Internet Explorer shell

An Internet Explorer shell is computer software that uses the Trident rendering engine of Internet Explorer.


IE Shells
These applications supplement some of Internet Explorer's usual user interface components for browsing, adding features such as popup blocking and tabbed browsing. For example, MSN Explorer can be considered an Internet Explorer shell, in that it is essentially an expansion of IE with added MSN-related functionality. A more complete list of Trident-based browsers can be found under the list of web browsers.


AOL Explorer[1]

Avant Browser [2]

Enigma Browser

Foxie

GreenBrowser

iRider

Lunascape

MenuBox

Mozilla Firefox web browser when used in conjunction with the IE Tab add-on

Mysoft Maxthon[3] (former MyIE2[2])

MSN Explorer

Netscape Browser 8.x (used both Trident and Gecko) [4]

NeoPlanet

Stilesoft NetCaptor[2]

Sleipnir

Tencent Traveler

UltraBrowser

WebbIE

Yahoo! Browser (or partnership browsers eg. "AT&T Yahoo! Browser"; "Verizon Yahoo!
Browser"; "BT Yahoo! Browser" etc.)

Non-browser shells
Other applications that aren't primarily for web browsing, such as Intuit's Quicken and QuickBooks, AOL, Winamp, Steam, and RealPlayer, use the rendering engine to provide a limited-functionality "mini" browser within their own user interfaces.

On Windows, components of Internet Explorer are also used in Windows Explorer, the operating system shell that provides the default file system browsing and desktop services. For example, folder views in Windows Explorer on versions of Windows prior to Windows XP utilize IE's DHTML processing abilities; they are essentially little web pages. Active Desktop technology is another example.

The Trident engine was, until recently, also used to render HTML portions of email messages in Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express email clients (Outlook 2007 now uses Microsoft Word to render HTML e-mail). This integration, while convenient, is an often-exploited "back door," since the Internet Explorer components make available more functionality to the HTML code than some feel should be permitted in the context of email messages, and Outlook and Outlook Express have, historically, not done enough to prevent malicious code from taking advantage of that functionality. The latest updates for Outlook Express, which require Windows XP and are distributed with Service Pack 2, are intended to improve this situation. Outlook 2003 already includes many of the updates.

While all of these programs can customize Internet Explorer's user interface and extend the feature set, they cannot modify the rendering engine, and are therefore subject to many of the same benefits and vulnerabilities of IE, including security holes and issues with rendering.


Source : www.wikipedi.com