On May 20th, 2021, Microsoft announced the end of Internet Explorer. So this is a perfect time to reflect back on my role in the creation of the world

Internet Explorer: A Brief History

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2021-05-28 21:30:04

On May 20th, 2021, Microsoft announced the end of Internet Explorer. So this is a perfect time to reflect back on my role in the creation of the world’s most popular web browser (1998-2012).

I first “surfed” the World Wide Web in June, 1994, at Microsoft. One of my co-workers had an “Internet Tap” in his office: a standard RJ45 wall plate, connected directly to the Internet (rather than the internal corporate network). This was before “firewalls”, so there were many cautions to be followed! I ordered an internet tap for my office, and started exploring the WWW at a blazing 1 Mbps (14.4 K was the fastest dial-up modem speed at the time).

In early October, my manager John Ludwig asked me to assemble a team and build a web browser for “Chicago” (the code name for Windows 95). I quickly grabbed 6 people and we went to work. Thomas Reardon licensed the NCSA Mosaic code base from Spyglass in December, and in early January we mapped out an 8-week development plan for “O’Hare” (theinternational gateway to the world for Chicago: our web browser would be the gateway to the World Wide Web for Windows 95).

Netscape was the early winner in the “Browser Wars”. Netscape posted the first beta release of “Navigator” (coincidentally) a few days after I created the IE team, and Navigator quickly became the most popular web browser. We shipped three versions of IE in 22 months and I — along with many other team members — worked 80-100 hour weeks for 17 of those months.

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