Can someone please explain the difference between Internet Explorer, which is an integral part of my system, and Google which always appears when I go on line. Are they not both search engines? Why do I have to have both?
Internet Explorer is a web browser (and it's not an integral part of your system).
There are a number of browsers you can use: Firefox, Chrome, EI, Opera, Safari, to name but a few.
Google is a Search Engine. You don't have to use it. Alternatives are Yahoo!, Bing, and Ask, among others.
If Google appears whenever you go online, that's because you have it set as your home page. You can set any website to be your home page, or (as I do) have your browser open to a blank page.
Genes Reunited (which I use a lot) recently upgraded their system and it was impossible to use using IE................after hundreds of complaints they've reverted to the old database so IE must be quite popular.
Interesting answers thank you. So IE is a web browser and Google is a search engine. A web browser presents the information found by a search engine - seems like two tools to do one job.