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Top 10 IE7 Annoyances

Tuesday, July 11th, 2006
at 6:27pm

I don’t want to be snarky about this - I really don’t. But since we’re at Beta 3 stage with Internet Explorer 7.0, it’s time to unleash the bitching. I’m not expecting any more features to be added to this version, but I am expecting a lot more spit and polish before IE7 is officially unleashed. If ever there was a time to be critical, it’s now.

  1. I still get prompted when I want to create a shortcut to my desktop - by right-clicking the page and choosing “Create Shortcut.” Yes, I want to create a shortcut - don’t ask me again!!! Dean, please add a toggle for this annoyance.
  2. You still get prompted when dragging and dropping an item from the browser to the desktop. “Do you want to move or copy files from this zone?” Yes, I do - or I wouldn’t have tried it in the first place, you fool. There’s no clear or easy way of eliminating this prompt, other than applying this registry hack.
  3. The information bar has got to go. It was annoying in IE6, and it’s even more annoying in IE7. I tried opening information from a trusted desktop app, and IE7 infobar’ed me - then when I told the infobar that it was okay, IE reloaded and showed me another warning dialog - just in case I missed it the first time. This is absolute madness. Let’s not even go into how the information bar reloads the entire page when you want to download a file from a URL! You have to make this far less annoying before going gold, Dean.
  4. I really, REALLY don’t want to go into all the UI inconsistencies, though the page properties icon is an old one, the History icon looks ass-nasty, and the Print Preview dialog is using Arial and a non-standard toolbar in Classic Mode. I could easily turn this into a “top 100″ list if I broke down all the ways that the IE7 UI is still rough around the edges.
  5. Why on God’s green earth is the RSS icon in the toolbar?! It’s a modal icon - meaning it should only show up when there’s something there to see! Safari puts an RSS icon in the address bar, Opera puts an syndication icon in the address bar, and we all know that Firefox puts it in the address bar as well. Who thinks they’re being innovative by putting the indicator in a place where most people will ignore it?
  6. Okay, I know I didn’t want to get into the UI problems in IE7b3, but the command bar’s Home icon menu items sport a different vertical height than others (like the Print menu). Why… why?! And why does the Quick Tabs button look different than the Home button, even though both of them have drop-down menu items?! The window flashes when I select options in the Favorites Center, WOULD SOMEBODY PLEASE WAKE UP OVER THERE?
  7. You still can’t control the specific point size of a default font. IE7 would have you walk through a convoluted process rather than let you, for example, say that you wanted 9pt Courier New for the default fixed width font. That would’ve been too simple, methinks.
  8. The “Delete Browsing History” dialog is still a kludge compared to the Firefox one. What’s the fear in making it work just as well - if not better - than the competition’s? Initially, I was also confused by the labeling of this feature - believing it only pertained to my URL cache. They should be using another word instead of History. Might I suggest… “Delete Browsing Social Studies?”
  9. Why does the entire window freeze and stall for a second (sometimes) before it closes completely? Seems to be a problem when I have more than one tab open. When I click the close button, the window should disappear instantly. It doesn’t.
  10. When “ico” files are rendered in the browser, why are they just as aliased around the edges as they were in IE6? Firefox doesn’t have this problem, and Opera doesn’t have this problem… so I’m waiting for a damn good reason why Microsoft can’t fix it.

Despite these snags, IE7 is certainly a better Web browser than IE6. I’m not even close to switching from Maxthon 1.x (though I don’t like the way Maxthon 2.x is shaping up). The Firefox faithful won’t be returning to the Internet Explorer brand anytime soon, either. IE7 puts Microsoft back into the game; they’ve fixed hundreds of known bugs and added a small amount of “new” features. My question is: will IE8 blow us away - or just blow?

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19 Comments

Jason

July 11th, 2006
at 7:25pm

You are right on Chris. And, while IE8 might be great, the biggest problem with IE development is that it is too little, too late. There are so many things in IE7 that would have been great 2 years ago but Firefox beat them to the punch. Whatever tomorrow will bring will appear in Firefox the next day; in IE months, or maybe years, later.

Brandon Watson

July 11th, 2006
at 7:49pm

My personal pet peeve is not being able to use ctrl+backspace to delete in the open dialog. I like to hit ctrl+L to get to a page. Once in that dialog, ctrl+backspace gives a square char, but in IE6 this worked fine. Lame.

jccalhoun

July 11th, 2006
at 8:47pm

I don’t notice the UI things, however, I have to agree with your first three. I think they are indicative of the most irritating features of all of Microsoft’s products starting most noticably with XP SP2. Microsoft seems to have a very different definition of “security” than I do. They seem to think that poping up a window that says, “Are you sure that you really want to do this???” is some form of security. Call me crazy, but I think it would be better to actually make things secure rather than just put up warning signs. Putting up a flashing sigh that says, “pothole ahead” may make it more obvious where the pothole is, but it doesn’t do anything about fixing the pothole. Microsoft needs to spend more time fixing the potholes and less time putting up flashing signs.

marc klink

July 11th, 2006
at 9:45pm

The major problem I see with IE7, and all MS stuff is bloat. Although I have a fast machine, not everyone does. This is why I am using Firefox less and less, and Opera more. They seem to be able to add features without bogging down a slower machine. MS needs to forget about the idea of reusable code ['cause that idea went south about 2 iterations of Windows ago] and get some assembly programmers to write tight code, with much testing to be sure of solidity. Those who say this is not easily portable are right….when did you last see Windows XP for Power PC?

Darren

July 12th, 2006
at 3:59pm

Top 1 annoyance with chris.pirillo.com:

#1. Your feed keeps getting refreshed, so Bloglines keeps displaying the same stories over and over again. I’m not sure if this is your fault of BL’s, but I’m going with you, as I’m not seeing the behaviour elsewhere in my 200 feeds.

Selcuk Islamoglu

July 12th, 2006
at 5:18pm

Actually with IE7, my biggest problem is definitely “resource hunger”. I made a little self test with like 9 tabs of same pages open in Firefox, IE7b3 and maxthon 1.x as you used (with IE7 beta3 engine). Results are amazing, definitely maxthon using 20 mb’s of ram with Firefox following with 45 mb’s with IE, 120 mb’s…

Oh and not to mention let me “put” File Edit View” menu bar to top, I’m not going to use Vista for a while! Oh and that’s possibly most disappointing appearance from Maxthon 2.0 screenshots to see title and menu at same while hoping it is different on final.

Roberto J. Dohnert

July 12th, 2006
at 8:23pm

” Those who say this is not easily portable are right….when did you last see Windows XP for Power PC? ”

Your right there is no Windows for PowerPC, but there is Windows for Itanium, there is Windows for Opteron, and the is Windows for 32 bit. So writing in assembly is an idiotic suggestion

Saqib

July 17th, 2006
at 4:04am

My #1 new-feature request (which I know won’t make it in IE7) is some kind of decent download resuming, and not needing to open a new window for each file I download!

Sid

July 17th, 2006
at 4:24am

Chris, I’m curious to know what exactly about Maxthon 2 bugs you. I’ve tried it, and it seems to me like an improvement over Maxthon 1 in every way possible.

Is it the UI?

John’s blog » Blog Archive » Funny comment on Microsoft and security

July 17th, 2006
at 8:01am

[...] Hilarious and quite an on the spot comment by jccalhoun on Chris Pirillo’s article Top 10 IE7 Annoyances Microsoft seems to have a very different definition of “securityâ€Â? than I do. They seem to think that poping up a window that says, “Are you sure that you really want to do this???â€Â? is some form of security. Call me crazy, but I think it would be better to actually make things secure rather than just put up warning signs. Putting up a flashing sigh that says, “pothole aheadâ€Â? may make it more obvious where the pothole is, but it doesn’t do anything about fixing the pothole. Microsoft needs to spend more time fixing the potholes and less time putting up flashing signs. [...]

John Ericson

July 17th, 2006
at 8:07am

” ‘Do you want to move or copy files from this zone?’ Yes, I do - or I wouldn’t have tried it in the first place, you fool. There’s no clear or easy way of eliminating this prompt, other than applying this registry hack.”

What registry hack?

I Hate Firefox and Thunderbird (GnomeREPORT)

July 18th, 2006
at 3:32am

[...] No phrase in the English language will get me into more hot water than the one I opted to use as the headline for today’s report. You must understand that I wrote it to get your attention. Do I have your attention now? Great.Yes, I realize that an increasing amount of people are using Firefox for Web browsing and Thunderbird for viewing email (as well as managing other information). I, however, am not a flyer of the Firefox flag. I support Mozilla’s efforts, but I don’t think their software is amazing… yet. And before you begin to criticize my choices, understand that I’m just as annoyed with IE7. I have Firefox installed on my machine, but the only time I use it is when I’m troubleshooting a Web page. [...]

G. Szusz

July 18th, 2006
at 4:01pm

…IE’s biggest error is that it has failed to appeal to the imaginative web-designer by bringing full-screen capability back as a default feature. Once again, design is limited to ” a page at a time”, totally blowing by the real potential of what a screen can do…and, please, no sob stories about spoofing…

Paul

July 26th, 2006
at 5:24am

You say: ” It’s a modal icon - meaning it should only show up when there’s something there to see! ”
Sorry but that’s not how the modal word should be understood. I reached this page looking for “modal” and “save”. The save dialogue in IE7 is modal (inside the browser window), meaning it is alwasys on top and you can’t use other tab while saving is in progress. And this is annoying.

Modal ICON? What a heck is a modal icon?

Software Annoyances

July 31st, 2006
at 1:40pm

Chris Prillo lists the top 10 annoyances of Internet Explorer 7 beta 3. [IMG ] Read it here.

YAMU: Top 10 IE7 Annoyances

August 27th, 2006
at 7:06am

[...] Top 10 IE7 Annoyances LOL, I just had to post about this, many of you are probably familiar with the name Chris Pirillo. Well, some weeks ago he published a list of top 10 IE7 annoyances. Quite a funny and revealing read, and he makes no secret of the fact he is a Maxthon fan too.Despite these snags, IE7 is certainly a better Web browser than IE6. I’m not even close to switching from Maxthon 1.x (though I don’t like the way Maxthon 2.x is shaping up). Check it out! [...]

I Hate Firefox and Thunderbird ~ Windows Fanatics

March 5th, 2007
at 10:46am

[...] Yes, I realize that an increasing amount of people are using Firefox for Web browsing and Thunderbird for viewing email (as well as managing other information). I, however, am not a flyer of the Firefox flag. I support Mozilla’s efforts, but I don’t think their software is amazing… yet. And before you begin to criticize my choices, understand that I’m just as annoyed with IE7. I have Firefox installed on my machine, but the only time I use it is when I’m troubleshooting a Web page. Recently, Thunderbird users have been seeing mis-Capitalized Words in Lockergnome newsletters. At first, I thought it was a random hiccup - but then more subscribers started to complain. The common thread between them was the Thunderbird client. Tonight will prove my sleuthing efforts successful or void, as I believe I’ve identified the problem and fixed it. If not, then it’s back to the drawing board - back to trying to fix a problem that I inadvertently created. But is it really my problem, or is it the email client’s issue in the first place? [...]

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