Since I had joined ATS, I have noticed that there have been many members who have experienced browser related problems. Mostly with MS Internet Explorer.

I stumbled across an idea not long ago, about having a browser, or should I say shell program, that would replace IE or Firefox, but only for linking to ATS.

I had this idea while recalling a program called Gameos.

That too, was a shell program, that was intended for playing computer games. Upon opening, Windows Explorer, and many unneccesary processes were temporarily 'turned off', thereby increasing available resources for gameplay, in turn, making the computer more responsive.

What if we had such a shell program for members like me, with a slower internet connection (and several dozen processes running in the background? AT startup, it could stop unneccesary processes from running, turn of 'normal' browser, lessen the chance of spyware, viruses, etc. (IE has a lot of holes in it, and Firefox exploits are possibly going to increase as popularity grows) As few as possible processes running in the background, no other competition for bandwidth (i.e., Automatic Updates not suddenly trying to 'help you' by locating available updates, while you are on ATS)

Anyway, this was just an idea I was toying around with. I don't believe it would be very difficult to program such an application. I have dabbled in Visual Basic, and a little bit of C++ just for kicks, and from what I've seen a shell program would not be hard at all to create. Of course, there will probably be other problems, but I don't think anything is impossible.

Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

Mechanic 32.