June 16 - 12:10pm EDT   Opera on Tuesday unveiled its Opera Unite service that breaks with tradition by allowing users to share files with other computer users via their web browsers and not a third-party server. Ease-of-use is being touted as an advantage of the new software, and Opera expects even devices with modern web browsers, such as smartphones, will also be able to access the files. As Opera Unite services are based on current open web standards, creating a full web service is said to be as easy as coding a web page. [full story]

June 12 - 8:45am EDT   Microsoft's decision to pull Internet Explorer from Windows 7 in Europe isn't enough to address EU antitrust complaints about the company's abuse of the market, the European Commission said Friday. The continent's officials now say that Microsoft's proposed solution would actually hurt competition as it would leave the five percent of those buying retail copies of Windows each year with few options. Instead of having an immediate choice, buyers would have to resort to obtaining a physical copy of a web browser or else some alternative. [full story]

June 2 - 11:20pm EDT   The Opera mobile browser has surpassed Apple's iPhone browser as the most popular mobile browser internationally, according to numbers collected by the analysis company StatCounter. The two browsers have battled for the lead position over the past six months, with Opera generally losing against mobile Safari from February through April. Sometime in May, however, a spike in Opera usage put the browser up to 24.6 percent while the iPhone fell slightly to 17.9 percent. [full story]

May 7 - 8:05am EDT   Mozilla and Opera on Thursday criticized Microsoft over settings in the Windows 7 release candidate that they claim are designed to be anti-competitive. The two web browser developers point out to FT that users who opt to upgrade to Windows 7 from Vista rather than install fresh are given an "express" option that automatically reverts the default browser to Internet Explorer even if Firefox, Opera or another browser was set as the default before. Although the "custom" choice lets users maintain this setting, Mozilla and Opera argue that Microsoft is hoping most users won't be aware of this or that it will be considered too much extra work. [full story]

March 25 - 3:00pm EDT   Nintendo's DSi should make non-game apps an important core of its DSi Shop mobile online store when the console is released on the 5th, the company revealed as part of its efforts at this week's Game Developers' Conference. Having spoken with CNET earlier, Nintendo said the handheld will get a free version of Opera's browser that is described as upgraded over an earlier version for the DS that depended on Nintendo's proprietary cartridges to work; the new version can be saved either directly to the DSi's internal 256MB of storage or to an SD card. [full story]

March 20 - 3:25pm EDT   The release of Internet Explorer 8 hasn't had any significant impact on Firefox or any other competing browser, data collected by StatsCounter shows. While the final release of IE8 increased its market share slightly on launch day to 1.39 percent, Firefox 3.0 grew more quickly and reached 25.38 percent. The most significant losses were for Internet Explorer 7: the outgoing browser lost 0.4 percent of the total share. [full story]

February 27 - 10:25am EST   ASUS on Friday launched the P835 as its new, range-topping touchscreen smartphone and one of its first more conspicuous challengers to the iPhone. The phone depends on a 3.5-inch, 800x480 touchscreen but also adds a BlackBerry-like trackball for one-handed navigation and quicker scrolling. ASUS bases the phone on Windows Mobile 6.1 but tries to get around interface limitations by implementing a new version of its in-house Glide interface which is believed easier to use and also more visually appealing. Opera Mobile also gives the P835 fuller HTML support than Microsoft's default Internet Explorer browser. [full story]

February 24 - 10:35am EST   The European Commission late Monday said it plans to require that Microsoft offer web browsers other than Internet Explorer in Windows. The EU body's spokesman Jonathan Todd says a final decision in the matter would mandate a choice of which browsers to download and install in addition to the existing ability to specify a default app. The feature would potentially involve a portal that lets users choose the browser early on. [full story]

February 20 - 4:20pm EST   Official photos of the Motorola ZN300 first spotted earlier this month have surfaced on Thursday, thanks to Russian site MobileReview. While official specs are still not confirmed, it is believed the multimedia-oriented slider, which could go by the name of MotoZine ZN300, sports a 240x320 display and a 3-megapixel camera. [full story]

February 9 - 4:15pm EST   The LiMo Foundation on Monday announced six new wireless providers have committed to release LiMo Platform based handsets in 2009. The Linux OS-based phones will become available from Verizon Wireless, NTT DoCoMo, Orange, SK Telecom, Telefonica and Vodafone sometime in 2009. The open-source Linux operating system in the devices will be based on the latest version of the LiMo Platform. [full story]

February 9 - 1:10pm EST   Mozilla is throwing its support behind a European Commission ruling on bundling Microsoft's Internet Explorer with Windows, according to the company's CEO. Microsoft received a Statement of Objection from the Commission last month, accusing it of violating European competition laws. The action was initially sparked by a complaint from Opera, which produces third-party web browsers. Mozilla itself develops the Firefox browser. [full story]

January 2 - 11:45am EST   Minority browsers grew in popularity again during the month of December, according to tracking figures from Net Applications. Marketshare for Mozilla's Firefox reached 21.34 percent, up from 20.78 percent in November; Apple's Safari jumped from 7.13 to 7.93 percent, and Google's new, Windows-only Chrome browser shifted from 0.83 to 1.04 percent. This marks the first time the software has been over the 1 percent mark. [full story]

December 18 - 4:55pm EST   Microsoft is being praised by industry professionals for already releasing a fix for what it itself calls a critical security flaw in its Internet Explorer 7 Internet browser. The patch addresses a flaw in the data-binding function of 5.01, 6, 7 and 8 Beta 2 versions of the popular web browser. It was at first believed only IE7 was affected, but research revealed all currently available versions of the browser have the issue. [full story]

December 16 - 3:45pm EST   A new and previously undiscovered vulnerability in Internet Explorer 7 has triggered warnings to at least temporarily avoid the browser until it can be fixed. The exploit, which takes advantage of the browser's data binding feature to create a memory hole, is unique to Microsoft's code and potentially dangerous due to its usability over the web. A maliciously formed website can use the exploit to steal private data or otherwise compromise the system; some benign websites have been turned hostile using the exploit and other vulnerabilities, the company says. [full story]

November 26 - 5:15pm EST   Apple is investigating two different graphics issues relating to MacBooks, posters in the company's support forums say. The first is limited to unibody MacBook Pros, but involves a hard lockup during various games, in which the screen goes black, audio loops and no cursor control is possible. The problem affects both Mac and Windows games, and appears to be unrelated to a specific title, since crashes have occurred in games like Call of Duty 4, World of Warcraft and Company of Heroes. [full story]