In case you missed it, Microsoft has announced that it will officially end support for Internet Explorer for the Mac on December 31st 2005 and pull the download from their web site on January 31st 2006. It seems to be a cause for consternation on some Mac news web sites but given that the last update, version 5.2.3 for Mac OS X, was released two and a half years ago (6/16/2003) the announcement that they “will provide no further security or performance updates” shouldn’t exactly elicit a gasp of surprise. That there are still a few sites that only work with IE Mac says more about the state of their cross-browser support libraries than its superiority to more current browsers like Safari or Firefox.

IE Mac was a groundbreaking browser when it was released for the original Mac OS, providing speed and features not even available in the Windows version. It made the transition to Mac OS X but hasn’t kept pace with features like tabs and pop-up blocking or with rapidly developing web standards. Its demise may or may not have been precipitated by Apple’s own Safari but it may also be that they anticipated the decline of Explorer and produced Safari as a result. It was also probably not the best idea to depend on a key competitor to supply an important piece of your own product.

What does this mean to you? Not a whole lot actually. Your current Internet Explorer version won’t magically stop working January 1st if you still have a need for it. Better yet, try out Safari, Firefox, Camino, iCab, OmniWeb and Opera. All but iCab and OmniWeb are free and those two have demo versions and sport unique features that you might want. Try them out on your important web sites. If one won’t do everything then keep several.

So don’t sweat it, your web browsing needs will be amply served even without official support for IE Mac. But if you’re still feeling insecure about it, head over to Microsoft’s web site and download the standalone Internet Explorer installer now, burn it to a CD-R then mount it in one of those glass fronted “break in case of emergency” boxes right next to your Mac just in case.