Windows 7 May Allow Internet Explorer 8-ectomy
By: Doug Caverly
We all know that Windows controls (at least) 90 percent of the PC market, and that’s not likely to change anytime soon. Internet Explorer is steadily losing users, however, and if you’re one of the folks who have switched to Firefox or Chrome, it may interest you to know that there’s a possibility Internet Explorer 8 won’t be inseparable from Windows 7.
A recent test version of Windows 7 (build 7048) is similar to many others insofar as it gives users the opportunity to turn features on and off. Chris Holmes and Bryant Zadegan noticed that this build lists IE8 among the many other options, though, and they got a screenshot as proof.
Holmes and Zadegan also went through the removal process, and Zadegan observed afterwards, “For now, this only seems to wipe the actual executable running Internet Explorer 8 (iexplore.exe), but given that many of the most vocal proponents of choice were just looking for an option to functionally remove IE8, this might’ve been the only way to do it without killing the rest of Windows.”
Zadegan then continued, “In addition, this actually takes two reboots and a configuration step to complete, so there’s definitely something going on behind the scenes (likely a remapping of where IE-related functions can be found for other elements in Windows so that Windows doesn’t complain about IE’s nonexistence).”
It may be possible for Windows 7 to avoid the EU’s wrath and for the average Windows 7 user to save a fraction of his computer’s resources, then. We’ll just have to wait and see whether this feature makes it to market.