Internet Explorer for Mac

Internet Explorer for Mac (also referred to as Internet Explorer for Macintosh, Internet Explorer Macintosh Edition, Internet Explorer:mac or IE:mac) was a proprietary web browser developed by Microsoft for the Macintosh platform. Initial versions were developed from the same code as Internet Explorer for Windows. Later versions, particularly with the release of version 5 which included the Tasman layout engine.

As a result of the five-year agreement between Apple Inc. and Microsoft in 1997, it was the default browser on Mac OS and OS X from 1998 until 2003 when it was superseded by Safari with the release of Mac OS X 10.3 Panther.

On June 13, 2003, Microsoft announced that it was ceasing further development of Internet Explorer for Mac, with the final update being released on July 11, 2003. The browser was not included in the default installation of Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger" which was released April 29, 2005. Microsoft discontinued support for the browser on December 31, 2005 and removed the application from their Macintosh downloads site on January 31, 2006.

History
Versions of Internet Explorer for Mac were released starting with version 2 on April 23, 1996 to version 5, which received its last updated on June 16, 2003. Versions of IE for Mac typically lagged months, sometimes a year behind Windows version; despite this, some unique features were added, such as the Tasman layout engine.

Internet Explorer 2.0 for Macintosh

 * See also: Internet Explorer 2

The first version of IE for Mac OS was a beta version of Internet Explorer 2.0 for Macintosh, released on January 23, 1996 as a free download from Microsoft's website. This version was based on Spyglass Mosaic, a web browser licensed from Spyglass. It was available for both 68k and PowerPC-based Macs running System 7.0.1 or later, and included support for the embedding of multiple multimedia formats into web pages, such as AVI and QuickTime formatted video and AIFF and WAV formatted audio. On April 23, 1996, the final version was released. In August 1996, version 2.1 was released, which only focused on bug fixes and stability improvements, but also added new features such as support for NPAPI and QuickTime VR.

Internet Explorer 3.0 for Macintosh

 * See also: Internet Explorer 3

On November 5, 1996, Microsoft announced the release of a beta version of Internet Explorer 3.0 for Macintosh. This release added HTML 3.2 support, CSS, Java applets, and ActiveX controls. The final version was made available on January 8, 1997, and added SSL and NTLM security protocol support, as well as the PICS and RSACi rating systems that can be used to control access to websites based on content ratings.