third-party company).  You can get to this feature by opening the Tools option and then choosing Pop-up Blocker.  You can then turn it either on or off and change the settings for the blocker (for example, to allow pop-ups from certain Web sites to come through).

-Phishing filter.  The Internet definition of “phishing” is to attempt to fraudulently obtain sensitive information from a person (credit card numbers, Social Security number, bank account numbers, etc.) by masquerading as someone who legitimately needs access to that information.  Some Web sites will attempt to obtain sensitive information from your computer by use of phishing techniques; IE now has a phishing filter that will check any Web site you load and alert you if it is attempting to obtain information from your computer.  To get to the filter, click on the Tools option and then choose Phishing Filter; you can then choose if you want to check the current Web page you are viewing, report it, turn the automatic check on or off, or otherwise adjust your phishing settings.

-Multiple tabs in a single browser window.  Browsers that allow you to have multiple tabs open give you the capability to have several Web pages open at one time, but only have a single copy of the program running.  Browsers such as Opera and Netscape have previously offered this feature; now, with version 7, Internet Explorer offers it as well.  If you notice on the screen shot, the title of your current page will be displayed in a tab at the top of the window.  Just to the right of that tab, you should see a much smaller blank tab.  Clicking on that smaller tab will allow you to open a separate window within the program and load a Web page into that window.  You can do this multiple times to load several different Web pages at the same time.

That’s just a sample of the new features and changed locations in Internet Explorer 7.  Your best bet for learning how it works is to use it, play with it, and experience all the new features and locations first-hand.  If you run into any problems with the new version, our trained technicians at HunTel.net® are available and are happy to assist you.  You can contact us by phone at 402-533-5777 (Washington County and Omaha) or 1-888-491-9115 (toll free throughout our service area); by E-mail at techsupport@huntel.net; or through our live support chat service at http://www.huntel.net.  Normal support hours are 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., Central time, 7 days a week.

And before we sign off this month, a tip of the Info Bytes cap to astute reader Peggy Howard for catching a rather ironic error in last month's article.  In the same paragraph where we rhetorically asked you if you’re the type of person who cringes at the interchangeable misuse of to/too/two, we mistakenly used “to” where “too” would have been the correct choice.  While we wish we could say we were just trying to test you, that one unfortunately gets chalked up to being a typo—our thanks to Peggy for catching it.

Thank you for using HunTel.net!