When I started my blogging lide back in April, I posted a very brief history of Mozilla Firefox and its roadmap. Today, I saw an article from Microsoft by Sandi Hardmeier, talking about the history of its browser, Internet Explorer.

Well, I didn’t know actually Internet Explorer is celebrating its 10 years old birthday this year. Microsoft Internet Explorer was officially born in 1995, when its former browser Mosaic handed the licensed source code to Microsoft. I was also surprised when I get to know the development team of Netscape Navigator is on the same team who created Mosaic, which means Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator are from the same family. :p

Here is the chronological history of Internet Explorer :-

• August 24, 1995 – Internet Explorer 1 officially launched in Windows 95 Plus! Pack.
• November 1995 – Internet Explorer 2 final version launched.
  Supports both Windows and Mac, SSL Javascrip, etc.
• August 1996 – Internet Explorer 3 launched.
  Supports CSS, able to display gifs and jpg files and MIDI sound file. This version was the first to use the Blue E logo.
• 1997 – Internet Explorer 4 launched and included with Windows 98.
  Supports DHTML. Included some added features like Active Desktop.
• May 2000 – Internet Explorer 5 launched and was included with Windows 98SE.
  Supports XML, XSL, bi-directional text support (from left to right and vice versa) and improved CSS compatibility.
• October 2001 – Internet Explorer 6 launched and was included with Windows XP.
  Supports auto image resize and print preview. Moreover, IE6 in Windows XP SP2 has a pop-up blocker, finally. :p
• 2006 – Hopefully, we will see a better browser from Microsoft, Internet Explorer 7, after such a long wait.