Microsoft/Google hijacking.

The Colonel got extremely tired of having Google Desktop launch Internet Explorer to read our favorite syndicated blog feeds when our default browser is other than IE. We went so far as to uninstall IE and still found that IE was mysteriously still resident, even though it did not show up in the list of programs to be uninstalled.

The directory for IE under "program files" was untouched by the uninstall operation and even individual attempts to rename or delete the executable for IE would result in the spontaneous reappareance in the subdirectory of a new IE executable. Attempting to just remove the program subdirector were prevented with an error message that the program was still in use (which it was not).

Rebooting in safe mode (!) and just deleting the whole folder for IE did the truck with, so far, no sign of having screwed up other functioning.

How else to deal with the attempt by Microsoft and/or Google to control one's computer and dictate browswer selection?

Is this what you get when you choose IE or download Google Desktop? It's like the last time we installed AOL, which then proceeded to aggressively take over our browser and make a whole lot of installation decisions that we did not like.