The open nature of the web makes it possible for different browsers to co-exist, possibly
providing different features, user interfaces, and operating system support. Over the years
different browsers have competed for the user’s choice. The competition between browsers
has led to several “browser wars”—periods of fierce competition between different web
browsers that are characterized by technological innovation and aggressive marketing,
typically leading to the eventual dominance of one browser and the fall of another. In
recent years we have witnessed such a shift (albeit somewhat protracted) from Microsoft’s
Internet Explorer to Google’s Chrome.
The reasons for this shift are most probably a mix of technical reasons and marketing
reasons. Our goal is to explore the technical aspects, and see whether they can explain the
growing popularity of Chrome. In particular, we wanted to assess the technical quality