By LEROY MCLEAN, ContributorMICROSOFT INTERNET EXPLORER is the default web browser for Windows. It is one of the most popular and powerful browser on the market for free. Yep! That's right, it is totally free. Now I don't think anyone will be able to disagree on that important point. Since its going to become the only browser for most Windows users, I have decided to help you understand more about it.
Always stay current
Even if you have a version of Windows prior to XP, you can still download and run IE6. Surf to http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/downloads, click the link for Microsoft Internet Explorer 6, and click the 'Go' button next to the pull-down list for your preferred language (English by default). You will be prompted to download a 497KB set-up file, which then manages the download of IE6 itself, a roughly 17MB
file.
New Window
Nine times out of 10, the only reason we click New from the File menu is to select the Window listing and create a carbon copy of the active window. (Pressing CTRL-N is a shortcut for this.) However, the listings below Window are handy shortcuts to other common Microsoft communications apps. There are four listings: 'Message', 'Post', 'Contact', and 'Internet Call'. If you click the 'Tools' menu, 'Internet Options', and the 'Programs' tab, you'll see the applications with which these names are linked.
If you have Outlook installed, odds are that all of them link to various parts of that program, save for Internet Call, which generally links to NetMeeting or Windows Messenger. (If you don't have Outlook, these links will associate with Outlook Express, which has now officially become part of IE6.) Having two-click access to these features sure beats having to fish for them the long way.
Unlock and select your toolbars
One of the first things you may notice about the IE6 interface is that you lose a fair bit of screen real estate to toolbars. By default, there are three bars along the top of the screen: the menu bar (which is always on-screen), the Standard Buttons toolbar, and the Address Bar (in addition to the Status Bar along the bottom of the interface. Click View on the File menu, and the first two options you'll see are Toolbars and Status Bar, which has a check next to it by default. If you click Status Bar, the check will disappear along with the bar along the bottom of your screen.
Depending on how you use IE6, it may be possible for you to get along without any toolbars at all. After all, the Back, Forward, and Print functions are all available by right-clicking the browser window, and you don't need the Address Bar if your surfing is limited to a handful of Favorites sites. You may want to use one toolbar or the other, or you may have additional toolbars available via third-party applications. (Norton AntiVirus is one common example.) All of these can be enabled or disabled by clicking the appropriate toolbar name under Toolbars in the View menu.
Use the Links toolbar
If you find yourself frequently visiting a select group of 'Favorites', you can fashion a toolbar of sorts offering quick links to these sites. One of the default folders contained in the Favorites menu is 'Links'. Using the 'Add To Favorites' dialog box, you can add pages to the Links folder. Now, when you click View, Toolbars, and select the entry for Links, a new toolbar will appear containing icons for the item entries in your Links folder.
Feel free to send your suggestions to thestartech@yahoo.com
