Once again it is time to analyze browser usage in the US for the last month. July saw the appearance of Firefox 3.5, which has replicated the pattern seen with Internet Explorer 8, where it supplants the previous version slowly and linearly as people get around to upgrading.
Can MSIE 8 overtake MSIE 7 in August? How much will Firefox 3.5 usage grow in August and will it replace FF 3.0 as the dominant version in the Firefox family?
As with previous analyses, Internet Explorer 6 retains its iron grip on the corporate, custom Web application market. The question is not when, but if, this browser will actually fade away. It is unlikely that Internet Explorer 6 will disappear until Windows 2000 and Windows XP percentages are in serious decline.
This points to a larger concern that organizations will have to face within the next 18 months: What do they do when the Windows 2000 lifecycle terminates in July 2010 and as Windows XP sees fewer updates moving toward lifecycle retirement in 2014? [See the Microsoft LifeCycle information here]
Hiding from the inevitable just makes changes that much more dramatic and difficult.
It is not likely that the patterns in the StatCounter data will change until the summer vacation season is over in the US, and students bring their shiny new computers online at the start of the school year.
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